[geeks] linux box upgrade

[Lionel Peterson]

I like Intel solutions, but it is as much from personal experience as anything
else. That said, I would encourage you to consider the following:

I would encourage you strongly to look for a MB that uses DDR3 RAM - if you
can forgo ECC, you can put 16 Gigs on the board (4x 4 Gig DIMMS) for about
$80. ECC DDR3 can be gotten for about $125 - nice options to have.

For CPU, quad core CPUs can be found for $80-120 that will give you impressive
performance for several years of use.

As for Graphics, the latest SandyBridge CPUs include very nice integrated
video - you can always find a discrete video card better supported under Linux
(I defer to others for video card suggestions).

For $300 you can upgrade to an ATX MB, quad-core CPU with 16 Gigs of non-ECC
RAM for about $300:

AMD x4 960 quad-core CPU for $100 -
http://www.microcenter.com/single_product_results.phtml?product_id=0382790

Gigabyte AM3+ MB with 2 PCI slots for $90 ($100 before rebate) (NO on-board
video) -
http://www.microcenter.com/single_product_results.phtml?product_id=0375772

2x 8 Gig DDR3 RAM kits for $30 each -
http://www.microcenter.com/single_product_results.phtml?product_id=0360526

You'll need a graphics card to add to the above for a complete upgrade, but
the above comes to $260 w/o tax, s/h so a little left for a 'plain Jane'
workhorse video card if needed.

A similar system can be made with Intel components for similar money, but will
likely include on- board graphics - no need for add-in discrete video card.

Hope this helps,

Lionel

On Mar 27, 2012, at 9:40 AM, Bertrand Hutin <bhutin at yahoo.fr> wrote:

> I plan to upgrade my very old linux (Debian) box soon
> I alreadyu have 1 ssd
> for the os and a sata disk for data
>
> I guess 4GB of memory will do
> i also need
> at least 2 PCI slots to reuse old cards (scsi and 2 network)
> usage is mostly
> personal office and web browsing, beeing able to watch videos would be nice
> what would you recommend as Motherboard, CPU and video card?
> I have a
> preference for AMD, but is open to Intel.
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