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statmobile
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Joined: 16 Jul 2004
Posts: 286
Location: Chapel Hill, NC

PostPosted: Mon Aug 14, 2006 3:51 pm    Post subject: GNU/Linux Hardware Review Sites Reply with quote

Well, that's it. My server finally bit the dust. I can't complain too much, because I bought it used about 4 years ago. May it rest in peace.

Now I'm looking to buy a new MB and Processor, but what really concerns me is the MB. I'm afraid of the expenses I could incur here, such as having to buy a PCI-E video card, new memory and of course the processor. It appears to me that modern MBs don't give as many PCI slots, as a tradeoff of having more features integrated into the board. Having installed GNU/Linux on a fair share of machines, I know that integrated features does not imply GNU/Linux support.

Does anybody know of a good hardware review site that actually pays attention to their GNU/Linux readers? anandtech seems alright, tomshardware doesn't seem to care and linuxhardware.org just seems outdated.

Thanks, and I'll take any recommendations as well!
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chrismortimore
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Joined: 03 Dec 2005
Posts: 721
Location: Edinburgh, UK

PostPosted: Mon Aug 14, 2006 4:14 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

In my experience, very few motherboards these days struggle with Linux, as long as you stick to the big names. I've installed Linux with very few problems on MSI, Elite, ASRock, Asus and Dell motherboards in the past. The only one that gave me trouble was the Asus, because HD sound chips are still kinda unsupported, but it works fine in 2.6.17. Basically, all mobo manufactorers worth their salt list the north and south bridge model numbers, so search google, horror stories generally arise quite quickly if they are there.

You can also still get boards out there with 5+ PCI slots. When I was searching for a new mobo, I came across many MSI and Asus boards that offered 5 PCI slots and an AGP/PCI-E slot for a graphics card.

And for reference, Asus K8V-X works fine using gentoo-sources-2.6.17 , I'm typing on it just now ;) I'm also yet to come across an ASRock board that doesn't Just Work (tm)
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Desktop: AMD Athlon64 3800+ Venice Core, 2GB PC3200, 2x160GB 7200rpm Maxtor DiamondMax 10, 2x320GB WD 7200rpm Caviar RE, Nvidia 6600GT 256MB
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statmobile
Apprentice
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Joined: 16 Jul 2004
Posts: 286
Location: Chapel Hill, NC

PostPosted: Mon Aug 14, 2006 5:10 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Thanks for the input chrismortimore, it's very helpful. It seems like ASRock doesn't make many "modern" MBs, but I'm willing to take dated for stability. I had an old Asus A7V MB, and it was rock solid, so that's where I would probably go. I'm still trying to figure out my budget, so that I can figure out what kind of processor I should go for.
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chrismortimore
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Joined: 03 Dec 2005
Posts: 721
Location: Edinburgh, UK

PostPosted: Mon Aug 14, 2006 5:15 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Just to give you an idea of what you can get these days, I recently bought an AMD Athlon64 3800+ Venice Core for around £60, and my mobo was around £35, which I thought was a pretty good deal.

One thing I would recommend is give your PSU the once over, it turned out that my old one was about 100W underpowered. Get a good PSU first, and do your budget around that ;) My major money saver was also picking slightly older bits, so it'd work with my 2G worth of DDR400 I had lying around, rather than going for DDR2.
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Laptop: Intel Pentium M, 512MB PC2700, 60GB 5400rpm IBM TravelStar, Nvidia 5200Go 64MB
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