Bullding a Linux Box

arnuld · 2008-11-26 11:21:48

Hello There,

I am building a Linux Box. After reading ESR's ULB article: http://www.catb.org/~esr/writings/ultim … b2001.html , I have
dropped the idea of quad-core processor.

Rather than what most people do, instead of Intel I am going after 64 bit AMD Athlon dual or Phenom triple core system, both are much cheaper than quad-core. I have used AMD Athlon 64 on ASUS's K8V-MX motherboard for 2 years and it was excellent (except for using gnash).

GOAL: i) To use Arch Linux as machine's native OS
ii) play movies or songs
iii) NO Video Games
iv) GNU Hurd as 2nd OS
v) using Flash-Drives from Kingston, Transient or i-ball
vi) connecting my friend's digital cameras for getting/sending
pictures

thats it.

Here is what my idea is like:

1) AMD Athlon X2 (or Phenom X3)
2) ASUS Motherboard
3) 22 inches LG LCD W2242S or W2252TE
http://www.in.lge.com/Product/Products- … subcat=LCD

4) 2 360 GB SATA Hard-Drives (one for back-up)
5) 1 SONY DVD-RW, 1 DVD-ROM (DVD-ROM is here for I will do all
reading work in it. It will be used like hell.
6) 2 x 2GB RAM (1000 MHz)
7) Numeric UPS
8) Logitech Mouse + keyboard (my favorite)
9) 2 extra pair of fans for extra cooling

What you people suggest. I am in Hyderbad, India, so will not have much choices in motherboard except of ASUS, Gigabyte or MSI. As per ESR's ULB FSB is more important which actually belongs to motherboard itself, so I will see which model of ASUS is good on that.

- what about video card: ATI Radeom or Nvidia . Do I need them ?
- What about ASUS's on-baord audio/video support in Linux ?
- you have better recommendation for flash-drive ?
- Anything else ?

Thanks in Advance

MindTooth · 2008-11-26 13:03:20

That guide is written in 2001. So bare in mind that some of the suggestions is old.

IMHO, I would suggest ATI. Onboard video is just poor. Unless you purchase one with Geforce 9400 chipset.

Birger

amranu · 2008-11-26 13:50:35

Quad core is plenty cheap these days, a q6600 is a 2.4ghz quad core you can get really, really good deals on, so consider looking into that if you want.

elmer_42 · 2008-11-26 16:56:11

You may want to consider investing in an Intel i7 and compatible board.

iBertus · 2008-11-26 22:41:22

The Q6600 or Xeon X3220 (same chip, different name) are great quad-cores for cheap. You could easily overclock either with the proper motherboard to 3.0Ghz+ with the latest stepping and good air cooling. I'm not sure the Core i7 is really that much better than the current generation for most users. Plus, it's gonna cost you more to go with the i7 currently.

Zariel · 2008-11-26 23:27:21

you might as well get 500gb hard drives also.

500gb £45, 11.1gb per £
320gb £40, 7.5gb per £
250bg £35 7.1gb per £

shazeal · 2008-11-27 00:25:52

If your not gaming or encoding video there is no real difference between intel/amd, and a 3 core amd will have very nice compile times compared with a dual core intel.
For video, as suggested a cheap ATI card, like a 4350 would be far better than any onboard/shared memory junk.
Would definately go for 500gb drives over 320s as the price difference is so small and set them up with software raid 1.

arnuld · 2008-11-27 10:31:41

Okay, I will go with 500 GB SATA HD. But I am not going to Quad core, its very expansive here in India. I am going after AMD Athlon X2 Dual-Core 5400+ , 2.8 GHz.

what about video audio and video cards ?

doorknob60 · 2008-11-27 18:40:14

The audio built in to pretty much any motherboard should work fine. For graphics cards, I'd personally go with Nvidia but you could go with ATI too I guess. If you're not playing any games you don't need anything too good though, maybe like an 8400GS (I got one for cheap, it works well, even for some games). But depending on your motherboard, the integrated one might do fine for you considering you don't plan on playing any games.

elmer_42 · 2008-11-27 21:40:29

Integrated audio is much better than it was previously, but if you want an audio card there are a few things to consider. The first thing to consider is your use. If you are going to be gaming you will want a different card than if you want a good card for music. It should be noted, however, that a gaming audio card will make music sound better than integrated sound and a good card for music will make games sound better than integrated audio. There are a lot of aspects to consider, and if you want more specific advice I would recommend asking at the Head-Fi computer audio forum located here.

Video cards also depend on usage. For heavy gaming you will want a different card than for regular desktop use. If you don't want to use Compiz or other desktop effects, integrated graphics will do just fine. However, if you want to use Compiz or want to do some light gaming, you'll want to step up a little. I have an nVidia 7600GT that works just fine for Compiz and even light gaming, but you can't buy that card any more. You could get an 8600GT, though, and for only $70. If you want more power, you can go for an ATi HD4850, priced at around $150. If you need even more power than that you can climb up through some other GPUs. Tom's Hardware has a pretty good monthly guide of the best graphics cards for the money, and November's is located here.

iphitus · 2008-11-28 00:03:26

elmer_42 wrote:

You may want to consider investing in an Intel i7 and compatible board.

Except they still cost a fortune. The processors are expensive, the motherboards are expensive, and it needs DDR3 ram, which guess what, is still very expensive.

If it has onboard video, it should be more than adequate for your needs. Save the money and don't get one. Remember the PCIEX slot will always be there so you can upgrade in the future if necessary.

As for whether or not to get a sound card, unless you really care about sound quality, and you have good speakers to match, the integrated will be perfectly fine. Again, I'd say save the money.

For processor, you're not missing out if you don't get the quad core - your usage doesnt really indicate that you'd benefit from it anyway.

arnuld · 2008-11-28 05:09:16

Okay guys, I got your point I think. I run no Desktop, only wmii. I don't play games (actually, games like "World at War" don't work on Linux and Linux will be the native OS on my machine, I am not going to install Windows just because I love to play games. I Love Linux more than games . I was thinking of video card, only if there are 3d games available on Linux and an audio card for that to make a good pair , there is not other reason for buying them anyway. I still need some advice on which brand is god idea to buy:

DVD-RW: LG, SONY, SAMSUNG, ASUS
Monitor: LG or SAMSUNG (I prefer LG because I don't like the way SAMSUNG designs monitors)
RAM: SIMMTRONIX, Kingston, Transcend
SATA HDD: Seagate, HITACHI, Samsung
Cabinet: Frontech, i-ball, Intex (only these are available)

shazeal · 2008-11-28 05:43:40

The only reason you want a PCI sound card is that onboard chews up your cpu time, so for games you really need hardware sound. Or for audio editing etc.
The only reason you dont want onboard video is if you dont want it to use your system ram, or want to run 2 monitors etc. I would still go with even a very cheap ATI/NVIDIA card just so it would not use my system ram.

For brand of video card, they are all the same really, you just get more in the box, and slightly better coolers on the more expensive brands, easiest way is just to buy the same brand as your motherboard, ASUS/Gigabyte both make good video cards.

DVD-RW: LG, SONY, SAMSUNG, ASUS
Monitor: LG or SAMSUNG (I prefer LG because I don't like the way SAMSUNG designs monitors)
RAM: SIMMTRONIX, Kingston, Transcend
SATA HDD: Seagate, HITACHI, Samsung
Cabinet: Frontech, i-ball, Intex (only these are available)

DVD-RW: I have seen so many dead Sony drives its not funny, never seen an Asus die. Others I cant comment.
Monitor: Samsung monitors tend to be better quality lower dead pixel rate, LG arent bad, I just prefer samsung for their quality.
Ram: My real choice would be Adata but you didnt list that, so Kingston
SATA HDD: Seagate HDDs have a ~20% failure rate with 3 years, Samsung have the lowest around ~10%, this is according to stats from the local IT distribution company I deal with, they stopped selling Seagate and only deal with WD and Samsung now.

Last edited by shazeal (2008-11-28 05:51:43)

arnuld · 2008-11-28 11:42:16

shazeal wrote:

The only reason you want a PCI sound card is that onboard chews up your cpu time, so for games you really need hardware sound. Or for audio editing etc.

No, I have finally decided a big NO to games. Also, I am not going to do any audio editing except that I will convert some DVD to Theora or x264 format using ffmpeg etc. Nothing else in audio except this. If an extra card helps keeps the system in balance only then I will buy one.

shazeal wrote:

The only reason you dont want onboard video is if you dont want it to use your system ram, or want to run 2 monitors etc. I would still go with even a very cheap ATI/NVIDIA card just so it would not use my system ram.

I am going to put 2 x (2 GB of DDR-2-800 MHz) RAM. So no question of graphics eating it. I thought buying an extra card will not put extra load on the motherboard and will help keeping it okay.

shazeal wrote:

DVD-RW: I have seen so many dead Sony drives its not funny, never seen an Asus die. Others I cant comment.

Nearly everyone is happy about ASUS

shazeal wrote:

SATA HDD: Seagate HDDs have a ~20% failure rate with 3 years, Samsung have the lowest around ~10%, this is according to stats from the local IT distribution company I deal with, they stopped selling Seagate and only deal with WD and Samsung now.

Okay, I will go with HITACHI or Samsung.

Last edited by arnuld (2008-11-28 11:53:01)

iphitus · 2008-11-28 13:24:57

Yeah, no need for a graphics or sound card. You just don't need either for what you're planning to do. Integrated graphics is more than adequate - my laptop has 4 year old integrated intel graphics, but it's still an extremely useful device.

If you ever do decide you need one, then you can buy it later - that's the great thing about building your own computer.

Arch Linux

#1 2008-11-26 11:21:48

Bullding a Linux Box

#2 2008-11-26 13:03:20

Re: Bullding a Linux Box

#3 2008-11-26 13:50:35

Re: Bullding a Linux Box

#4 2008-11-26 16:56:11

Re: Bullding a Linux Box

#5 2008-11-26 22:41:22

Re: Bullding a Linux Box

#6 2008-11-26 23:27:21

Re: Bullding a Linux Box

#7 2008-11-27 00:25:52

Re: Bullding a Linux Box

#8 2008-11-27 10:31:41

Re: Bullding a Linux Box

#9 2008-11-27 18:40:14

Re: Bullding a Linux Box

#10 2008-11-27 21:40:29

Re: Bullding a Linux Box

#11 2008-11-28 00:03:26

Re: Bullding a Linux Box

#12 2008-11-28 05:09:16

Re: Bullding a Linux Box

#13 2008-11-28 05:43:40

Re: Bullding a Linux Box

#14 2008-11-28 11:42:16

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#15 2008-11-28 13:24:57

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