Hi Dave, What is the exact model of the mobo? Is it by any change the MSI K8NGM2-FID ? There is very useful info in this forum http://forums.anandtech.com/messageview.cfm?catid=29&threadid=1803985 > 2) Recommended case/power supply ? I recently helped a friend with a very similar setup (with above mobo). He went for the Antec P150, which is a very nice quiet case, with a quiet PSU, for a good price. http://www.silentpcreview.com/article272-page1.html The Antec P150 is the second recommended case of SPCR, but !!! note the warning: http://www.silentpcreview.com/article75-page3.html In my friends case, the PSU got replaced with a different model, because of these issues (The store he bought the case was aware of them). So, make sure that when you buy it, that the PSU is a revised one, or that you can return it if it fails. A bit of a hassle maybe, but the case is really really nice. > 3) The MSI box says it includes an nVidia nForce3 chipset, which I > assume means that there's an audio/video chipset on the mobo. I'll > probably disable the audio, and I have a gForce AGP video card to put in > the machine. Question: Am I better off using the integrated video or > should I use my card instead ? (Btw, I use the kernel nv driver, not > nVidia's binary driver). If you use the nv driver, I think you will not notice any difference between the onboard and external video card. > 4) I assume I'll have to buy new RAM. What should I buy ? See the anandtech forum. > 5) The CPU includes a fan, but should I get something more powerful ? Something more silent, rather. Maybe a Zalman heatsink+fan? > 6) How can I best reduce the noise from this system ? See above. A good case with damping and good airflow, a silent PSU, a silent CPU fan, and one large case fan (maybe 120 mm) at low speed. It will not give you a perfectly silent system, but it won't be the vacuumcleaner noise level you'd get without taking care of these issues :-) > 7) Am I correct to assume that this system runs in a 32-bit more as > well as the 64-bit ? How do I determine which mode I'll run in ? You may run into some hassle running at 64 bit, 32 bit will work fine. But since you are no newbie, you might want to go fo 64 bit. > This system will replace my ancient desktop machine, so also I need to > know if there are any precautions or warnings re: running Linux audio > software on it. The distro of choice will be Debian Etch a la Demudi 1.3.0. Hm, on the MSI based system of my friend, I didn't get the reverse engineered driver for the nvidea onboard ethernet to work, so I installed the binary driver from nvidea. Many people however do report the reverse engineered driver to work, and better even than the nvidea binary, so YMMV. But if you are stuck with the binary driver (for either video or ethernet), low latency might be at risk. Maarten
