It's being called Kida...

kida after Kidagakash Nedakh.

SPECS

AMD Athlon 64 3200+
AOpen Motherboard w/ Build-In 5.1 Surround Sound and Gb Ethernet
Lite On Midtower Case w/ 400w Power Supply
Crucial 1GB DDR RAM
240GB IDE Hard Disk Space (1x120 Seagate, 2x60 Maxtor)
PNY GeForceFX 5200 128MB AGP Video Card
Adaptec SCSI Card
Actiontec 56K Internal Modem
Logitech Keyboard
Logitech Trackball
Dell 17" CRT
Sony Floppy Drive
IO Gear 2 Port Audio KVM Switch (to share components w/ older machine)
Twin Speakers w/ Subwoofer
HP Deskjet 722C
HP Scanjet 5P SCSI
SuSE 9.1 Pro, 32 bit
WinXP Pro, 32 bit

PURPOSE

This is a home machine, designed for number crunching on the Linux side. Occasionally I work from home, and I crunch lots of data in large files. It is not unusual for some of my algorithms to make trillions (10^12) of passes. Accordingly, I need a fast box. I also need something that isn't going to break the wallet.

On the Windows side, I need something my wife can use. She uses AOL and therefore the box must support her too. I also have a game weakness. Enter The Matrix and URU await.

FIRST HOMEBUILT COMPUTER

This is the first machine I've made. The last tower I purchased was a Dell, a P3/800MHz box. While good, I spent considerable money and time making it accommodate my needs. This time I figured I'd start from scratch.

ASSEMBLY

Everything went together well. The equipment assembled easily. Although the case didn't have much in terms of instructions, there was sufficient information and pieces to make it work. The m'board documentation was a sort of Taiwenglish, mostly comprehensible.

OS WARS

Windows installed very easily, first time. The drivers that weren't on the MS CD were available on CDs from equiment manufacturers (AOpen, PNY, for instance). While I am no fan of Windows or MS software, the Windows side was easy.

SuSE did not install very easily, nor did it install on the first attempt with the 32 bit version. I have since successfully installed SuSE, having circumvented its foibles.

begin mini-rant

Linux meets my needs much better than Windows. At present, SuSE Linux is my distro of choice. My experience is that Linux is more powerful, stable, and secure than Windows. My expectation was that installing MS Windows and SuSE on a virgin box would be equally as frustrating; in truth, Windows installs much easier. I'll take SuSE over XP any day of the week. However, I'd still like SuSE if it installed better.

Another little twist is that I tried the 64 bit version of SuSE. Mostly it worked, but "mostly" isn't enough for me. Imnsho, the 64 bit version isn't yet ready for prime time. I'll see how they do in the 9.2 release.

end mini-rant

AMD

I've said very little about the AMD chip. After running a 24 hour burn-in which ran flawlessly, this has been an otherwise unobtrusive little device. It is fast. On a simple benchmark of mine, it is:

2.2x the speed of my office Dell P4/2.2GHz tower
2.6x the speed of my home IBM P4M/1.6GHz laptop
5.0x the speed of my home Dell P3/800MHz tower

So far I'm impressed.

CLOSING

I was asked by a friend if I'd do it again. "Yes. Absolutely!"

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Evil Math Ogre Kgh-Ra

Linux - Fast Pane Relief