Time for a new motherboard
 

OK, folks. The usual thread. :)

I'm looking for a new mobo for my office desktop. Just asking for model numbers being happily used by other Slackers. I don't need detailed specs. Just list your board if you are happily running Slackware and I'll do the leg work.

I am not looking for bleeding edge or flaky drivers. Just something newer and faster. Anything I buy will be a noticeable performance boost. That said, I want quiet more than muscle.

Current system is an AMD 5050e Brisbane with 8 GB RAM. On-board video. Slackware 14.2 64-bit. Been a decent system for 10 years, but I run VirtualBox VMs on this thing. Kind of sluggish. :)

I prefer on-board video. Intel only. No patience for Nvidia or AMD video. I'll consider a separate card but only Intel and fanless.

Thanks for sharing. :)

Edit: I forgot some specs: at least one PS/2 port for my keyboard and DVI-D for my monitor. I have a DVI-D to HDMI converter, so a DVI-D port is not critical. :)

Edit: Also need 6 SATA ports. I use the office desktop for experimenting and use drive bays. :)

Edit: While I am firm about avoidng Nvidia and AMD video, I am not particular about the CPU. I think quad core will fit my needs and then some. I think modern CPUs are power efficient at idle (run cool and pull low watts), which my office desktop pretty much does except when I run VMs or compile.

Based on limited personal experience and a lot of posts on the forum, newer Intel video (if memory serves correctly, Skylake and newer) tends to be quite problematic. You have to try and get the right combo of kernel and video driver to make things work properly, and if you don't manage that, you may end up with a frustrating experience.

That being said, I have a Gigabyte B150M-D3H-CF motherboard running a Skylake-based Intel Pentium G4500 (this is a temporary system until I build my AMD Ryzen system). I had serious video issues with the onboard video, the biggest being every time my monitors would go in standby, X would somehow forget that I had two monitors attached and when I would wake up the system, all open windows would show up on one screen and there'd be a crash/dump listed in my logs/dmesg. I tried troubleshooting and using a few different kernels and video drivers and eventually decided it wasn't worth the hassle and I put in my old ATI HD3870 (before ATI was purchased by AMD). That works flawlessly.

I have no fan/voltage sensors working using kernel 4.9.26 and lm_sensors-3.4.0, but my temperature sensors do work (although, I don't believe they worked under the 4.4 kernel from 14.2, but I don't remember for sure).

Realistically, if you are against binary drivers from Nvidia, your best bet is a few generations' old AMD video card. It should be well-supported by the radeon or amdgpu driver and will likely give you much better performance than an any onboard intel video could with much less hassle. You really only run into support issues with their newer cards, since it takes time for the support to trickle down to the kernels and mesa versions install in OSes.

And if you knock out the requirement of the likely problematic onboard Intel video, the AMD Ryzen platform may become more attractive with their impressive performance numbers. Just something to think about, but feel free to stick with Intel only :)

last year at work I had to request a quote for my own desktop and, looking around just a little, I opted for an Asus Z170-A.
it's working pretty fine since they shipped it here (I run current) attached to a Asus PB287Q.
about the sensors I too have just the cpu temperature detected with kernel 4.12.x and lm_sensors-3.4.0.

EDIT: I can't hear pretty much anything (the case is a Cooler Master Silencio 352 and the power supply a Cooler Master B700)

I'm happy with Supermicro X11SAE-M and Xeon E3-1275v5. My aim (just for fun) was a computer without moving parts, so SSD and no fans. The case is HDPLEX H5.

I have no problems with video (Intel HD Graphics P530), but I don't use 3D or KDE. For video driver (in /etc/X11/xorg.conf) I use "modesetting" (not "intel").

I'm very happy with the MSI 990FXA Gaming motherboard I have, if you are considering sticking with AMD CPU's. I currently have a Phenom II X6 1090T Black Edition CPU, but looking to upgrade to the highest FX processor it can handle within the next year or so.

link here: https://us.msi.com/Motherboard/990FX...#hero-overview

Greetings
I haven't owned an OEM PC since my first one, a Tandy 8086, and I've built, modded, and repaired hundreds since then. For a long time I used nothing but Asus and they're still high on my list but a few years ago I tried out an Asrock Z77 and I've been very pleased. However there are only 2 motherboards I've ever owned that really stick out in my memory and that is the ancient Asus P3Bf with the venerable 440BX chipset and a SuperMicro S370 Dual CPU server board.

I still have 2 SuperMicro servers running while the Asus gave up the ghost years ago, so I am determined to buy a SuperMicro enthusiast board for my next mobo. I'm aiming very high, expecting to spend nearly twice what I've ever spent on a single mobo so I'm lusting for the MBD-C7Z270-PG or whatever replaces it, as I don't expect to buy it for at least 6 months.

Why? The Supermicro BIOS was the most feature-full yet simple and solid I've ever had the pleasure to work with and I'm expecting similar attention to detail and options for UEFI and I'm going to need that as I plan to use Legacy BIOS Mode for as long as I can hold out. Unless some major change occurs I see no compelling benefit/reason to switch to UEFI since it's benefits mostly suit Windows 10 which I will never use. That said, if UEFI adds features good for Linux I want to be able to switch with confidence and no low level formware has ever impressed me more than SuperMicro's. They are still completely designed in the US and that is another major Plus to me for many reasons. SuperMicro gets my vote and my money this time.

Quality? Combined -All server grade with attention to cooling and speed needed by extreme gamers which has an extreme benefit for non-gamers - They run extremely cool and quiet and essentially forever (in PC time anyway)

Here is an in-depth review at chip level. The reviewer is quite young so be prepared for lots of "awesomes" but he is also very knowledgeable about individual chips and gives an excellent review that demonstrates where the money goes and why it is likely valuable to you.

-- Excellent In-Depth Review of Why SuperMicro Excels --

This isn't the exact board I want but it is common to the design attention SuperMicro provides and may help anyone decide if such quality, reliability, stability and performance appeals to you.

To OP - While this may be more than what you were looking for please note that not only does it retain a PS2 port (either mouse OR keyboard compatibility) but even has an onboard COM port. A few here undoubtedly recognize how that can be important for networking, control consoles, diagnostics, scientific work (like MATLAB) and a host of other low-level controls few bother to provide anymore. This is the legacy from server boards - wide ranged support, built like a tank.

FWIW - I have zero connection to SuperMicro other than as an extremely satisfied user. I'm betting on the quality and versatility affording me a minimum of 5 years use and possibly as much as 10+ years. After all I still get use from 2 systems now 15+ years after their introduction. Seems a pretty safe bet.

Member response
 

Hi,

Depends on which processor that you want to use. I chose the ASUS M5A97 R2.0 for my last build. This motherboard supports AMD socket AM3+ multi-core processors with unique L3 cache. Better overclocking capabilities and less power consumption.
I wanted to have a water cooled system to lower the noise and allow better power control. This new system sits quietly in my Den office 24/7 with Slackware64. I am very happy with this board and running with no issues for a year now.

Hope this helps.
Have fun & enjoy!
:hattip:

mini-itx
 

I have used some M-ITX motherboards to try to minimize the desktop footprint of some machines.

My personal machine is "luggable" unit arranged on a wood frame that fits into an medium-sized carry-on bag. The present motherboard is a ASUS ROG Strix Z270I (mini-itx) with a i7-7700k Intel chip, 8G 3200 MHz G.Skill ram. It boots from an on-board Samsung 960 NVME m.2 chip. I only have Slackware64-current -multilib on my personal machine.

I used an Asrock Z87m-itx with a i7-4770k and a Samsung mSATA for 3 years but recently used that motherboard to replace the motherboard and chip in a older home desktop box unit used by my 13 year old daughter. At that time I also upgraded it with an MSI single-fan watercooling unit which has eliminated any thermal throttling issues.

I got really good service out of that unit and i first upgraded my personal machine with another Asrock motherboard since the first one had been so reliable. But after fiddling with the new Asrock z270m-itx I found it to be faulty and sent it back to the mail order supplier and bought the more expensive ASUS strix board locally as I was then pinched with downtime. I would say the ASUS Strix board is superior to the Asrock boards in several aspects but cost 30% more.

I now want to add watercooling to my luggable unit which presents some conquerable challenges for mounting the fan...

Power supplies have been an issue for me, perhaps because of variations in voltage as I travel in Asia. What finally worked for me is a Great Wall 1000W power supply which solved my power supply burnout issues quite reliably after frying several locally made power supplies and even an imported Antec power supply.

I am running a Gigabyte ga990fxa - ud3
I have a 8 core AMD FX cpu that I cannot recall when I bought but its lasting me great time. no plans to upgrade anytime soon. belive my FX 8 core cpu is a 8125 3.10ghz overclocked to 4 ghz any the cpu stays ice cold.

Gigabyte used to feature dual bios a safety feature incase main bios gets taken out somehow. not sure if they still offer it but is nice.

You folks running LGA 1151 mobos are not having issues with Skylake?

LGA 1151 with KabyLake i7-7700k no problems with Slackware64-current -multilib.

Fast, crisp, fluid, no glitches.

My luggable machine has a standard sort of cpu fan right now, so I am running a modest overclock.

With the processor? No. Things work as it should. I had a lot of issues with video running -current right before 14.2's release. The biggest being that once the displays would go to sleep, when they'd wake up, I would experience a core dump and one monitor would be temporarily disconnected (which meant all open windows would move to one screen). Once the system recovers (within a few seconds), both screens would be available and I could use them normally, until they went back to sleep.

I think the newest kernel at the time was an RC for 4.7, which didn't solve any problems. However, 4.9 or newer might have fixes that weren't in the older versions.

Unfortunately (for you, not for me), I've switched to a discrete AMD card around the time 14.2 was released and I haven't tried the intel video since. Things may have improved with the latest -current, but it might be hit-or-miss on 14.2, depending on the specific hardware combinations you're running.

I get the feeling that if I select a Skylake mobo I should use Slackware Current or wait until the release?

@upnort

You are kind to specify your current motherboard make and model? This one driving that low power processor, sluggish with the virtual machines?

I have my reason to ask; you know, there are many ways to skin a cat... ;)

I just built a PC around a MSI 880G-E45 that I picked up for $50. It's a little older, but 32GB PC3 G-Skill Sniper RAM OC'd @ 1600MHz and a AMD Phenom II X6 1100T make it quite the powerhouse. The onboard graphics chipset is "unsupported" as it is a ATI Radeon HD 4250 but the X drivers work fine for it.

EDIT: It also has a single PS/2 port, HDMI, DVI and 6 SATA ports.

But if you don't want AMD, well, I don't know what to tell ya. This thing kicks some serious butt.

My only complaint about it was that it doesn't have onboard USB3. But a simple PCI-E 1x card with a front expansion fixed that for me.

EDIT2: Oops, it only has 5 SATA ports, my bad.

I have one Skylake server with SATA SSDs that works perfectly with 14.2 (4.4 kernel). On desktop and notebooks with Skylake CPUs and NVMe SSDs I use the current kernel, that is 3 packages: kernel-generic, kernel-modules, and kernel-source I take from current.

upnort --

I am very happily running Slackware 14.2 on my Skylake Laptop with an i7-6700K Processor + MoBo.

My Laptop does not have the same Class of MoBo you're asking about, but Slackware 14.2 with the 4.4.x Kernels has run very well since Feb 8 2016, even before the first Release Candidate was announced on Mar 17, 2016.

The first Kernel I installed on Feb 8, 2016 was Linux 4.4.1 which was released in Slackware pre-14.2 on Feb 3, 2016.

Note: Before I committed to Slackware 14.2, I ran Alien Bob's Slackware Live ISO Image to make sure everything was working properly before wiping Win10 from the System.

HTH.

-- kjh

P.S. I've stayed with Linux 4.4.x and I am presently running 4.4.79 HUGE built with Pat's SlackBuilds

# this is the count-proc script:

Please read the original post rather than just jumping into the middle of a discussion. :)

I'm not interested in skinning cats.

What kind of energy consumption do you Skylake owners see with your rigs? Lots of variables, yes. Just trying to get a basic idea of consumption at idle -- I don't want a foot warmer. :)

Edit: I'm fuzzy about UEFI. My current office system drive is formatted with GPT on a traditional BIOS mobo. Do I understand correctly that a UEFI system requires a dedicated EFI partition? If yes then that means I would have to repartiton the drive? I am aware that UEFI supports legacy BIOS and that is not the focus of my question. :)

Amazing! You care about "energy consumption" while you want power to crunch data and play smoothness with virtual machines? :D

I'll have to pull wattage from my battery backup when I get home.

But yes, UEFI does require a separate partition and it is typically mounted under /boot/efi/ (I'm not sure that's in the spec, but I believe it is expected by most bootloaders). I think typical recommendations are around 100MB (I gave mine 500MB, since in the past, I have played wiht a lot of different kernels and tend to keep them for a long period of time) and it is formatted using FAT32 (mkfs.fat -F32 /dev/sdxY).

I manually edit my /boot/efi/EFI/Slackware/elilo.conf file rather than letting eliloconfig manage it for me. It is like editing your /etc/lilo.conf and has very similar syntax.

Initially, I was worried about switching to UEFI... really, just because it was new and unknown. I had my 14.1 install on an older SSD, and I had my shiny new Samsung 960 EVO 1TB NVMe drive plugged in the motherboard, just waiting to get 14.2 installed on it. Since I knew the 14.2 installer had issues with UEFI and NVMe drives (it's since been fixed in -current, but I don't want to run -current on that machine), I manually partitioned and formatted the drive within my 14.1 install. I then mounted the main drive and then overrode the installation directory using the ROOT variable and installed everything to the new drive. I then realized I had no idea how to set up UEFI, and I couldn't use eliloconfig, since I hadn't booted using UEFI. I knew 14.2's eliloconfig didn't work with NVMe, so I grabbed the one from -current and overwrote the one installed on 14.2. After that, I grabbed Didier's "fake" install ISO and dd'd it to a thumb drive and booted up the installer in UEFI mode. I set up the swap and mounting points, then skipped the installation and went right to the post-install setup scripts. This included the initial setup of elilo on the drive.

Once that was done, I rebooted into my 14.1 install and then ended up creating my initrds (I also installed the -current kernel so I had both 4.4 and 4.9 installed) and then updated my elilo.conf. Rebooted into the NVMe to test everything, and it worked beautifully.

Long story short, if you're not using an NVMe, drive, UEFI is cake. If you're using an NVMe drive on 14.2, better be prepared to do a little tinkering, but it should be easy on -current.

Sorry for the novel...

Darth Vader, for your sake, I wrote the following in my original post:
I don't see in my posts where have I written or implied that I "want power to crunch data and play smoothness with virtual machines."

Regarding virtual machines I wrote:

Kind of sluggish ties into my statement of "Anything I buy will be a noticeable performance boost."

Kind of sluggish does not mean painful or impossible. My car is not a speedster or roadster, but gets me to where I want to go. Likewise with my current office computer. I am now running virtual machines on the system despite approaching 10 years of age. Seems any newer system will run virtual machines too and faster. So running virtual machines is not a topic of concern. I wrote "I want quiet more than muscle." Thus asking about energy consumption is a reasonable request.

Although I did not write that I "want power to crunch data and play smoothness with virtual machines," wanting a newer system does not mean energy conservation is impossible or that there is no comfortable middle ground. I know how much energy my current system uses, but I am unfamiliar with newer hardware and I asked.

I accept that English is not your native language. All I ask is you exert some effort to read, comprehend, and provide a poster the benefit of doubt and engage in helpful discussion. If you are unwilling or incapable of doing that then I ask that you do not reply to anything I post.

ASRock Z97 extreme3. Any of the ASRock Z97 boards really, but I've only personally touched the extreme3. That and a 4th gen Core i7 will be a lot cheaper than a more modern one, work without a lot of frustration since it's not "bleeding edge" hardware, and still offers incredible performance.

No apologies needed or requested! I have not kept pace with hardware. Hence this thread and my new question.

I have been exposed to only one UEFI systems and that was another person's. From that one experience I framed my question.

If I understand correctly, I can buy a UEFI mobo, configure for legacy mode, and my current hard drive should run just fine without tinkering. But the proverbial handwriting is on the wall and I probably should buy a UEFI system even if I do not immediately use UEFI. Nominal future proofing but not much. :)

I won't be dual or multi booting with this system. I tend to leave the office system alone and tinker elsewhere.

Probably the most frustrating part of this search for a new system is discovering that newegg has been converted into spastic JavaScript POS. ;)

I don't even know if you can get a semi-recent motherboard without UEFI. I think it's been pretty standard for a few years. But most, if not all (that we can buy), will have the ability to run legacy mode -- which, yes, means you can use your existing harddrive without any modification (except for maybe mount points, if the motherboard changes the order). I had my motherboard for over a year running legacy mode until I decided to finally switch to UEFI when I installed 14.2 on my NVMe drive (which was like 1 1/2 weeks ago, so it's still fresh in my mind).

The board you mention (and some of the boards mentioned by other helpful posters) satisfies my original desires of at least 1 PS/2, 6 SATA 3 ports, on-board video, DVI-D, and not bleeding edge. My frustration is these boards seem out of stock with online retailers. Perhaps I should buy refurbished and then transplant the mobo into my existing case.

That was the sentiment I wanted to convey in my original post. :)

That said, I do not mind buying a newer CPU such as Skylake, but I need to know that 14.2 will work without hiccups. From what I see, Kaby Lake or Ryzen requires running Current and even then might require compiling a newer kernel. I've done that kind of maintenance in the past, but these days life has other priorities and I don't have that kind of time. I also tend not to update to the next release of Slackware until a few months thereafter. Once upon a time I did update within days of release, but those other priorities now get in the way of playing full time geekster. :)

At the moment I am leaning toward the compromise of buying an i5. No hyper threading but has four cores and a notable difference in price from an i7. The i5 somewhat satisfies my desire for quieter rather than muscle and will be a dramatic improvement over the current system.

Good to know. Thanks. Only one hard drive in this system and likely will stay that way.

Edit: "My frustration is these boards seem out of stock with online retailers." I did not mean that all such recommendations are out of stock. Only that many of them are and that makes searching more challenging.

Over the last couple of hours I've been "shopping" for a new moherboard and CPU at newegg.com and frys.com.
Having a Ryzen processor would be nice, but, as it has been pointed out, Linux hasn't "caught up" with the Ryzen and Kaby Lake CPUs yet, and mickeysoft has colluded with the hardware manufacturers to prevent the use of any version of windows older than 10.
At the moment I'm leaning towards a Skylake CPU and the Asus Prime Z270 motherboard.
We'll see.........
BTW, if anyone is looking at the Ryzen processors, newegg.com is having a sale on the Asus Prime X370-A board and, separately, the Ryzen 5, 1600. Both prices good until the middle of next week.

According to your profile, you are using Current and not 14.2?

I am close to selecting one pre-Skylake motherboard, but I am thinking I should select a Skylake system too. Been more than a year since 14.2 was released. Possibly Current is getting close to an official release, which would have improved support for Skylake.

The Skylake processors were released two years ago this month, so I would think, hope, that by now the Linux kernel would support them. :)
Here is one announcement I found,

http://www.pcworld.com/article/29552...thusiasts.html

I prefer to dual boot with Slackware64-current as the main OS and Xp-sp3 on a small partition for the rare occasion I need it, e.g., last weekend when the audio ports died.

It occurred to me to double check as to whether or not older versions of windows will run on the Skylake processors and the information is conflicting, at best. Some say win7 will run on Skylake and one person has ran winXp on a overclocked i7-6700K skylake, but other sources say it is, as of 2017, not possible to run any version of windows older than 10.
If that is the case, I might as well buy a Ryzen....
Anyone know for sure?

Will they run on skylake, yes...

The issue is that M$ has decided that they don't want to try to keep up patches for newer processor, so if Windows pre-10 detects skylake or newer, it disables Windows Updates, so you don't get security patches.

There are workarounds currently, but I'm sure M$ will patch them so they don't work. End result, if you want to have Windows, if you're going Skylake, Ryzen, or anything newer than those, go with Windows 10.

Thank you for the information.
So, if I'm reading this correctly (I'm getting slow in my old age :) ), it, in theory, would be possible to run winXp or win7 on the latest AMD and Intel processors, but you wouldn't be able to get updates? If so, that is fine. I just use the old winXp installation, as I said, as a backup in time of hardware or software troubles.
:)
I had the impression that the newest, seventh generation, processors from both AMD and Intel wouldn't even boot anything older than win10.
Thanks, again.

I'm not sure if you'll be able to get XP running on one (I suspect it would, but never seen it), but 7 most definitely will run on Skylake, I have friends running Skylake with 7.

All --

I've a question concerning Dual-Boot -vs- Virtual Machines.

Why would one set up Dual Boot, especially an older version of Windows when one can run Windows in a Virtual Machine ?

I am not knocking it, I just don't understand what one can do with Windows on Bare-Metal that can't be done as a Virtual Machine ?

Thanks.

-- kjh

Usually from what I've seen, for no reason other than licensing. Most of the time the version of windows is OEM that's installed on bare metal, then LEGALLY speaking, to install into a VM, you must acquire a different license key as that key cannot be used. The OEM version is forever locked to the board it was installed on, and while you can get it to activate in a VM, it's not legal per the OEM license. So unless you have retail licenses, or have spare never installed even 1 time for testing OEM licenses laying around, most people cannot legally virtualize their Windows.

Well, as mentioned elsewhere, last weekend the audio ports on this motherboard apparently died. To confirm it was the hardware and not the Slackware64 Linux operating system, I booted over to winXp and confirmed it was, indeed, the hardware.
There have been other times in the past when having windows (or it could be most any other operating system) on another partition has come in handy for similar reasons.

Hmm. To get my own thread back on track, thank you everybody for sharing about your motherboards. :)

I am going to be patient and wait for Current to be officially released. Then select a Skylake board. I have three candidates tagged.

Looks like the Skylake chips are rather efficient at idle.

Unless some kind of sale appears, I think I am going to stick with an i5 rather than the more expensive i7. No hyper threading but I don't know that I need that, and the i5 will be a huge performance jump from my current system.

For my school, I'm required to use a program called Lockdown Browser, which completely locks my system down when I take certain tests to try and prevent cheating. There's no window switching, no start menu, no hotkeys, etc. This software only works on Windows and it detects VMs and refuses to run (which means you can't take your test and would fail it).

I'm annoyed by the requirement to use the software, but I believe it is required by the regional accreditation for my online-only degree program to prevent us from needing to go somewhere physically to take a proctored exam. The school would likely lose its accreditation if they didn't use this software or it would force us to find somewhere locally to take a proctored exam (I'm about 2500 miles away from my school).

I also remember reading a post that at least Valve has some anti-cheating technology that may detect if you're in a VM and can kick you off the server. This could be used by other vendors as well, but I don't game much, so I don't really have experience with it.

Also, for those who game, you typically need two GPUs to be able to passthrough one of them to the VM. If you don't have an integrated GPU in your processor (most AMD owners), that means you need to have two discrete cards, which can be expensive.

How many VMs do you (plan to) run? I bought an 8-core AMD processor precisely because number of cores trumps clock speed when running multiple virtual machines. The Asrock 990 Extreme 9 board I bought for this processor, however, does not have onboard video. I have two video cards - one Nvidia and one AMD. There is no problem whatsoever with the AMD; I don't understand why you are so resolutely set against it. The Nvidia is easy to set up with the proprietary driver. The board has 8 SATA ports. I have a lot of 120mm fans in the case but the system is reasonably quiet.

One VM on the office system is run every day, but none of the VMs run 24/7. I run them as needed. Sometimes I run two VMs concurrently but often do not have the need. Thus, a four core CPU will be fine, especially since the current CPU is an early generation dual core. If I wanted to run a dedicated VM host like Proxmox I would buy the hardware. I get to play with rack servers at work and I don't need the same at home. :)

Perhaps my bad luck of the draw, leaving a proverbial bad taste in my mouth? Two of my current boards use Nvidia. My previous office system motherboard was Nvidia too until giving up the ghost. I am now using Nouveau as I don't need any 3D. In the past, many times I updated the drivers only to have them crash my system and then had to revert to the previous version. Just one of those things where the last time I experienced a crash I said, "That's the end of that!" and vowed to never again buy a motherboard with Nvidia video. Since all dedicated video cards are Nvidia or AMD, that leaves me with on-board video, which I like because there are no fans, I don't do games, and the Intel people seem to support really well.

I have two Intel video systems and I never once had an issue with them and never had to install special drivers.

There was a long period years ago when AMD drivers were painful to use. Perhaps those days are long gone. Nonetheless, call me "gun shy." :)

If there are non proprietary AMD drivers these days that are part of the Linux kernel like other modules, then I'll keep an open mind when selecting a new mobo.

I don't want the fan noise or additional heat of a typical video card. If there are AMD cards without fans then I'll take a look.

What is "reasonably" quiet to many people is noisy to me. I prefer silent and very quiet systems. I am sitting next to three running computers right now and can't hear any of them. :D

I can tolerate noise. My system is right beside me on the desktop, and yes, there is a constant hum. But when I upgraded it last year my thinking went as follows: I wanted to be able to run whatever I needed to run, in 2016 and in 2026, without hiccup. Video encoding, audio encoding, multiple virtual machines, and so on. That requires a beefy CPU, which requires, for me at least, beefy fans (no water-cooling here, thanks). I understand your reasoning, but I also encourage you to reflect on what your needs might be in five years, not just this year. Your existing system is ten years old. You never know what you will need your new system to deliver in ten years' time. Just yesterday I came across an excellent app for Android. Nothing similar exists for the desktop. So today I set up an Android emulator on the desktop and now I just run the app on my desktop. That's just one virtual machine claiming CPU cycles and memory from the host. There are others too. You might find yourself in the same position in time to come, needing to run virtual machines regularly where now you run them only intermittently. So plan ahead, not just for tomorrow. That's all!

There are AMD cards without fans. I have one :) There are more onboard options for AMD these days that might potentially qualify.

About being gunshy: You should always check the driver status of any potential buy. There is even Intel stuff that don't work right out of box. That said, the selection of well supported HW on OSS drivers and increased quite a bit the last few years.

Most of AMD's stuff works great with the included modules in the kernel and X... no proprietary needed. In fact, most of their older cards don't even support proprietary drivers on modern distros because they never updated them to work with the newer X.

As is normal for most things in Linux, if you buy something brand new to the market, driver support will likely be lacking, but I'd imagine any low enough powered discrete card that wouldn't require a fan would be old enough to be well supported by either the radeon or amdgpu drivers, both of which are open-source and included in Slackware 14.2. The same can likely be said of any of AMD's APUs (CPU + GPU in the same chip). You'd likely be able to boot up X without any tinkering of files and have direct rendering working properly.

I've certainly had better luck with AMD than with Intel as far as video is concerned, but my only experience was the Skylake processor I mentioned earlier. My htpc is actually running an APU and is fairly low-powered, but is more than capable of driving my 1080p tv, even decoding h265 encoded video with the CPU (the GPU didn't have support for h265 decoding).

I think you and I live on different planets. I'm exhausted just from reading what you do. ;)

I will look around. :)

All of these conversations reminded me why I have not purchased a new system in a long time. Researching makes my head hurt. :)

I will browse a bit to learn more.

No surprise to me. This is how most of these conversations go. Something works great for one person and not for another, and vice-versa. :)

Huh. I just remembered that I have three systems with on-board Intel video. I plumb forgot about the living room system. :) Same story though -- no fussing with drivers.

Edit: Which model? :)

Well shoot me folks.

Based on the feedback in this thread, I started looking into AMD CPUs and APUs. I wasn't familiar with APUs.

Seems there are some good deals?

For example, AMD A8-7600 Quad-Core with Radeon R7 for $65. AMD A10-7860K Quad-Core with Radeon R7 for $100. The A8-7600 can run at 45W. Those seem like a whale of a bargain. Comparatively, CPUs like this probably would be half way to the finish line before my old system even leaves the gate.

Seems many people are using these APUs in media centers and for gaming. Gee, I just want a nice office desktop. :)

Too good to be true? What am I missing (besides previously being stubborn)?

The biggest thing you'll be giving up is these APU's have a MUCH worse IPC than Intel chips. So some Intel dual-cores will actually be faster than the AMD quad core APU. However, it's going to be faster than your old machine, and as you've seen, they're cheap, so if you can live with the knowledge that your quad core is actually not all that incredibly powerful when compared to Intel dual cores, then there's absolutely no reason to not go with one. Generally speaking, if you are attempting to game, the APU's will overall beat an Intel chip due to how much better the integrated graphics are on the AMD's compared to the Intels. But pure CPU, the AMD doesn't have a chance.

As Timothy Miller stated, IPC (instructions per cycle) are lower in the older AMD chips (the newer Ryzen chips are much better, but they don't have any APUs available yet). However, depending on the cost of the Intel equivalent, AMD may still be worth it.

Per this PC Mag review on the A8-7600, it was slower than the i3-4330, which I would assume was that chip's main competitor when released, in all tests except GPU performance (AMD was quite a bit better in that regard, almost doubling the score). But a quick check of Newegg shows the cheapest you can get a current i3 for is around $120. I'm not sure how much better the performance would be with the newer i3, but it would be up to you on whether the extra money would be worth it.

Since AMD released Ryzen on a new socket with much better performance than their old stuff, their old stuff is probably cheaper than normal "last generation" stuff, which might make that performance hit compared to an i3 more easy to swallow. And, as you said, anything you get now would likely be a substantial performance upgrade to what you're currently running.

There are Nvidia cards with heat sinks instead of fans. A year or two ago I was shopping for a new card and found a Nvidia GeForce GT-730 with 2 gigs of ram at a good price in a local store. It wasn't until I got it home and opened the box that I noticed it had a heat sink instead of a fan and was smaller than any other graphics card I've ever owned. It sill fits into a PCI-e x16 slot.
BTW, the heat sink is so large it turns what should be a single slot width card in to a double slot width card, so you lose a slot.
OTOH, while recently shopping for a new motherboard I noticed the manufacturers are spacing the slots appropriately for the double widith video cards, i.e., there is not a slot immediately next to the first PCI-e x16 slot (on some m/b, not all).

As to AMD vs. Nvidia, I bought nothing but ATi (AMD now) for just about 25 years. About 5... closer to 6 years ago the ATi/AMD card died and all I could find in the local stores were Nvidia based cards. Bit the bullet and bought one. Best thing, video wise, I've ever done.
IMHO, if one is running Linux, their video should be Nvidia. Again, just my opinion, of course.
:D

Hmm. I don't do gaming. I guess that negates that one perceived advantage. I run a VM or two and compile packages. Occasionally convert video files from one format to another. Otherwise just a basic user -- writing, editing text, listening to tunes, watching videos, surfing the web with Firefox, and checking mail with Thunderbird.

I have no significant complaints about my current system, despite the age. While possibly only my imagination, I seem to notice the system is a wee more sluggish with each Slackware release as kernels and other software changes. Hence the idea of getting something newer.

The "older" APUs don't seem as well future proofed as the Intel chips, although probably fine for my use case for the next few years. An AMD APU would be a noticeable leap over my current system. The low prices caught my eye because I could make that leap without pinching the wallet. Possibly the lower priced AMD speed improvements over my current system will be sufficient that I won't care much about the differences compared to the Intel chips.

I think that should be the foremost criterion: comparing to my current system.

I'll keep researching but the AMD APUs seem tempting.

I will look. Possibly the generation of Nvidia chips I had on my mobos were problematic (series 6, 7, and 8). Who knows, perhaps newer series are less prone to problems. All I know is I never once blinked with the three systems here running Intel video and that kind of thing impresses a person. :)

Perhaps the nouveau driver will be sufficient and I won't have to wrestle with proprietary drivers. Other than the VMs I don't do anything that is video intensive and nouveau should be good enough.

Sigh. Back to researching.... :)

The Nvidia "Long Lived Branch" drivers have never presented a problem. They are easy to install and have always, "just worked." No fuss, no muss.
I could be wrong, wouldn't be the first time ;) , but I have had the impression Nvidia provides better Linux support than their competition.