Mailing List Archive: New System/New User Hardware Questions

New System/New User Hardware Questions

Jun 10, 2003, 2:58 AM

Post #1 of 3 (698 views)

All,

I'm new to MythTV and have a hardware question for you. I am putting
together an all new MythTV box to put in my entertainment system. I've
selected an Athlon XP 2000+, 512MB PC21000, a micro-ATX case (which
actually takes full size PCI/AGP cards), an Asus A7N266-VM motherboard
(nVidia Chipset and integrated GeForce 2 video), wireless
keyboard/trackball/game pad, 40GB WD HDD, and Samsung CDRW+DVD. My only
hold up is a tuner and video card. I am considering disabling the
onboard graphics and buying an Xstay Everything (GeForce2 MX400 w/64MB
w/tuner/remote) to handle the video. I'm just curious if anyone has one
of these and can let me know who will it works in Linux/MythTV. I'm sure
I want to use nVidia for the graphics card in some flavor, but am unsure
if the tuner card on the Xstay Everything will work in Linux. Thanks for
any help!

Jason
Redhat 9

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RE: New System/New User Hardware Questions [ In reply to ]

aperry at atg

Jun 10, 2003, 6:56 AM

Post #2 of 3 (692 views)

Permalink

I can't answer your questions , but coincidentally I just ordered a
similar list of hardware this morning from newegg:

Asus A7N266-VM motherboard

AMD Athlon 1700

512MB Kingston PC2700

And a nice little micro-ATX aluminum case that'll look good with my
entertainment center

(it totaled about $250 and I already have a spare HD and CD-ROM, as well
as the PVR-250)

I've read that some people are having problems with this motherboard and
various Linux distributions, even with the nvidia drivers. But I
couldn't resist the integrated NIC and video and sound (digital 5.1
out!). I just completed a Myth setup for the first time on a P4 2.4Ghz
Dell (Mandrake91 and PVR-250), and I like the results but I want the
computer back for other things, so I thought this would be a fun (and
better looking) project.

Let me know if you find anything out....

Aaron

RE: New System/New User Hardware Questions [ In reply to ]

christianh at pdd

Jun 10, 2003, 4:53 PM

Post #3 of 3 (677 views)

Permalink

> -----Original Message-----
> From: mythtv-users-bounces@snowman.net
> [mailto:mythtv-users-bounces@snowman.net]On Behalf Of Perry, Aaron
> Sent: Tuesday, 10 June 2003 11:57 PM
> To: Discussion about mythtv
> Subject: RE: [mythtv-users] New System/New User Hardware Questions
>
>
> I can't answer your questions , but coincidentally I just ordered
> a similar list of hardware this morning from newegg:
>
> Asus A7N266-VM motherboard
> AMD Athlon 1700
> 512MB Kingston PC2700
> And a nice little micro-ATX aluminum case that'll look good with
> my entertainment center
>
> (it totaled about $250 and I already have a spare HD and CD-ROM,
> as well as the PVR-250)
>
> I've read that some people are having problems with this
> motherboard and various Linux distributions, even with the nvidia
> drivers. But I couldn't resist the integrated NIC and video and
> sound (digital 5.1 out!). I just completed a Myth setup for the
> first time on a P4 2.4Ghz Dell (Mandrake91 and PVR-250), and I
> like the results but I want the computer back for other things,
> so I thought this would be a fun (and better looking) project.
>

Using the exact same motherboard I had only minor troubles getting things
work under RH8 and slightly bigger problems with RH9 due to the fact that
they have changed the kernel to include some 2.5 memory management stuff.

Using RH8 I needed to install ALSA, but once I did that, sound was peachy.
Not too hard either. (The RH9 memory management stuff also broke the ALSA
drivers, but that was back when RH9 was brand new - ALSA may allow for this
difference now)
Network card worked out of the box using the nVidia drivers.
On board video did cause some problems, but since it didn't have a composite
out, I went with a AGP GF2 MX 400 (and later a GF4 MX 440) that I have been
quite happy with.

BTW: It would be a great motherboard if you're setting up a PC on the cheap
since you could get away without having to buy an extra cards (video, sound,
network etc) and it's only A$110 ~= US$70

Can you point me towards the source for your case?

CH