Posted on 01/21/2002 5:27:07 PM PST by FatherTorque
I've been here going on 4 years and this is my first vanity post, so the thread police can keep their guns holstered. I need a bit of computer help, I'm going to upgrade and need to know the pros and cons of a few things.
What I have now is:
My computer is a 700 hz Athlon, 512 ram, cd writer, geforce 1, and soundblaster live, I surf and game quite a bit. My wife's computer is a little 300 hz emachine, nothing special, but all she uses it for is email and surfing the net. Windows 2000 is installed on both of them.
I've got cable internet hooked to my computer and I'm using Intel Anypoint USB 10mbps phoneline adapter to network to hers.
OS's I have on hand. Windows 3.1, 95, 98, 2000.
The new one I plan on getting will not have windows XP on it, I'll be going back with 2000. I do want a version of Linux on it as well to try it out. What's the best way to go about this? Partition one drive, or get dual drives and put each OS on it's own drive? Recommendations as to the best flavor of Linux to use? I'll be getting another AMD chip as well, if that makes a difference.
The Anypoint is a pain, because my computer has to be on all the time for hers to have internet access. I just didn't want to run the cat5 at the time. I want to change to either a router or use one of our computers as a server. Anybody have a preference either way? If I go the server route, what software would I want to be running on it, and which one of our older computers should I use as the server? If you think the router is a better idea, do you have a preference as to which one to buy? Keep in mind I'll be running Windows and Linux on mine and will need internet access with both OS's.
Stability and ease of use are the main features I'm looking for. I travel quite a bit with work, and when my wife has computer/networking problems it's hard to troubleshoot them over the phone.
What's a good motherboard for a 7- 800 mhz AMD chip?
I want to do a cheap upgrade from my ASUS p5.
This LinkSys router/hub combos are great instead of a dedicated server to share Internet access. They are a piece of cake to set up and the docs are quite good. They have built-in DHCP, so both Linux and Windows should be able to share access through it.
You may also want to consider getting the version that incorporates wireless, and getting wireless network adapters for each computer that is separated from the hub (to replace the Anypoint). But the wireless adapters are fairly expensive - around $100 per system.
i've got win xp, but it has some bugs, as all new software does.
most people running multiple os's today use removeable hard drives--you just pop one in, and pop it out.
I'd start by bumping the clocks up into the MEGA hertz range.......;>)
2) Your PC: Add another PCI NIC to your machine. Enable NetBEUI on the secondary NIC. Enable Remote Internet Access by toggling the option in the tab. Set the IP manually to 128.0.0.1 (subnet 255.255.252.0; DNS: Whatever your cable internet's DHCP-assigned DNS server value is -- type 'IPCONFIG /ALL' at the CMD prompt to get that info and plug those values in)
3) Get a mini 5-port NetGear switching hub at BestBuy for $45. (10/100Mbps is OK, but you'll never utilize it 100%. I don't even think you can find a 10Mbps version anymore so just get what's cheapest). Next, simply connect two patch cables to the hub and then to your secondary adapter and her primary adapter. Total cost for all of this is under $100.
My dual-boot OS recommendation: Get a few 5.25" removeable bay cartridge and carrier assembly and jam whatever IDE drives you want in there, assuming you have one 5.25" slot open to mount the carrier. Make all drives inside a cartridge the primary disk on IDE0. When you want to run another OS, just shut down, pop in the new cartridge, and reboot. Putting two OS's on the same drive is for goofballs who enjoy heartaches. $30 solves it all.
Recommendation for Linux: Mandrake Linux.
On her PC, when your PC is running UNIX, she can still access the Internet using you as the host as well as get to files on your MS Windows directories by mounting NFS Share. There's good MAN pages inside Mandrake telling you how to set up a Windows client (her PC) to yours with your PC in control. It's easy.
Install a version of Linux first - you can use the LILO to boot into a partition of Windows 2000. If you install Win2k, you will have to use a boot disk to get into Linux.
Generally, you're better off installing the Microsoft OS first, then installing Linux. Windows refuses to recognize any "competing" operating systems and will configure things to suit itself, while Linux will recognize and accomodate any existing Windows partition.
Note that fixing Windows to allow booting into Linux is easy... it only requires adding a line to the "boot.ini" file in the c:\ directory. But you have to add the line manually.
Note that fixing Windows to allow booting into Linux is easy... it only requires adding a line to the "boot.ini" file in the c:\ directory. But you have to add the line manually.
Oops, I should have made it clear that I was referring only to Win2K and WinXP when I was referring to "boot.ini".
We are not running near the speed of the machines that Father Torque is discussing (we have 1-600 MHZ, 1-350MHZ, and 1-166MHZ). We are also on cable.
We installed a Netgear Router and we are extremely happy with it.
Regardless if 1, 2, or all three computers are on line, there is no perceptible difference in performance.
More importantly, as you pointed out, the installation and setup was quite easy. No need to set up a server system!
"... Enable TCP/IP protocol on her card as well, and set her IP to 128.0.0.2 (subnet 255.255.252.0; DNS 128.0.0.1)
I should have written:
... Enable TCP/IP protocol on her card as well, and set her IP to 128.0.0.2 (subnet 255.255.252.0; GATEWAY 128.0.0.1; DNS: Whatever the server-assigned DNS number is on *your* PC)
Now, if ya want to geek out and want more control, a Linux box with netfilter and some sentries loaded will definatly be the way, but it can become VERY time consuming VERY quick (and at all the wrong times - If your like me, you never stop messing around with the systems ;) )
Currently, I have my DSL piped into eth0 with a netgear FS108 that hangs off eth1 of my Linux firewall. It'a sll cool, but sometimes, I wish I would get off my duff and simply goto CompUSA and buy the damn Linksys broadband switch ("router", if ya want to buy into the hype)..Hell, that way I could make my firewall machine into a dedicated UT server...Yeah..that's the ticket, it'll be the FRFS machine (FreeRepublic Frag Server!)
With regard to Linux - nobody ever got fired for going with Red Hat (I just installed it a couple of weeks ago and it was really a breeze), however I hear that Mandrake is now even superior as far as installation goes.
When installing Red Hat I recommend a Workstation install rather than a server install (at least if you're intending it to be a personal workstation and have dynamically assigned IP addresses (which will be assigned from your wonderful LinkSys router)).
Don't bother with another disk unless you just want more space - partitions are just fine. Allocate 250 Meg for root filesystem space, 200 Meg for '/home' and somewhere between 2-3 times your physical memory for Linux swap space (probably 2x since you've got 500Meg of memory).
And, last but not least, if the Linux partiation is not located at a small enough cylinder number on your disk then you may not be able to boot diretly from it. I ran into this problem with my notebook and found that you can instead have your system start to boot Windows, and add some lines in your Windows startup file (autoexec.bat as I recall) to cause Windows itself to boostrap over to Linux.
Happy Linuxing!
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