During the coming summer I plan to build a computer that will run linux. The problem is that I have a limited buget and this computer will only used for learning linux. So I must have components that will be friendly to linux.
In order for components to be linux friendly (Not to much configurations needed) components must have company tech. support and be familiar with most computer news groups.
The site that I choose to find my components is www.PriceSCAN.com. This site I found to be the most non-biased and have the widest selection of companies.
First item is the heart of the computer, the motherboard. Although the motherboard is the main part of the computer the price of the motherboard can be the cheapest part of the computer. But in this research I will be looking for a motherboard that will be of a brand that a lot of people are familiar with and has good tech support. After careful research I found the ASUS company to be the choice but which board to choose that won't break my budget.
The motherboard that I choose was the ASUS A7S333 which supports 3 DIMM slots which can support up to 2GB PC2700 and up to 3GB PC2100/1600 non-ECC DDR SDRAM. The memory bus has a speed up to 333 MHz. It also has a 266/200 MHz front side BUS.
The ASUS has 5 PCI Slots, 2 USB Ports, 4X AGP Slot, 2 standard IDE Connectors.
The site I found was the @ Computers All Services.com.
Price $67.95
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The processor that I choose for the motherboard was the AMD duron 1.3GHz socket A CPU 200MHz FSB retail pack which includes a cooling kit.
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Price is $47.97
The next component is the video card. The video card that I choose will not be the extreme for gaming but a video card that will be enough to support a flat panel moniter and play DVD videos.
The video card is the Radeon 7000 AGP 32 MB. This video was highly rank by the Picescan.com and Computers 4 sure.com scoring all 10. But what really got me to choose this product is the ease of installation and setup.
The card that I choose was the Radeon 32 Mb sdr PCI TV out video card from Tiger Direct.
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Price is $39.99
Hard dive that I choose was the Western Digital Caviar 20 Gig EIDE.This hard drive has 7200 rpm speed with 2MB buffer and 8 milisecond seek time.
Price is $65.99
The next component is the floppy drive. Although this is an obsolete technology but to gain full use of the Linux O/S like install another O/S at a later time (Windows 200) I need to use a floppy drive to load a boot disk.
The drive that I found is a internal Samsung Floppy SFD-321B/DJN2. This drive I found at Tiger Direct.com cost is $14.99.
The next component is the CD drive. I know that today everything is either a DVD or a CD RW, but this is a buget machine and will only be used for linux system and I have another system that has a burner and a DVD drive.
The drive that I found from Computer Gate is the NEC 52X internal IDE CD-ROM drive.
Price is $17.99 with the added installation hardware.
Next is the case that will contain the components. Although there were cheaper cases on the market but to find a case that can withstand the salt air environment of Maui I found that the Antec cases to be the choice due the construction and price.
Tiger Direct has a Antec case for $49.95 and has the perfect dimension that will fit under my computer table.
So the total cost of the linux box will be $304.81. This cost is does not reflect shipping and handling charges and there were sites with cheaper shipping but I found those sites to be unreliable. These sites that I choose I found to have very good reputation of reliable shipping and tech support.
But if you look at this price compared to a Dell or evan a Compaq this cost is very minimal.
In this project I was to find something that is unusual that I cannot buy on Maui. Well here is an item that I always wanted.
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Packman