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orange_juice
Guru
Joined: 16 Feb 2006
Posts: 588
Location: Athens - Greece
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 Posted: Sat Oct 07, 2006 8:49 pm Post subject: Asus Crosshair and Gentoo compatibility [Verified] |
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Hallo,
I decided to buy a new pc and go with AMD 64. Although Intel seems to be outperforming AMD I will choose the latter due to its excellent support in gentoo community and due to -according to my opinion- more tested, reliable and suited to my needs componnents that support this architecture.
I would like to ask your opinion on the setup I am about to purchase and I would appreciate your feedback.
Motherboard: Asus Crosshair
CPU: AMD Athlon 64 X2 AM2 3800+ or 4200+ (I would go with 4000+ for its 1MB L2 but it is too expensive for me...)
Cooler: Gigabyte Neon K8
Memory: Corsair DDR2@800 2x1024A-6400 (I am not a pationate overclocker and therefore I would not like to spend more money on 2x1024A-6400C4, unless it is worth its value)
PSU: Enermax Liberty 500W or 620W
Graphics Card: I would like to go with nvidia due to its better support in Linux and Gentoo.
My questions:
**EDIT**
1) Does anyone have any experience with this motherboard?
2) Do you think that spending more money on C4 memory will make a difference? I am not neither a gamer nor an overclocker. I will be using my PC for image processing, internet and everyday office work.
3) What graphics card would you recommend? I need a card fully supported by Gentoo but I am not interested in the high end market cards. I have heard that Saphire Radeon X1300XT is a great solution. However I am not sure about ati drivers. Would it better be to go with NVidia? If yes, which model would you suggest that will suit my setup?
4) Which PSU is better for this setup? I consider Enermax a very reliable provider. 500W would be enough or I should go for 620W on this setup?
Thank you for your help.
Kind regards,
orange_juice
Last edited by orange_juice on Tue Oct 10, 2006 11:06 am; edited 4 times in total |
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juhah
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Joined: 03 Oct 2004
Posts: 46
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| Posted: Sun Oct 08, 2006 8:09 am Post subject: |
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When purchasing a new motherboard the first question in my mind is: How good Linux support the chipsets on the motherboard have?
In your case you would have to check support for these chipsets:
- NVIDIA nForce 590
- Silicon Image 3132 SATA controller
In addition the mobo in question has integrated LAN, Audio, IEEE, etc. components. These components should be tracked down to verifiy are they supported, if needed. Also, nowadays nearly all mobos have hw monitoring chip. The chip is usually mentioned in manual.
You mentioned that you are not a gamer. In this case I would highly recommend using intel graphics because they have good open source drivers. Check out i965.
500W PSU is enough for normal display adapter. If you buy fast nvidia or ati card then you need more powerful PSU. |
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Jakub
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Joined: 04 Oct 2003
Posts: 377
Location: Warsaw, Poland
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| Posted: Sun Oct 08, 2006 8:24 am Post subject: Re: Hardware setup for gentoo question |
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As for the cooler, I can recommend you the Scythe Ninja Plus rev. B (I have the first rev. which doesn't work with AM2 sockets, it's really great - my system is much more quiet now). It's huge though so you have to make sure beforehand it fits in your case.
If I were to buy a middle range gfx card now, I'd go for the 7600GS, 7300GT with DDR3 memory or 6600GT (I have the last one in my box and it superb - driver, performance, everything). |
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orange_juice
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Joined: 16 Feb 2006
Posts: 588
Location: Athens - Greece
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| Posted: Sun Oct 08, 2006 12:10 pm Post subject: |
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Thank you for your answers!
| juhah wrote: | In your case you would have to check support for these chipsets:
* NVIDIA nForce 590
* Silicon Image 3132 SATA controller
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You have a point. However, The most relevant answer I have found after googling the chipset or the motherboard is the following from Sol4
| Quote: | One of the most common questions asked by those thinking of using Linux, goes something like “Will it work on my hardware?” well there is not really a cut and dried answer to this one, you ask two Linux techs and you are likely to get three answers.
My answer is to this one is along the lines of “if you have a fairly recent machine, without anything too non-standard, then you have a good chance of it being Linux friendly” |
Therefore, I edited the topic of my thread and the questions list in order to seek for advice based on experience before I start digging deep into my kernel's .config file... Do you think I will have issues with this motherboard? I have searched linuxcompatible, linuxhardware and other sites that did not provide any information...
| Jakub wrote: | | As for the cooler, I can recommend you the Scythe Ninja Plus rev. B |
Unfortunately seems to be difficult to find it in the local market...
| juhah wrote: | | I would highly recommend using intel graphics because they have good open source drivers. Check out i965 |
| Jakub wrote: | | I'd go for the 7600GS, 7300GT with DDR3 memory or 6600GT |
This is the class of gfx cards I am looking for.
Intel: Indeed this is a new effort...
Nvidia: Gentoo seems to be fully supporting NVidia
I do not feel comfortable living on the edge and therefore I am kind of considering NVidia.
Kind regards,
orange_juice |
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juhah
n00b
Joined: 03 Oct 2004
Posts: 46
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| Posted: Mon Oct 09, 2006 6:36 am Post subject: |
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| orange_juice wrote: | | Do you think I will have issues with this motherboard? I have searched linuxcompatible, linuxhardware and other sites that did not provide any information... |
Well, yes and no. Google is pretty good help in here. Try googling for "foo kernel" where foo is the chipset name. I googled for the nForce 590 and the Silicon Image 3121. Kernel has Silicon Image driver, good. The nForce is causing some trouble on a relatively new kernels:
http://www.google.com/search?q=nForce+590+kernel.
These problems are usually solved when a new kernel release comes out.
| orange_juice wrote: | Intel: Indeed this is a new effort...
Nvidia: Gentoo seems to be fully supporting NVidia
I do not feel comfortable living on the edge and therefore I am kind of considering NVidia. |
Far from a new effort and living on the edge. The i965 announcement was some sort of PR-trick. The truth is that intel has been releasing open source drivers for many years. See discussion http://lwn.net/Articles/194724/. Especially the comment from keithp (one of the driver developers): http://lwn.net/Articles/194767/.
But I also understand that the intel might not offer all that 3d performance that people are looking for. |
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orange_juice
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Joined: 16 Feb 2006
Posts: 588
Location: Athens - Greece
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| Posted: Mon Oct 09, 2006 9:33 am Post subject: |
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I see...
A friend of mine has just baught a system based on this mobo. He runs on windows, however, I will try to boot from the Gentoo Live CD to see what actually happens...
Thank you for your help.
Kind regards,
orange_juice |
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orange_juice
Guru
Joined: 16 Feb 2006
Posts: 588
Location: Athens - Greece
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| Posted: Tue Oct 10, 2006 11:05 am Post subject: |
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Yup!!! I tested this baby mobo with Live CD, and rocks solid like a miracle!
Thank you for your help!
Kind regards,
orange_juice |
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StinkingMonkey
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Joined: 24 May 2003
Posts: 183
Location: UK
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| Posted: Sun Oct 15, 2006 12:12 pm Post subject: |
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Thats a relief orange  , have had one sitting next to me for about 2 months, have been waiting for my new cpu to arrive, so nice to know that someone has tested and verified this mobo works, thanks.
_________________
Intel Q6600, Asus P5N32-E SLI, Audigy2 ZS, Gainward 7950 |
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orange_juice
Guru
Joined: 16 Feb 2006
Posts: 588
Location: Athens - Greece
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| Posted: Sun Oct 15, 2006 1:32 pm Post subject: |
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Yup!  LiveCD seems to be working just fine!
In a few days I will have built my system and I will be trying to install Gentoo. I will be back for further info!
Kind regards,
orange_juice |
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96140
Retired Dev
Joined: 23 Jan 2005
Posts: 1324
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| Posted: Sun Oct 15, 2006 2:42 pm Post subject: |
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| A 500W PSU is overkill. Even at max load, you're probably not going to be drawing more than ~250W, assuming you're using only one graphics card. Note: If you're not planning on running SLI, then why bother with such an expensive board? Go for something with all the features, but only half the price. Boards based on nForce 570 would probably be much better choices. |
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orange_juice
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Joined: 16 Feb 2006
Posts: 588
Location: Athens - Greece
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| Posted: Sun Oct 15, 2006 11:30 pm Post subject: |
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I intend to use SLI but not currently... I also want to experiment with video processing.
The problem is that I cannot afford a complete system for the moment and I am building just its base.
At last, and being honnest, I am also doing a "constructive shopping therappy" 
I think that it is my time to exaggerate -a bit- and I am plainly enjoying it!
I am running 2 years on an Intel P4 Prescott 3GHZ, and ASRock P4VM8. It is great but... Enough! This will become my firewall now!!!
(OpenBSD with chrooted Apache as a reverse proxy and SNORT etc etc...)
This should be it...
Allow me a question: If I use 250W of a 500W PSU, does the PSU draw 250W from the socket, or it draws 500W and uses only 250W?
Kind regards,
orange_juice |
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96140
Retired Dev
Joined: 23 Jan 2005
Posts: 1324
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| Posted: Sun Oct 15, 2006 11:51 pm Post subject: |
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No, you're only pulling 250W, regardless of your PSU's rating.
As far as power consumption goes, I would check The Tech Report and AnandTech. Read the video card reviews, and especially check out the power consumption figures under load (most often when playing the latest games maxed out). If I recall correctly, not once does any system, even those with power-hungry SLI setups, ever even break 300W. Even if they did hit a ~300W peak, it's still well below what you'd need. Even a 380W PSU can handle an overclocked SLI rig.
Save some money when doing your comparison shopping -- you don't need all 500W. If you want to stay on the safe side, get a 430W PSU. I recommend anything by Seasonic; they're known for making very quiet, efficient, high-quality power supplies. They also just started offering modular PSUs, so that should help greatly reduce cable clutter. |
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orange_juice
Guru
Joined: 16 Feb 2006
Posts: 588
Location: Athens - Greece
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| Posted: Mon Oct 16, 2006 2:11 pm Post subject: |
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Thank you for your help. I will check those links. Your argument is very reliefing because PSU wattage is kind of an over-exaggerated issue.
I can find the only available Seasonic in the local market which is a PSU S12-430Watt(430HT) at the same price with Enermax Liberty 500W. I always wanted an Enermax PSU and since the rate of the PSU does not affect consumtion I think I will go for the latter. However, it is very importat for me to be aware of what I am buying and why and you gave me a very importat hint.
I will make some comparisons and decide taking in consideration the new hints and also the availability in the local market (meaning my country's market).
Thank you again!
Kind regards,
orange_juice |
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weaksauce
Apprentice
Joined: 17 Nov 2005
Posts: 204
Location: NYC
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| Posted: Sat Oct 21, 2006 1:15 am Post subject: |
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hey, if anyone has this working, can you tell me which kernel option to select for the alsa card? I haven't messed with it too much, but I'm not sure. I just got the ASUS crosshair nForce 590.
Thanks |
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96140
Retired Dev
Joined: 23 Jan 2005
Posts: 1324
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| Posted: Sat Oct 21, 2006 5:41 am Post subject: |
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| snd-hda-intel should do nicely, since I think that board uses the standard hi-definition audio found on nForce500 chipsets. |
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orange_juice
Guru
Joined: 16 Feb 2006
Posts: 588
Location: Athens - Greece
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| Posted: Sat Nov 11, 2006 8:16 pm Post subject: |
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Hallo!
I have just set up my system and I am currently installing Gentoo.
I just wanted to paste a note marked as important in crosshair's manual:
| Code: | | For a fully configured system, we recommend that you use a power supply (PSU) that complies with ATX 12V Specification 2.0 (or later version) and provides a minimum power of 600W. To support an AMD Dual-Core CPU, make sure that the PSU can provide at least 16A and 19A peak on the +12V_2 lead. |
The system seems to be rocking steadily! If anything occurs I will post back.
Kind regards,
orange_juice |
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weaksauce
Apprentice
Joined: 17 Nov 2005
Posts: 204
Location: NYC
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| Posted: Mon Nov 13, 2006 3:18 pm Post subject: |
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Yeah, I agree. My 500W power supply is plenty it seems, I don't have any problems pulling this board. However I have one question. Has anyone gotten cpu thermal monitoring to work? My /proc/acpi/thermal_zone/THRM/temperature always says 40C which I know isn't right. Which module in the kernel should I activate? Anyone know?
Thanks |
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orange_juice
Guru
Joined: 16 Feb 2006
Posts: 588
Location: Athens - Greece
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| Posted: Mon Nov 20, 2006 6:49 pm Post subject: |
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| weaksauce wrote: | | Has anyone gotten cpu thermal monitoring to work? |
Not yet...
| weaksauce wrote: | | Which module in the kernel should I activate? |
Alsaconf suggests that snd_hda_intel is the right module. However Alsa Soundcard Matrix suggests that snd_intel8x0 is the right module...
It seems that snd_hda_intel is not working for me. I will try the other one... Did you manage to enable it?
Kind regards,
orange_juice |
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weaksauce
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Joined: 17 Nov 2005
Posts: 204
Location: NYC
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| Posted: Mon Nov 20, 2006 9:38 pm Post subject: |
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well, so I could use either one, as long as my BIOS option was right. For some reason, legacy non-digital sound was the default in the BIOS for me, so I had to enable i8x0 for sound to work. But, when I changed that option to digital, then snd-hda-intel worked.
Hope this helps. |
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orange_juice
Guru
Joined: 16 Feb 2006
Posts: 588
Location: Athens - Greece
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| Posted: Tue Nov 21, 2006 10:44 pm Post subject: |
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I see! However, I could not find the relevant field in the bios setup... 
Where is it?
I have updated to version 0203 I hope that they have not removed it..!
Kind regards,
orange_juice |
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weaksauce
Apprentice
Joined: 17 Nov 2005
Posts: 204
Location: NYC
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| Posted: Sat Dec 02, 2006 11:53 pm Post subject: |
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sorry juice, I don't remember getting an email about your post. My BIOS seems different than the one in the book, I don't get it. Anyways, in mine, under
Advanced->Onboard Device Configuration->HD Audio
set it to Auto to use SND_HDA_INTEL or Disabled to use SND_INTEL8x0
Also, I can't play dvds. Have you tried to do that/ have any advice for kernel options? It's not a permission issue, btw, because it gives the same error as root. (And I can rip dvds in Windoze but it doesn't work in Linux).
k3b - I can burn cds and dvds and play cds, but when I try to rip a dvd I get "could not open device /dev/hda" (hda is the correct device)
xine - two popus.
1) There is no input plugin available to handle 'dvd:/'. Maybe MRL syntax is wrong of file/stread source doesn't exist.
2) The source can't be read. Maybe you don't have enough rights for this, or source doesn't contain data (...)(/dev/hda)
Again, same errors that I get if I run these apps as root. Also, dd will fail after about 253MB of copying to an image, and say Input/Output Error. This happens with every dvd i've tried (pressed movies) |
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orange_juice
Guru
Joined: 16 Feb 2006
Posts: 588
Location: Athens - Greece
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| Posted: Mon Dec 04, 2006 5:17 pm Post subject: |
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Hallo,
The delay causes no problem to me... Those things happen!
| weaksauce wrote: |
Advanced->Onboard Device Configuration->HD Audio
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Thank you!
| weaksauce wrote: |
Also, I can't play dvds. Have you tried to do that/ have any advice for kernel options? |
Have you enabled the hal useflag while compiling kdebase?
| weaksauce wrote: | | k3b - I can burn cds and dvds and play cds, but when I try to rip a dvd I get "could not open device /dev/hda" (hda is the correct device) |
Unfortunatelly, I do not have a recorder...
Kind regards,
orange_juice |
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weaksauce
Apprentice
Joined: 17 Nov 2005
Posts: 204
Location: NYC
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| Posted: Mon Dec 04, 2006 6:43 pm Post subject: |
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| well, I just recompiled k3b with it, I'm compiling kioslaves with it now. First of all, what does it do, second of all, xine-lib doesn't have a hal use flag and it won't play dvds either. I'm stumped. |
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orange_juice
Guru
Joined: 16 Feb 2006
Posts: 588
Location: Athens - Greece
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| Posted: Mon Dec 04, 2006 7:25 pm Post subject: |
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With hal enabled, the computer autodetects and automounts cds or dvds inserted in the players.
| Code: | | hal Enable Hardware Abstraction Layer (HAL) support |
This is the relevant part from my .config file... I was not sure which driver I should enable and therefore...
| Code: | #
# ATA/ATAPI/MFM/RLL support
#
CONFIG_IDE=y
CONFIG_BLK_DEV_IDE=y
#
# Please see Documentation/ide.txt for help/info on IDE drives
#
# CONFIG_BLK_DEV_IDE_SATA is not set
# CONFIG_BLK_DEV_HD_IDE is not set
CONFIG_BLK_DEV_IDEDISK=y
CONFIG_IDEDISK_MULTI_MODE=y
CONFIG_BLK_DEV_IDECD=y
# CONFIG_BLK_DEV_IDETAPE is not set
# CONFIG_BLK_DEV_IDEFLOPPY is not set
# CONFIG_BLK_DEV_IDESCSI is not set
# CONFIG_IDE_TASK_IOCTL is not set
#
# IDE chipset support/bugfixes
#
CONFIG_IDE_GENERIC=y
CONFIG_BLK_DEV_CMD640=y
CONFIG_BLK_DEV_CMD640_ENHANCED=y
CONFIG_BLK_DEV_IDEPNP=y
CONFIG_BLK_DEV_IDEPCI=y
CONFIG_IDEPCI_SHARE_IRQ=y
# CONFIG_BLK_DEV_OFFBOARD is not set
CONFIG_BLK_DEV_GENERIC=y
CONFIG_BLK_DEV_OPTI621=y
CONFIG_BLK_DEV_RZ1000=y
CONFIG_BLK_DEV_IDEDMA_PCI=y
# CONFIG_BLK_DEV_IDEDMA_FORCED is not set
CONFIG_IDEDMA_PCI_AUTO=y
# CONFIG_IDEDMA_ONLYDISK is not set
CONFIG_BLK_DEV_AEC62XX=y
CONFIG_BLK_DEV_ALI15X3=y
# CONFIG_WDC_ALI15X3 is not set
CONFIG_BLK_DEV_AMD74XX=y
CONFIG_BLK_DEV_ATIIXP=y
CONFIG_BLK_DEV_CMD64X=y
CONFIG_BLK_DEV_TRIFLEX=y
CONFIG_BLK_DEV_CY82C693=y
CONFIG_BLK_DEV_CS5520=y
CONFIG_BLK_DEV_CS5520=y
CONFIG_BLK_DEV_CS5530=y
CONFIG_BLK_DEV_HPT34X=y
# CONFIG_HPT34X_AUTODMA is not set
CONFIG_BLK_DEV_HPT366=y
CONFIG_BLK_DEV_SC1200=y
CONFIG_BLK_DEV_PIIX=y
CONFIG_BLK_DEV_IT821X=y
CONFIG_BLK_DEV_NS87415=y
CONFIG_BLK_DEV_PDC202XX_OLD=y
# CONFIG_PDC202XX_BURST is not set
CONFIG_BLK_DEV_PDC202XX_NEW=y
CONFIG_BLK_DEV_SVWKS=y
CONFIG_BLK_DEV_SIIMAGE=y
CONFIG_BLK_DEV_SIS5513=y
CONFIG_BLK_DEV_SLC90E66=y
CONFIG_BLK_DEV_TRM290=y
CONFIG_BLK_DEV_VIA82CXXX=y
# CONFIG_IDE_ARM is not set
CONFIG_BLK_DEV_IDEDMA=y
CONFIG_IDEDMA_IVB=y
CONFIG_IDEDMA_AUTO=y
# CONFIG_BLK_DEV_HD is not set
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Kind regards,
orange_juice |
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weaksauce
Apprentice
Joined: 17 Nov 2005
Posts: 204
Location: NYC
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| Posted: Tue Dec 05, 2006 7:00 pm Post subject: |
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I haven't tried this yet, but just out of curiosity, what kernel sources are you using, and version?
also, could you just attached your whole .config for those kernel sources? I'm just running out of options here....
Thanks |
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Gentoo on AMD64
