[sf-lug] new linux box

[Tom Haddon]

On Thu, 2007-11-15 at 20:53 -0800, Alex Kleider wrote:
> Again, my gratitude goes out to all who have given me input re my plans
> for building a high end computer.
> Your responses have driven home to me how little I really understand
> about the issues.
> No, I am NOT a gamer! and I don't foresee any need for 3D graphics.
> I would however like to get into photo editing (GIMP)
> and be able to use VMWare (I need a MSWindows based program to see
> images delivered over the web for my job) which as I understand it is a
> program that can actually run MicroSoft Windows as a linux program. To
> do that I assume it needs a lot of hardware resources.

VMWare is a program that allows you to run an entire operating system as
a "single program" from your host operating system. So, you could use it
to run Windows (and any applications on Windows) on Linux, or another
flavor (or the same flavor) of Linux on Linux, etc. VMWare is one of a
class of programs that run "Virtual Machines". Others are QEMU,
VirtualBox, etc. You need a fair amount of RAM to be able to run Virtual
Machines comfortably. Think of how much RAM each OS is going to need,
and add a bit for cushioning. Most modern computers (with 1+GB RAM)
should run a host and guest operating system without any real problem.
Unless one of those is Vista...

There is a program called Wine - http://www.winehq.org/ - that lets you
run Windows programs from Linux by implementing the Win32 api. It's a
little patchy, and works better for some applications that others, but
if it happens to work for your application it may be a better option
than an entire virtual machine.

> Also I'd like to spoil myself and not worry too much about having too
> many  screens/windows open at a time. And have everything work asap!
> (I've started my Linux career using rejected equipment but now that I'm
> committed to it, I feel it's time to seriously upgrade!)
> So what I'm looking to get is high end, just shy of the 'latest' (so
> there won't be Linux compatibility issues and also so that the
> product(s) will be know to be reliable.)
> I certainly don't want to throw money away but I'm lucky enough not to
> have too much financial constraint.
> 
> I was not aware of the poor reputation that Nvidia has re cooperation
> with the open source community so I'll take Rick's advice and stay away
> from them. Christian's suggestion to go with AMD has a rational I like
> also.

It's simply that they don't provide open source drivers. The drivers
they do provide support Linux pretty well, but if you run into some
weird issue, you're pretty much stuck. That being said, unless you're
into serious gaming, there's no real need for an Nvidia graphics card,
which tend to excel in 3D applications and games.

Cheers, Tom

> 
> Has anyone got a specific processor and motherboard to recommend? 
> 
> The EVGA 680i MoBo was suggested but I gather that it is for the Intel
> processor family and has Nvidia chipset(s.)
> 
> The "build a linux computer" searching I've done has resulted in either
> very old posts or minimum investment projects.
> 
> alex at kleider.net
> 
> 
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Tom Haddon
mailto:mthaddon at yahoo.com

Best of all is never to have been born.  Second best is to die soon.


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