[mythtv-users] Motherboards: help me understand my choices

[Owen Townend]

2008/9/2 Sixten Otto <himself+myth at sfko.com>:
> On Sun, Aug 31, 2008 at 6:29 PM, Owen Townend <owen.townend at gmail.com> wrote:
>> The real trend-setter here is Intel.  They do not make discrete
>> graphics cards[0], they have always stuck to integrated workstation
>> graphics.  Their drivers are open source and work across _many_
>> platforms.  They're not renowned for 3D gaming etc, but they 'just
>> work'.  For 2D work such as mythtv not having great 3D support is like
>> (oblig car analogy) not having a spoiler and alloy rims on a dump
>> truck.
>
> I'll ask you the same question: are there chipsets (board and/or
> graphics) among the Intel offerings that are known to work better
> under Linux than others?
>
> I'm not planning to use this box for anything that would require much
> 3D performance, so I don't think there are any worries there.
>
> Sixten

I don't have any first hand experience using an Intel IGP, until my
AMD 780G purchase all of my graphics were nVidia discrete cards (with
the exception of my Toshiba laptop with its Trident CyberAladdin-T
GPU).  Reading through sites such as AnandTech and Phoronix show that
the G45 chipset is still too new to have great driver support and the
older G35 leaves much of the HD work to the CPU.  For a plug and play
type experience I'd still recommend nVidia as it is what I've had the
most consistent experience with.  Something like the integrated nVidia
6100 in the N-Force4 seems to play well with HD and mythtv from the
few reviews I've seen.

The ATI HD3200 in the 780G chipsets is working well for me, and the
boards are so cheap, but not everyone seems to be having a smooth run
with them and the drivers are still not _perfect_.

cheers,
Owen.