On Friday 05 December 2003 09:20 pm, Bruce Marshall wrote:

On Fri December 5 2003 08:23 pm, Janus Sandsgaard wrote:

...

I am buying a new PC and can choose between these two motherboards:

- Asus P4BGL-MX/533 (standard)

<http://uk.asus.com/products/mb/socket478/p4bgl-mx-533/overview.htm

...

- Asus P4P800-VM (with AGP) http://uk.asus.com/products/mb/socket478/p4p800-vm/overview.htm

They are both "all-in-one" types of motherboards with integrated LAN, audio, graphics etc.

Question:

- Does anyone have experience with these motherboards running Linux? - Do they work 100% with Linux?

Asus provides some drivers for Linux, but I gues that is not the same as saying everything (lan, audio etc) will work in real life? I can't find the motherboard in the hardware database at the SuSE website.

Well, a sour grapes comment that deals with ASUS but not necessarily those boards.

I have had bad problems with ASUS boards and won't buy another. And once I started having the problems, I heard that ASUS has really bad quality control and if you send a MB back as not working, they are just as likely to send it out to someone else for them to try....

But.... lots of people have had good luck with them. +-------------------------------------------------------------------- --------+ + Bruce S. Marshall bmarsh@bmarsh.com Bellaire, MI

*********** I vote with Bruce here, I don't like the ASUS mobo much anymore. That's not to say you might get a good one, if you go ahead, but I just wouldn't take the chance. Also, I would never recommend getting a motherboard with integrated video, most just suck. Within a month, you would be back here asking what video card to get. ;o) Lee -- --- KMail v1.5.4 --- SuSE Linux Pro v9.0 --- Registered Linux User #225206 On any other day, that might seem strange...

On Fri, 05 Dec 2003 22:13:19 -0600, Jack Malone wrote:

I for one have have very good luck with asus, we use the amd versions at work an have been for past 6 years. have had a few go bad but considering how many we have bought its not anything to gripe about. Have never used a P4 asus mb so can not speak for them.

... yep. opinions on MOBOs have to be put into some sort of context, in order to qualify the opinion (not aimed at you). to simply say "i think they suck" doesnt really say much. much better to say "i think they suck because i could never get the onboard video to work or my system always locked up with that". in many instances, it could be something as simple as a bad RAM chip, a memcheck test would reveal :) . -- /// Michael J. Tobler: motorcyclist, surfer, skydiver, \\\ \\\ and author: "Inside Linux", "C++ HowTo", "C++ Unleashed" /// The United States Army; 194 years of proud service, unhampered by progress.

On Sat, 6 Dec 2003 10:00:15 -0500, BandiPat wrote:

rather than a full page, detailed, rambling description of a motherboard's advantages and disadvantages would be, I will end it here!

... howdy Lee ... i wasnt directing my opinion at anyone in particular. and no, i dont expect a paragraph-long diatribe. as i said, even a simple, "they suck because the onboard video and IDE controller are pisant" is sufficient without drawing it out. that same board with 3rd party video and controller, or another MOBO from the same vendor, might work great - Jack Malone eluded to this. . -- /// Michael J. Tobler: motorcyclist, surfer, skydiver, \\\ \\\ and author: "Inside Linux", "C++ HowTo", "C++ Unleashed" /// "The wages of sin are death; but after they're done taking out taxes, it's just a tired feeling:"

On Sat, 06 Dec 2003 10:33:37 +0000 Mark wrote:

If you have a wider choice, I'd suggest avoiding integrated graphics on Intel chipsets. Not up to much at all. The Nvidia NForce2 chipsets for the AMD platform wipe the floor with them in every single regard. Go for a modest stand-alone video card if you can afford it.

Do you have experience with nvidia2 audio? nvidia web site has proprietary drivers but alsa tools says they are "old", the result is they are not working, or at least I haven't been able to make them work. Modules load correctly with no error. nvaudio 34676 0 ac97_codec 13460 0 [nvaudio] but no sound in KDE. I'm running a stock 2.4.23 kernel with intel 8xx modules compiled (it seems the nearest choice to what yast autodetect) + of course nvidia proprietary drivers. I was wondering if I had to download alsa drivers from alsa project web site and compile them. It is anyway strange that nvidia that makes pretty good drivers for their video board fail to make equally good or at least working audio drivers. Furthermore nvidia audio drivers have a pretty different name from the one suggested on alsa web site and I was used to think that manufacturer drivers were better than reverse engineered "guessed" ones.

On Sat, 6 Dec 2003 07:11:10 -0600 mjt wrote:

on your sound issue, BION, i've seen many instances where the line settings were muted - check alsamixer (or the gui version) to ensure the volumes are on and turned UP

too easy, tried before. alsamixer: function snd_ctl_open failed for default: No such device Same box, same drivers (nvidia proprietary), slightly different kernel (2.4.23-pre6 vs. 2.4.23, just SUSE 8.1 working, SUSE 9.0 not working. even SUSE 8.1 was complaining about the nvidia alsa driver (something like old and no /proc/alsa/version) but I could use the sound card... new SUSE doesn't work. I think maybe other alsa related stuff are more strict...