I do not suggest people use on-board SATA in Linux. I suggest a PCI SATA manufacture that gives you open source drivers that works for linux kernel 2.4.x and 2.6.x, so you can compile for your kernel version instead of waiting for pre-compiled drivers for your kernel version. Do not setup RAID in the controller's BIOS because Linux will still detect two or hard drives hard drives. I suggest setting up RAID using Linux instead of the BIOS. I suggest using a PATA hard drive to install Linux first and then copy from the PATA to the SATA when you know that the SATA driver works every time you boot into Linux. If you compiled the SATA driver as a module, you will have to put in the ramdisk file.

Turtle Beach Santa Cruz is a full duplex which means it can record and playback at the same time without any loss in sound quality and without crosstalk. Turtle Beach Santa Cruz also has hardware mixing for OSS, so you do not need artsd, esd, and alsa dmixer plugin to mix sounds. With the Turtle Beach Santa Cruz you do not have to use any cache when playing video files in mplayer unlike Soundblaster LIVE!. With the Turtle Beach Santa Cruz, it is very easy to adjust the volume to record and to use surround sound. With the Soundblaster LIVE!, in order to record sound you have to adjust settings which are not obvious. Also for surround sound it is the same problem with Soundblaster LIVE!. If were me I would go with Turtle Beach Santa Cruz. because it is easy to setup for recording, playback up to 6 channels, hardware mixing for OSS applications, very good sound quality, easy to adjust surround sound channels (center, subwoofer, and rears), and great performance when playing video files.

The Audiotrak Prodigy 7.1 does not have hardware mixing, but it does have great features for an audiophile. One feature is 192 KHz at 24-bit audio resolution for all eight (8) channels for playback that has very, very high quality audio. The second feature it has 96 KHz at 24-bit audio resolution for recording. Third it has an high quality headphone amplifier that can be enabled or disabled. Next it has digital in and digital out to connect to amplifiers and recording devices. I have not tested if it can record and playback at the same time, so I can not verify that it can do duplex. Its too bad that a/52 does not support 8 channel output and 192 KHz at 24-bit audio resolution for movies that were encoded with EX sound because this card will be great in home theater setups. Through OSS it supports up to 6 channels although that is maximum I have found when playing movies in mplayer. Again if a/52 supports 8 channels and 192 KHz at 24-bit audio resolution, Audiotrak Prodigy 7.1 will output 8 channels and 192 KHz at 24-bit audio resolution using OSS. This card has two CD inputs so you can use two CD-ROM/DVD-ROM drives to play music CD instead of sharing it. The Audiotrak Prodigy 7.1 surpasses the Audigy2 cards for sound quality.

Setup SATA in Linux not in PCI SATA bios.....ok...

What is PATA drive? (i am assuming regular ATA drive)

Why not raid 0?
I am just looking for faster not redundancy.

With Raid one I pay for two drives and effectively get 1?
But I have a backup if something bad happens to one.
What happens if something bad happens to both?

Couldn't I just do Raid 0 - and backup important files to a network drive?

I think electro sold me on the turtle beach Santa Cruz.

I am planning on going with FC3 64 for the distro.
I do not have high speed where I live. So I hesitate to get Debian 64 or Gentoo 64 because I can't apt-get or emerge any decent sized packages.( I wish Slackware had a 64)
I figured Fc3 would be pretty current which would get me through the couple of months until affordable/reliable broadband gets here.
I hope 64bit FC3 is on the dvd download.( I have a friend downloading it.)

Ok last but not least ---the case.

I have an old case that would work, but it is pretty blah. I could fix it up, but I am feeling very lazy and don't feel like cutting a window and painting the box with a million coats wet sanding and such.

Can anyone recommend a cheap and decent looking case that comes witha 400W power supply?
I really like the cooler master wave master in black, but it is $140 with no power supply.

Sorry for being a pain with all this. I just want to get it right.
This is my Xmas present. I asked everyone for computer store gift cards for xmas, and have been spending the gift cards and all my beer/food money on this. (ergo, I am sober and really hungry.)

I appreciate all the help.

Regards,
Blair

/crys for DeadPenguin's lack of beer

How soon are you looking to buy DP?

Mu Brother just built a system with:

AMD Athlon 64 3200+ Processor Socket 939
MSI K8N Neo2 Platinum nForce3 Ultra Athlon 64(FX) Skt939
Chaintech nVidia 5700 LE 256MB

I'm hoping that in the next week or so I will get the chance to thrown in my extra HDD and try a SuSE install on it. I f you can wait that long I should be able to give you a quick run down on how that MoBo works.

I was hoping to get some of it together next week on my week off.
Money is burning a hole in my pocket.
I prolly won't have all the pieces together until at the earliest next Sat. I have to wait for thursday for more beer/food money to put into this.

I would like to hear how that mobo does.

Good Luck with SUSE.

Regards,
Blair

There are no speed benifits with RAID 0 to put Linux on. The reason for this is the files are not big enough to make RAID 0 really stand out. RAID 1 will give you faster accessing for programs. RAID 1 mirrors the drives, so Linux has ways to access two files or more at once. The only time RAID 0 will benifit is when recording raw video, raw sound, and transfering over a 1 Gbit ethernet (network). I like to call RAID 0 a serial transaction which means that it can access one file at a time. RAID 1 is a parallel transaction that can access multiple files at once depending on how many drives.

For instant loading times, Western Digital's Raptor series hard drives are much faster than their 250 GB hard drives. This is not because of the RPM. It is because the lower accessing times.

A case that comes with a power supply will not have a very good power supply. The reason why the desire case does not come with a power supply is because gamers and overclockers will use power supplies that will be better than a case that comes with a power supply. Power supply brands like Zalman, Enermax, and Power & Cooling are great brands for the money. You can get Antec power supplies but get more wattage.

HenchmenResourc, why did your brother got a MSI K8N and Chaintech nVidia 5700 LE 256MB because these components will not be very good for games. My GeForceFX 5700 Ultra beats the Chaintech nVidia 5700 LE 256MB. Abit, ASUS, and Gigabyte will be better than the MSI board. I hope next time he does more homework.

Is there a CompUSA in your area? Shipping on a computer case can get expensive. If you get an Antec case the PS will be decent though few come with one as high as 400W.

Also sometimes RAID 1 or 0 is no faster (and sometimes even slower than) a single drive.

I was planning to alot of dv video stuff with this box,but haven't used linux for video or dvd authoring. I do it on my wifes xp box now.

How is Raid 0 better for gig networking?
I am in the process of setting up my house for a gigabit home LAN.
I have the Cat5e already run. I just got to get some new gig nics and wait for broadband.

I really like the wave master case, but I am not sure I can justify a $230 case and power supply price tag.

$300 - cpu and mobo
$150 - Ram
$300 - Video Card
$100- DL DVD
$50- Sound Card
$100 - SATA controller.
$300 - Sata drives
$150 - Case
$100 - Power supply.

$1550 - not bad, but more than I had hoped for and not taking into account rounded cables, new fans, blow hole, possibly a built in card reader, dvd, web cam.

CAN anyone recommend a sata controller card?
I have been looking, but I do not really know much about them.


I thank you guys again for the time spent helping me.

Regards,
Blair

Wish I had saw this forum earlier. Here is my "Frankenstein:"

Mobo: K8 Triton GA-K8NSNXP-939 w/nForce3 Ultra chipset.
Power Supply: Enermax Noisetaker 420W
Thermal Control: Enermax UC-A3FATR2
Case : SilverStone Temjin SST-TJ04
Processor: AMD 64 FX-53(939 PIN)
Hard Drive: Hitachi Deskstar 120 GB
Memory: Corsair Twin x1024-3200C2PT DDR
OS: Suse 9.1 Pro
Video Card: Asus V9570/TD/256mb
DVD Burner: Mad Dog Dominator 6-in-1
DVD ROM: Liteon 16X SOHD-167T
Monitor: HP Pavilion f70 flat panel
Keyboard: Kinesis Advantage/MPC USB
Sound Card: M-Audio Audiophile 192

Reason:
Personal desktop that doubles as a DAW.

Issues:
Kinesis keyboard will not work in Suse 9.2. Works fine during upgrade installation, but quits once OS is booted. Sticking with Suse 9.1 for now.

Fans still a little noisy. My guess is the fans that came with the SilverStone case need to be replaced with higher quality ones.

Audiophile 192 sound card. I failed to read the fine print. The 192 is the newest M-Audio card which ALSA has not released a driver for yet! RATS!!! I understand that the 2496 card is supported. The onboard audio works but haven't found a way to use the 8-Channel audio functions (driver issue?).

Help Me Somebody:
Forum search on LinuxQuestions.org and a posting resulted in no answer to keyboard dilemma yet (at least nothing comprehensible to a linux amatuer: can't say "newbie" as I have been with it since post GUI days - so I'm told).

Forum search and Web search resulted in no info as to when (if ever) a driver for the Audiophile 192 may be developed. Ditto on linux support for the ALC850 codec (not really too conerned with the onboard audio though).

Summary:
Other than the keyboard and audio issues... IT LIVES!

Check http://www.4front-tech.com/linux-x86.html for audio support.

The keyboard sounds like some wierd usb problem. Do you have UDEV properly setup?

That's why I stick with generic keyboard and mice.
I tried to check HCL for most of my purchases to avoid hardware compatability issues.

Still putting the box together. I just got my 3ware 8006 card in the mail today.

Still waiting on the Sound card(Creative Audigy 2 zs plat. pro.)
-2nd DVD nec nd3520.
-New Monitor (21" Crt NEC FE2111SB)

I have FC3 up and running without raid now.
Setting up onboard raid kinda stumped me, and most of the tuts went over my head.

Thinking on switching to Gentoo 2005.0 for AMD64.

Good luck with the keyboard issue ramowl.

Regards,
Blair

I do not know about you, but Creative Audigy 2 zs platium pro. is a waste of money. You are better off with the Turtle Beach Santa Cruz because it is cheaper, it sounds better, and there is no EAX or sound hardware accelleration support in Linux. In Linux the Audigy 2 card is no different than other sound cards.

Two hard drives in RAID 0 setup can output 30 to 60 megabytes per second. This is good for copying files on a 1 Gbit network although the NIC have to be on a 266 MB per second bus in order to take advantage of 1 Gbit network.

ramowl, IMHO, USB keyboards are pain in the ass. I suggest using PS/2 because it is a known fact that it is very, very reliable. The Audiotrak Prodigy 7.1 is good alternative of the M-Audio. I have the Audiotrak Prodigy 7.1 and its recording has no problems up to 192 KHz at 24-bit audio resolution in stereo. The Audiotrak Prodigy 7.1 can playback up to 8 channels with 192 KHz at 24-bit audio resolution, but Linux programs like mplayer does not have support for 8 channels. The sound quality of the Audiotrak Prodigy 7.1 matches that of the Lynx Studio Technology LynxTwo.

No ramowl, You just need to find a low dBa to high CFM ratio fans. They are not expensive. Any fan that has a 25 dBa or lower is consider as being noiseless. Use rubber like dynamat around the fan to reduce the vibration which causes noise from the computer case. Though do not use dynamat for the whole entire case because the computer chassis aids in dissipating heat.

Err, rarely do cases provide significant heat transfer over active cooling (fans or water cooling).

The reason not to use dynamat is twofold. One, it is quite expensive. Two, it smells like tar.

I lined my case with cork. You can pick it up by the foot in Home depot. The other is having temperature controlled fans. I have an Antect TruePower PWS, that includes special molex connectors for the fans that are speed controlled by heat sensors in the PWS. I would also suggest getting ball bearing fans over sleeveless. Sleeveless have higher rates of failure and tend to be noisier after just a few months of usage.

I have used USB keyboards for 3 years.

I was just going with Creative because I have used their cards in the past with no problems. And, they worked in HCL.

I would love to use the santa cruz turtle beach, because it's $110 dollars cheaper. Santa cruz only 5.1. Is the Catalina any good?


I would like to eventually have 7.1 sound. I was trying to find a place that sold the audiotrak prodigy, and could not find one. I saw a audiotrak maya 7.1.


Do the majority of linux programs not support 7.1?

I would like 7.1 for movies and games.

This computer is the only one I have capable of gig speed.

Thanks,
Blair

Electro,

quote: "IMHO, USB keyboards are pain in the ass. I suggest using PS/2 because it is a known fact that it is very, very reliable."

Yeah, that's probably true for ALL USB devices (PS/2 or serial) Yet, it bugs me that the Kinesis keyboard worked without a hitch in Suse 9.1 (and Mandrake 10.0 too). It's an expensive keyboard with a very ergonomic design that's perfect for me (I type alot). Sucks to have to shelve it due to inconsistencies from one kernel to the next (Kinesis does make a PS/2 model but it is not advertised as configurable for non-Windows PC users).

quote: "The Audiotrak Prodigy 7.1 is good alternative of the M-Audio."

On your mention of this, I took a look at the Audiotrak site. I did not see any information confirming whether or not this device will function on a 64-bit architecture, or if it can take advantage of a 64-bit architecture. The M-Audio 192 & 2496 are supported by the Audio-64bit project. Again, we're talking about shelving one device for another - give me a good line to feed my wife for spending another $100 - $200 so you won't be reading my obituary in another post.

Thanks for the advice on the case fans

----------------------------------------
alose,

quote: "...having temperature controlled fans."

The Enermax power supply I use (Noisetaker) has manual and automatic fan speed control. RPM of 8cm & 9cm fans are automatically controlled by thermostat plus rheostat control over 8cm & 9cm exhaust fans. I also have the Enermax UC-A3FATR2 Thermal Control unit which allows me to control fan speeds, monitor rpms, and monitor temperature (back lit LCD screen) in my floppy drive bay.

I should add as a semi-pro songwriter/guitarist I am blessed/cursed with "acute" hearing. Maybe I am just listening too closely

Search Froogle.

Its going to be a long time for the a/52 library to support 8 channel output. For the Catalina, its a question if ALSA supports it. I do not think it is supported at this time.

You do not understand how programming works. The card will work in just about any system that accepts 32-bit PCI or PCI-X (PCI Extended) that is clocked at 33 MHz. Just the programming have to be changed to 64-bit. I would not worry about 64-bit drivers because it does not effect recordings or playback. When you compile ALSA, specify -m64 for compiler flags. Though it may have problems afterwards. AMD processors work very well in past, present, and future instruction architecture unlike Intel processors, so compiling ALSA using 32-bit machine code instead of 64-bit machine code will not effect anything. I suggest compiling programs in 64-bit to get an added performance boost.

You could just get a USB to PS/2 converter. That is what my mouse has.