Suggestion for AM2 mainboard?

[Kybber]

After careful consideration I have abondoned my plans to go for a Core 2 system,
and have instead decided to go with an AMD-based LMCE HTPC because of the Nvidia
integrated graphics. I'll be using the Antec Fusion case, so the mainboard needs to
be m-ATX.

My TV is a Toshiba 37C3000PG which has both VGA and 2xHDMI inputs, but at this
point I do not know which provides the better PC input solution since I have only tested
VGA. There is noticeable tearing when I hook up my laptop w/NV-120 to the TV's VGA
input, so I am a bit afraid that will be the case with other VGA-based boards as well.

I am currently considering the following two boards:

1. Abit AN-M2HD
Pros:
Integrated HDMI-output
New chipset: GeForce 7050PV / nForce 630a
Supports PureVideo (so far only for Windows, so not really a biggie)
Cons:
Newer chipset, so may not be supported

2. Asus M2NPV-VM
Pros:
Known to work with LMCE (link)
HDTV out (not digital, but component. Already in use by my DVD player)
Cons:
Chipset is already previous generation: GeForce 6150 / nForce 430
Need to use DVI-HDMI adapter

Does anyone have any insight to share? Specifically: Will the GF 7050 chip work
nicely with LMCE 1.1 using UI2 with alpha-blending just like the GF 6150 apparently
does? Any other problems I may run into with the Abit?

[CharlieMopps]

I have the Asus MN2-E MB, so I give you the ins and outs of it, it shouldn't be too different than the one your thinking of.

Heat pipe = No noisy chipset fan
Only 1 bios chip (no backup) but the chip is removable if you need to replace it.
Do NOT use the Asus live update thing. Crashed my bios with it, not even a replacement chip would fix it, had to RMA the board.
Sata connectors are directly behind the PCI-E Slot. Depending on the legth of your video card and number of drives, you could have issues. I have an X1900XT (big card) and it makes all but 2 of the connectors useless. Luckly I only needed the 2 drives.

[Kybber]

Thanks for your response

I have the Asus MN2-E MB, so I give you the ins and outs of it, it shouldn't be too different than the one your thinking of.

Actually it is. Yours is a full ATX, whereas the M2NPV-VM is uATX. That probably also
means I'll have at least as much trouble as you with things getting in each other's way...

I've done quite a bit of digging today, and have found that it should be pretty straight-
forward to install Kubuntu Feisty 7.04 on the Abit AN-M2HD (link). A slight bit of tinkering
is needed, but as long as LMCE doesn't mind, it looks like it may work.

A couple of questions to ease my mind:
1. According to some fellow gentooist, the latest nvidia driver enables 3D acceleration
and allows beryl to show off. Is it safe to assume this means that UI2 with alpha
blending will work?
2. Will a manual installation of the nvidia driver cause any problems with the LMCE
installation or its automated upgrades?

I'll be ordering the board tomorrow unless someone warns me about potential
obstacles . Will of course add the board to the wiki hardware-pages once/if I
get everything working right.

[Zaerc]

Looks like a pretty nice board that abit one, just to be sure you might want to look around to see if anyone had problems with MythTV and that chipset, NVidia appears to be one of the better supported chipsets so you should be safe there (but don't take my word for it).

I have installed the latest NVidia drivers myself (diskless MD on a previous setup) that wasn't much of a problem,  whether it will cause problems with the updates I don't know. I dont expect it, but in the worst case I reckon one could always reinstall the drivers from the NVidia site over the updates again. 

I'm looking forward to seeing another motherboard added to the wiki (I need a better one too as I'm stuck with this ASUS M2A-VM HDMI), so good luck!

[Kybber]

Thank you

The 7050PV seems to work fine with MythTV:
http://www.nabble.com/-slightly-OT--HDTV-cpu-t4066129s15552.html

My order was just confirmed, so early next week I am expecting the following:

ABIT AN-M2HD, GF7050PV, Socket AM2
AMD ATHLON 64 X2 5200+ 2.6GHZ (Brisbane, 65W)
Crucial DDR2 BallistiX PC6400, 2GB
Samsung HD161HJ 160GB S166 3.5" 7200RPM
Samsung HD501LJ 500GB T166 3.5" 7200RPM
NEC ND-7173A DVD±RW 18x DL Black
Nexus Real Silent D12SL-12 BW, 2 pcs.

Somewhat overkill, I know. But future-proof, and I am quite happy with the price

Unfortunately the Antec Fusion doesn't arrive until the end of the month, so I
guess I'll just use an old Chieftec I have laying around for the next couple of
weeks. Also, our new kitchen floor will be arriving Monday or Tuesday, so I'll
have to work on that for a couple of evenings

The observant reader may notice the setup is missing a proper heatsink. The
very best sink for this cabinet is the Scythe Mini Ninja which isn't for sale in my
country yet. I'll be using the stock fan until then.

[afilep]

Let us know how you go with this config!

[marrandy]

Yes, definetely update us on what you use for the server/backend/core  and the client/frontend/media director.

I've been burned a few times trying to get the right combination going and gave up in the end, as a real working system as opposed to a test system.

The ASUS M2NPV-VM is a year old and the 6200 chipset has been replaced by the 7xxx and now 8xxx chipsets.

As fiire has just come out, I'm looking at that.  I have emailed them and polywell.  Does anyone know how many slots are in the server as I have 2 asterisk cards, 3 PVR cards and a 8-channel frame grabber

[teedge77]

what is a PIV card and an 8 channel frame grabber? do you know that they work with linux or linuxmce yet? i was looking for a security camera card which is what i thought the 8 channel frame grabber was, so i was hoping you knew of one that would work. and curious what a PIV was. I also wanted to get an asterisk PBX going with 3 analog phones...but was told analog phones were a pain to get working with it...can you enlighten me a little on these?

[marrandy]

Yes, I'm been having some medical issues recently and I don't seem to be checking stuff that I type and I also seem to get items mixed up.  Sometimes speech as well.

I've corrected the post.

I meant PVR.  I have hauggepauge PVR-150 and PVR-350

I use zoneminder, occasionally (the machine get's robbed for trying other stuff like plutohome, linuxmce, sugarcrm etc.).

http://www.zoneminder.com

Buy a TDM400 card from digium or a dealer.  It can have up to 4-modules e.g. 1 CO (Central Office) and 3 single line phones.  That's how I started with asterisk 3-years ago.  I had some issues with setting up zaptel, but it's better now, as it always is with time and peoples dedication.  If zaptel finds and autoconfigures the card then it will be a breeze.

If you have no experience with VOIP/asterisk, then try asterisk@home / trixbox

http://asteriskathome.sourceforge.net/

Oh, I later bought some aastra 9133i SIP phones.  They work great.

Full iso install of linux with call manager, call accounting, web GUI setup of extensions and routes.  Saves you having to configure by hand ie. you'll save several days, unless you already know apache, mysql etc.http://asteriskathome.sourceforge.net

I have a lot of pieces, zaptel cards, cameras, framegrabber, PVR's, x-10, insteon, caddx nx8e, IR stuff and want to tie it all together.

I talked to some of the plutohome people in the August - December timeframe last year as they have been talking about dealer systems for over 3-years on their web site, but I could never get a dealer name from them to buy the hardware, so, like many people, I keep testing when I can.
I've emailed fiire and polywell about the system for number of slots plus if linuxmce is specifically tuned for the hardware.

I'll let you know if I hear back

PS - this is an interesting read   http://www.linuxis.us/linux/media/howto/linux-htpc/buying.html

[marrandy]

Well it's been a nine days and I've emailed both fiire and polywell twice, but still no reply.

It's pretty sad that both companies can't even be bothered to respond to a simple question of how many PCI slots in fiire station

I even copied to my yahoo address so a reply-all would go to both addresses in case there was a spam filter issue.

Anyone else had any response from sales@polywell.com or info@fiire.com

Maybe the fiire is dead already.

Anyone else know the number of PCI slots in fiire station ?

[Zaerc]

Maybe this helps: Fiire Station specs anyone looked inside, no direct answer to your question though.

[marrandy]

and here we are, 12-days later and still no response from sales@polywell.com or info@fiire.com

Does anyone have any fiire stuff yet ?

I would like to know how many pci slots in the server

[colinjones]

Kybber

Haven't seen any updates on your progress ... can you update us? I am really keen to get a motherboard that has HDMI output (not just DVI), but got warned off that Asus you mentioned for various compatibility reasons. I had resigned myself to the other main Asus (DVI) recommended, but would really like to know how you went with the Abit....

[chris33f]

Hi !
I'm interested in the ABIT AN-M2HD board too.
Has anyone tested it in 1080p, since I think the nvidia 7050 chip only deals up to 1080i hardware playback.
What about encoding, what can be done by the GPU (720p/1080i/1080p/H264...)?
Thanks

[dopey]

Does anyone have any fiire stuff yet ?

I ordered some stuff from then on the 25th and the last update on the order is on the 27th, which says it was assigned to someone... I know I'm being impatient as some of this stuff takes time, but this is the first time I had someone charge my card (was almost immediate) prior to it being ready to ship.

Having said that, I did ask them a question before my order and they did respond... It just took a couple weeks...