Arch Linux

ataraxia

Member

From: Pittsburgh

Registered: 2007-05-06

Posts: 1,553

nettops (Atom-based desktops)

While it's obvious to anybody who reads this forum regularly that Arch users love netbooks, I've yet to see much love for their stationary cousins. I'm talking about things like the Eee Box, or this MSI Wind box with the dual-core Atom 330.

It looks to me that these have the potential to actually replace a full desktop for many uses. I'm considering building one to use in just that way, and I'm curious if people here have any experience doing that.

Some specific questions:

- What can't I do reasonably on an Atom 330? Compiling and number-crunching are right out, of course, but I have no need to do those things. Will mpd's use of libsamplerate overload the machine? How about decoding moderate-quality video with mplayer? (Specifically, I like to watch home-made anime fansubs.)

- Most of these boxes have Intel GMA 950 GPUs. Not a powerhouse, by any means. I don't have any desire to run 3D games or use Compiz, but I must have good XV support for scaling video to reasonable size, like 1680x1050. I've heard there are NVIDIA Ion-based boxes coming out soon that will surely handle all my graphics needs (with VDPAU to help the CPU out, even), but I expect those boxes will miss my price point by more than $100, so I'm not going to wait.

- Do these machines really run as cool, quiet, and low-power as they're made out to do? I've heard reports of loud fans when running full-blast, but at least some of those people had the machines upside-down. (Intake on top, exhaust on bottom = thermodynamic FAIL)

- How about those "green" hard drives? They looked really attractive at first, but it appears that most of the power/heat/noise savings appear to come from overly aggressive power management - the same that leads to extremely large load/unload cycle counts and kills many laptop drives. What is WD thinking here? That they want to sell us a lot of replacement drives? (I'd consider SSDs, but I need both big and cheap, and those are neither.)

apaige

Member

Registered: 2008-06-15

Posts: 96

Re: nettops (Atom-based desktops)

http://techreport.com/articles.x/16893
Dual-core Atom, GeForce 9400M with VDPAU goodness. MSRP: $189.

ataraxia

Member

From: Pittsburgh

Registered: 2007-05-06

Posts: 1,553

Re: nettops (Atom-based desktops)

http://techreport.com/articles.x/16893
Dual-core Atom, GeForce 9400M with VDPAU goodness. MSRP: $189.

Looks very much like the DIY version of the AspireRevo, which it mentions. Interesting, and of great promise, but a little more than I would pay for a "cheap" desktop board/cpu, since at that price I could build a decent "standard" desktop.

zodmaner

Member

Registered: 2007-07-11

Posts: 653

Re: nettops (Atom-based desktops)

I'd buy one as soon as it can play 1080p video and have TV output (cheap HTPC FTW! ).