[vdr] Hardware recommendation?

[Stephan Martin <dvb@martin.de>]

Hi,

I would like to buy a new mainbord and don't want to have another time
problems with new hardware.

Most important for me is, that its stable and reliable and thingst that 
should
work (APM or ACPI, DMA, USB, IR, Sound without klicks when accessing the HD)
just work.

I don't want to have to make 5 BIOS updates to get things go. I do not want
to spend my time to find workarounds making things work and learning
what is not possible.

Performance is not an issue, but I want the best value for my money.

I would like to use my Matrox G450 video and my Siemens DVB V1.3
with video overlay (I don't want to buy a TV).
I only run Linux and I use the computer as workstation
(with ipsec to the network of the company I work for) and as tv.

I asked around and peoble told me, that I should go for a Intel CPU
and a Intel Chipset. Is it true that don't have to much problems
if you are running Intel hardware?

Is VIA and AMD cheaper, because it don't work when doing more then average?

Any recommandations or warnings?


    I think of something like a Celeron 1.7 GHz
    and a Mainbord with a i845PE chipset like ASUS P4PE.

  Matrox G450 Dualhead, Siemens DVB V 1.3
  3 IDE Harddisks, 1 CDWriter, 1 SCSI-Disk
  Soundblaster PCI 64 (ens1371) or onboard sound
  Intel Etherexpress 100 or onboard network

  I expect onboard USB2.0.  S-ATA would be nice.
  If there is Onboard-Irda, I expect to be able to get an IRDA-Head for 
it.

(I usually by a cheap processor. When the fastest processor running in a 
Board
is cheap, I upgrade, using the Mainboard another few years)


Problems I had with my current hardware:
===============================
At the moment I have a Epox 8kha+ Mainboard (VIA KT266A chipset).
First APM, ACPI and USB didn't work. After 1/2 a year EPOX published a BIOS,
so I could use my USB keyboard and mouse.

I still can't reliable poweroff the PC when using ACPI. Since 2 month
I got it to work with APM, but I still don't get nvram-wakeup to work.

Since the beginning til now I get lockups when watching tv with vdr and
tuxview using video overlay. It also happens when using xawtv or fbtv.

Usually it takes some time and happens when accessing the harddrive.
Then the harddrive led is on and nothing, except of the fans,
is doing something.
Afterwards I have datacorruption like /bin/uname being a device
or /bin/login a directory (I use ext3 and 2.4.20 kernel).
It happed with the old and new drivers. It ist only when doing video overlay

With xawtv I had to reboot 5 times in 2 hours with timeshift
and video-overlay.

Without video overlay watching tv needs about 50 % of my Duron 800
and the video stops for about 1/10 s when reading or writing to harddrive.
(yes, I use DMA for the 3 harddiscsv and have onlz problems with 
videooverlay)

If you like, I could tell you more.

I think it may be a hardware issue, so I want to give the computer
to my brother iwho needs a computer for running windows and
don't doing video overlay.


SMartin




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