LinuxMCE Forums

General => Users => Topic started by: Crash on June 09, 2008, 08:35:04 am

Title: New system, fresh install, and a few questions.
Post by: Crash on June 09, 2008, 08:35:04 am
***This is a re-post, I apologize.  I originally posted in the wrong thread***

Hello everyone!

First off I'd like to thank in advance any help I'm hoping to receive from this thread.  It never ceases to amaze me how friendly and supportive the open-source community is. 

That being said, shall we get to the point?  I purchased a new system, dell pre-packaged. This isn't my first choice, but I got an amazing deal on the hardware in the desktop (I went through my account manager from work so I knew exactly the components going into the rig), and I couldn't pass up a pre-built system that cost less than what I could have built myself.  Specs are as follows:

*Dell GM819/DR845 Mobo  **standard mobo w/intel integrated graphics-which I don't plan on utilizing. **
*Intel E8300 Core 2 duo 2.83GHz proc
*2GB 800 RAM
*2x250GB Seagate 7200 sata's.  **These came in a raid, which I promptly removed. I then added the hard drive below..**
*1x160GB Seagate 7200 sata. **This is my install drive, the others are both media drives. 2x250 was cheaper than one 500**
*256MB ATI RADEON HD 2400 XT  **This I know is causing me issues.  More mentioned below**
*16XDVD+/- sata optical
*Minus the 160GB hd I had previously, this whole machine cost me $300 w/tax&shipping.

After looking at the setup, I like it all.  Although I seem to be the ying to the majority of user's yang.  I use intel processors while most on the boards here use AMD, but I use ATI cards while nVidia seems to be the favored in this ring.  More about below...

I'd want to setup a hybrid with it.  I started this process yesterday and had some issues.  **At this point, after struggling on some sort of comprehensive format with which to present my questions, I figure it's just easier to explain my step-to-step from yesterday, and present the questions in that timeline as they were presented to me.**  So here we go.



That's about where I left it yesterday.  I figure the ATI card is just a small waste of power right now, but I have a friend who's going to let me borrow his extra nVidia 8600GT 512mb to see if that does the trick.  I had originally planned on upgrading my main desktops video card in the next few months and moving one of the ATI 1950xtx's in there now over to this machine, but if it's not going to take any ATI card I'll just have to purchase a nVidia.  Q#4:  Does Lmce automatically find/mount other hard drives, or would I have to do that manually?  I never got that far.

Q#5: I also have a logitech diNovo mini http://www.logitech.com/index.cfm/keyboards/keyboard/devices/3848&cl=us,en (http://www.logitech.com/index.cfm/keyboards/keyboard/devices/3848&cl=us,en), bluetooth keyboard built to work with windows mce, anyone know if this will work as anything more than a keyboard with lmce?

As of now that's where I am.  Any questions? Comments?

Thanks in advance!

-crash

Title: Re: New system, fresh install, and a few questions.
Post by: Zaerc on June 09, 2008, 12:10:15 pm
The AVWizard isn't very good at dealing with ATI chipsets (or rather anything outside of a small range of nvidia chipsets).  So your system is probably using the VESA driver at the moment, which (as you have noticed) doesn't perform very well under the UI2 alpha blending you chose.  In a nutshell, switch to UI1 until you have installed the latests ATI drivers manually, then chose UI2 masked.  See: http://wiki.linuxmce.org/index.php/Display_Drivers for more info.
Title: Re: New system, fresh install, and a few questions.
Post by: Crash on June 09, 2008, 05:30:52 pm
The AVWizard isn't very good at dealing with ATI chipsets (or rather anything outside of a small range of nvidia chipsets).  So your system is probably using the VESA driver at the moment, which (as you have noticed) doesn't perform very well under the UI2 alpha blending you chose.  In a nutshell, switch to UI1 until you have installed the latests ATI drivers manually, then chose UI2 masked.  See: http://wiki.linuxmce.org/index.php/Display_Drivers for more info.

Thanks Zaerc, I'll check it out.

Hello Crash,

 I am using a 7.1 X-plosion, pci sound card that sets up great, I had it around so I installed as the new Asus ADI 1988B codec was causing some issues I dropped in the 7.1 and it worked great, I only had t enable to IEC outut in KDE's mixer and then it was fine, it offers a coax and toslink output on board. The only issue i have is it take up a PCI slot which I would like to use for another pvr card later. When I move all this stuff to the rack in the basement. Auzentech also make a cheaper version of this card which I think is still based on the C-media chipset which I think should work fine, but I can only comment on what I have above.

 Regards,
 
 Dave

Much appreciated Dave.  Luckily I've got a good handful of PCI expansion slots, so I'll check out the X-Plosion.

Title: Re: New system, fresh install, and a few questions.
Post by: Crash on June 09, 2008, 09:49:45 pm
Well I ran through all that was listed on the Display_drivers link you sent me, and it seems like it took.  The problem now though, is that I when lmce boots to the main menu, it only lasts a few seconds before switching to the dcerouter logon.  From there I'm not sure what to do.

I'm still blasting my way though linux, and have dual booted another computer of mine with ubuntu to try to get better equipped.

Thanks again for the help.