Building a PC!
 

Hey guys!

Most of you probably don't remember me as I haven't been around here much for a few years, even a bunch of my friends (like lady51, Bruce Hill etc) may be gone.

Anyhow I am building a new desktop PC and I'm a little concerned about what parts to use as I have had computers in the past that didnt work well with Linux.

This is what I'm thinking:
Asrock 990FX Extreme4 motherboard (http://www.asrock.com/mb/AMD/990FX%2...Specifications)
EVGA Nvidia GeForce GTX 650 graphics card

I'm wondering if anyone has any idea how well these components will go with Linux? I have googled and searched but not a lot of results. The Mobo and graphics tend to be the components with more Linux compatibily issues so I really don't want to buy something and find compatibily issues with it.

I was planning to get an Nvidia card because most people seem to say that they work better with Linux. Is this correct?

If anyone can give me any advice at all I'd appreciate it! :D

Hi:

I personally like Radeon works fantastic on my laptop!
I only know that an MSI Motherboard works well. Don't know what other chipset boards are out on the market-

Before making the purchase you could read a little on AMD, Nvidia and what DDR3 is now.
http://www.nvidia.com/object/geforce_family.html
AMD For Desktops
http://www.amd.com/us/products/deskt...-graphics.aspx
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16820231277

This thread might help you to pick up on a few good pointers.

http://www.linuxquestions.org/questi...on-4175417165/

Also; you should be careful with the internal hardware components inside of the tower or laptop or the static charge could render a device un-operational.

http://whatis.techtarget.com/definit...-discharge-ESD

Happy Building! And Good Luck :D

Building a PC!
 

When I build a Linux based PC I use Nvidia products with Gigabyte motherboards.

then I use the RHEL v X. Some may say it is way to easy but it works like a charm

If using CentOS v X. use the drivers from RPMforge.com for Nvidia

Chris

Looks ok, except for the Broadcom LAN card and the Marvell SATA controller (but it also has the AMD southbridge SATA controller, so just plug everything into that one).

For the graphics card I would upgrade to the GeForce GTX 650 Ti. It's only a bit more expensive and is plenty more powerful.

Thanks for the very helpful posts so far guys! :D

H_TeXMeX_H:
Thanks for looking it over! What are the issues with the Broadcom card and the Marvell controller?

Well for the graphics card I'm on a fairly tight budget but I'll think about it. From my research the 650 cards are about $100 and the 650 Ti are near $150. I looked at the comments of some people who bought the GTX 650 and they say it runs their games great so I think it should be good enough for my brother who edits videos. Plus I found a super deal on a GTX 650! :)

My biggest concern about the graphics card is Linux compatibily. Do you know how well the 650 or 650 Ti work on Linux? :)

Mainboards with the AMD990FX usually are only needed if you plan to heavily overclock the machine and use multiple videocards.
If you don't plan in that direction go for a cheaper model with the AMD970 chipset.
Regarding brands, I always prefer ASUS and Gigabyte, from my experience the most reliable hardware.

Regarding AMD vs. Nvidia: AMD's Linux support currently is a mess, with both FOSS and proprietary drivers. if I had to buy a new videocard now it would definitively be a Nvidia card and an Intel CPU if I had to replace the motherboard.

I agree with TobiSGD that you should look around a bit for more mobos before settling on one. Also note that most things with the work "extreme" on them are referring mostly to the price.

Why not try:
http://www.asrock.com/mb/AMD/970%20E...Specifications

It doesn't have the marvell SATA, and it has a realtek ethernet card, which has better drivers than the broadcom one.

If you arent gaming, and are not 100% sure that a video card will be used with whatever video editing software is going to be used, _dont_ get a GTX650/GTX650Ti. The extra cost will be pointless if the card isnt going to be used, and you'd be better off spending the 'extra' money you'll need for a GTX650/GTX650Ti on somethign else (like faster RAM, faster/more cores CPU, an SSD, etc..). A GT620/630/640 will output less heat, use less power and and be cheaper as well.

If are gaming (and possibly with video edting depending on software etc.) I'd get faster card than the GTX 650......nVidia 'entry' level gamers cards are IMO pretty crap.

Here are a few reviews on the GTX 650:
http://www.tweaktown.com/reviews/500...iew/index.html
Review: Nvidia's GeForce GTX 650 Ti graphics card
http://techreport.com/review/23690/r...-graphics-card
Nvidia Drivers and Linux/Compatability
http://www.nvidia.com/object/linux-d...51-driver.html
http://ubuntuxtreme.com/news/nvidia-...eviews-models/
http://www.compatdb.org/forums/topic...s-card-review/
And last; Consumer Reports. They are good at evaluating products and certain merchandise that we the consumer pay good money for and provide a good, fair, or otherwise result with explanations.
http://www.consumerreports.org/cro/computers.htm

Great point! The board you suggest would be fine and I'd save $45 that I could put towards maybe an SSD or something. My original idea was to not go cheap on the mobo or CPU since they are not easy to upgrade. I already bought an AMD FX 1850 CPU, partly because I got a free $80 liquid cooling kit with it.

If am going to go with a different board, should I be looking at a Gigabyte or Asus one? I noticed 2 of you have mentioned Gigabyte boards. I was going to go with Asrock because I heard somewhere that their boards were better with Linux. I'm looking for the board that works best with Linux, even though I could spend time sorting out drivers and stuff I'd rather just get a good Linux board.

I was looking at the comments for a Gigabyte board on Newegg that has the same LAN as the Asrock board you mentioned and this was their comment: "The included Realtek 8111E LAN chip does not work in most Linux distros, even very recent ones." However some other people had it run fine.

Here is a 990X board from Gigabyte: http://www.newegg.ca/Product/Product...scrollFullInfo
It still has everything I need. Most of the comments regarding Linux are positive. Some people had installation issues as the board doesnt seem to OS loaded flash drives done with unetbootin. And one person complaining about the NIC when rebooting after using Win7. But what do you think?

I think my brother has decided on Geforce GTX 650. We just kinda needed to know if there were compatibility issues between it and Linux. The 650 TI looks great but I think its a bit overkill for us. I certainly don't want anything less then a 630, or maybe even a 640. This is a family desktop ny brother & I are building and he is a photographer and does video editing. So a budget gamer card is what we need and I think the 650 fits the bill! And we found a great sale on one. :D

I have that exact board (The 990XA-UD3) and I'm pretty happy with it.
The only things I feel are lacking are it has two USB 3.0 ports (I'd have preferred more) and no ESATA. Oh, and only one PS/2 socket, though there are enough USB 2.0 not to matter.
I found that the SATA ports are oddly positions too and it's difficult to run the 5 cables I currently have to my drive bays. That's partly due to choosing a very cheap, tacky and small case though.
I did experience problems installing Debian, but nothing that took much to solve. I ended up putting some firmware for the network card on a USB drive at one stage, whilst installing Wheezy, because the installer complained but I an not entirely sure it was needed.
I couldn't install Sid due to a conflict between the kernel on the install iso (from USB) and the modules loaded for the SATA chip. That's to be expected when trying to install an unstable branch though -- I've a feeling Sid may not have installed on anything at that point from that image.
My NVIDIA GT 640 required the usual driver changes to non-free and some changes using nvidia-settings. I'm used to it though as I run two displays and I found that only running a card that's about couple of years old through one display will tend to work without some messing around. The GTX's are the same generation and I'd expect them to be supported the same, despite my card's relative puniness. My experience is that, though you might need to get them from NVIDIA themselves, the NVIDIA Linux drivers are good and current.

That's a good sign: if there were a lot of problems, you'd have found plenty of calls for help.

The brand of mobo is more of a preference I think. I personally would buy ASUS or ASRock. I don't really like Gigabyte because of some driver issues I had, but you can avoid it by choosing the right board.

As for the Realtek LAN, there are drivers on their site:
http://www.realtek.com.tw/DOWNLOADS/...&GETDOWN=FALSE

I can't say for sure because I don't have that exact model.

If I recall correctly it was firmware for the network chipset that the installer was asking for, but I think it turned out it wasn't needed.

Yeah, I'm a bit partial to ASRock myself. But the Gigabyte board I mentioned is about $20 cheaper the the ASRock board you mentioned plus it has more USB ports and inboard SATA connectors. So it's a better deal, and probably worth not getting ASRock. I should look into Asus tomorrow.


273: Okay, the onboard LAN should be okay then. So would you recommend this board overall for Linux? There are no other issues you know of besides your LAN firmware thing?