[Leaplist] AMD 45W processor w/fansink + nVidia MCP51 mainboard for $77 shipped - $15 MIR ...

[Bryan J. Smith]

Or you just use your existing 3ware card.  ;)

All of 3ware's 64-bit PCI/PCI-X cards in the 6000 through 9500S series
are 3.3V with 5V tolerance, and will work in 32-bit @ 33MHz 5V PCI slots.
Otherwise the 7506-4LP and 7506-8 cards are a Jackson or two on eBay.
Virtually no one wants them anymore, and want at least SATA.

The 6600GT ~ 7600GS ~ 8500GT in performance, with increasing vertex
and shading version and feature support (at FPS cost, of course).  E.g., the
8500GT allows FSAA and HDR at the same time, but don't be running too
high of a resolution.  The 6800GT ~ 7800GS ~ 8600GT ~ 9500GT as I
understand it as well, with much better vertex/shader support in 8000+.

It's hard to recommend anything below a 9500GT these days if you're
going to spend more than $25.  I'd try to find a 8500GT on a steal, which
will compete well against the 7600GS (note "GS", not "7600GT").

Under Windows, most people prefer ATI's products on a bang-per-buck.
You have to ask yourself how much you will want Linux v. Windows, and
dealing with ATI's lack of equivalent Linux support like nVidia.  And as with
most ATI cards, the free 3D _rarely_ works, and various 2D support can be
lacking with the free drivers when it comes to newer Rx500/600/700+ series
ATI GPUs.

As far as hardware mixers, they are out.  Even hardware headphone-speaker
switching is gone.  Yes, everything is software these days, removing every little
resister and cap they can.

My Gateway P-7811FX's software headphone switching works _better_ under
Fedora 9+ (9 being the first version I migrated to it from my prior HP Pavilion
dv900z) than Vista, and I still get Context audio error messages under Vista with
updated drivers.  I'll be in a game under Windows and it will come over the
speakers while I'm a plane and the _only_ way to fix it is to exit the program and,
sometimes, reboot Vista.  Pathetic, considering this is a Microsoft "premier
notebook" sold via BestBuy-only, with Microsoft subsidizing Gateway.

Fedora running all sorts of native Linux games and even via Cedega has no
issues.

It would have been nice is PCIe would have been designed to offer an "in-line"
option for "short x1" slots with PCI.  That way you could have a combo slot.  But
the PCIe slot is "not as tall" so there were physical issues, even if they "moved
the slot back" so it could be in-line with PCI.  Oh well.




----- Original Message ----
From: Jason Boxman <jasonb at edseek.com>

Yeah, but the current 3Ware I'm using is for 3x300GB PATA RAID 5 for backups.  
I recently moved that array into the box to reduce my system count by 1 for 
space and reduced energy consumption.

Where would I need to be to get those? ;)

I thought so -- thinking about putting the board in the gaming box, although 
then I need to buy a real video card.  Current one is a 7600GS AGP.

I had an old ECS mainboard, a 748 I think, with an ALC based chipset that had 
no hardware based mixer!  The volume was either on or off under Linux.  Very, 
very irritating.

Ah, okay.  I don't know why I thought 1x PCIe slots could double as legacy 
PCI...

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