V
Videodrome
Guest
Link to my eMachine specs: http://www.cnet.com/products/emachines-el1852g-52w-pentium-e5800-3-2-ghz-3-gb-1-tb-lcd-20/specs/
I recently got some steady work and I've decided to do a budget PC upgrade. Partly for self education in Hardware, but also would like to try gaming on Linux as well as just having a better machine with HDMI.
My eMachine has a 3.2 GHz dual core and I've already upgraded the RAM to 4 GB. I think that may be the memory limit of this board even though this is a 64 bit machine.
http://www.memorystock.com/memory/eMachinesEL1852G52w.html
The main issue I'm now addressing is the low profile form factor and the weak power supply which is only 220 watts. I found a large old eMachine Tower Case at a PC Shop in town and I've transferred the motherboard and everything into it. It was a little weird connecting the new power button on the new old case, but everything is working.
I figure I now have much more room to put in a power supply and video card.
The old Tower did have a 350 watt power supply, but I haven't tested it yet, and it has old style Molex connections while my eMachine parts use SATA power. Wondering if it might be worth getting power adapters to just use this old PSU. Then I could get a midrange video card.
Lastly, I suppose the main question I have is for any recommendations for a video card or brand name that will work with Linux or have minimal issues getting a driver.
I'm currently running Sabayon and there probably won't be any real reason to change distros. I'll likely start out looking for games on Steam, so as long as I have the Steam client and drivers for the video card I should be okay.
I recently got some steady work and I've decided to do a budget PC upgrade. Partly for self education in Hardware, but also would like to try gaming on Linux as well as just having a better machine with HDMI.
My eMachine has a 3.2 GHz dual core and I've already upgraded the RAM to 4 GB. I think that may be the memory limit of this board even though this is a 64 bit machine.
http://www.memorystock.com/memory/eMachinesEL1852G52w.html
The main issue I'm now addressing is the low profile form factor and the weak power supply which is only 220 watts. I found a large old eMachine Tower Case at a PC Shop in town and I've transferred the motherboard and everything into it. It was a little weird connecting the new power button on the new old case, but everything is working.
I figure I now have much more room to put in a power supply and video card.
The old Tower did have a 350 watt power supply, but I haven't tested it yet, and it has old style Molex connections while my eMachine parts use SATA power. Wondering if it might be worth getting power adapters to just use this old PSU. Then I could get a midrange video card.
Lastly, I suppose the main question I have is for any recommendations for a video card or brand name that will work with Linux or have minimal issues getting a driver.
I'm currently running Sabayon and there probably won't be any real reason to change distros. I'll likely start out looking for games on Steam, so as long as I have the Steam client and drivers for the video card I should be okay.