I am a new digital and SSDC user myself, and I simply took my old 3 year old Dual-Core Lenovo PC with 4 GB of memory and run it totally fine in Windows 7 x64. I dont see the CPU hit more then 10% when running SSDC with 6 cars. I also tried PC Lapcounter before SSDC and it never hit more then 10-15% either.
I think it is safe to say that you do not need lots of CPU, memory or hard disk performance today to run SSDC and it will be unlikely that it will in the future either. The protocol of the Scalextric tracks only work in 19200 bps, meaning that the main loop that handles the communication and the driving has very little work to do all together and performance can not be a real issue due to this fact.
I can however see a future where Lap Counting software developers push the limit a bit more and start to create real-time statistics for racers for throttle, speed, breaking, ..., and also better race reports (on my own wish list for SSDC), and then it might happen that more CPU, memory and hard disk performance might be needed. The reporting would probably take place after race finish tho, so I do not see that as an issue while driving either if the PC has less performance.
With the software today, I would say that any "common" laptop around that pricerange you mentioned will do absolutly fine and you could probably run 10 tracks on one of them with SSDC at the same time if it was necessary.
BTW Cat, I am surprised that the Atom doesn´t handle SSDC with 6 cars for you. I would look into the graphic drivers on your installation. I am curious myself now, so when I find the time I´ll hook up my own Atom netbook and give it a try. I´m running Ubuntu on it right now tho, so I will need to reinstall it and try it.
I think it is safe to say that you do not need lots of CPU, memory or hard disk performance today to run SSDC and it will be unlikely that it will in the future either. The protocol of the Scalextric tracks only work in 19200 bps, meaning that the main loop that handles the communication and the driving has very little work to do all together and performance can not be a real issue due to this fact.
I can however see a future where Lap Counting software developers push the limit a bit more and start to create real-time statistics for racers for throttle, speed, breaking, ..., and also better race reports (on my own wish list for SSDC), and then it might happen that more CPU, memory and hard disk performance might be needed. The reporting would probably take place after race finish tho, so I do not see that as an issue while driving either if the PC has less performance.
With the software today, I would say that any "common" laptop around that pricerange you mentioned will do absolutly fine and you could probably run 10 tracks on one of them with SSDC at the same time if it was necessary.
BTW Cat, I am surprised that the Atom doesn´t handle SSDC with 6 cars for you. I would look into the graphic drivers on your installation. I am curious myself now, so when I find the time I´ll hook up my own Atom netbook and give it a try. I´m running Ubuntu on it right now tho, so I will need to reinstall it and try it.
