Date: Wed, 24 Mar 1999 11:33:40 -0800 (PST) From: Mark Bermal <mark@ieng9.ucsd.edu> To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Cc: Luc Segers <Luc.Segers@vnet.atea.be> Subject: Re: real newbie doubting between linux/freebsd Message-ID: <Pine.BSF.4.05.9903241110010.274-100000@celerystick.inetworld.net>
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You seem to be a gamer type, concerning the hardware you're considering. But the new motherboards w/ the 133 front side bus I don't think will be released until second have of 1999, probably fall, and if you actually are going to buy such expensive hardware, why not go all the way w/ the video card (TNT2 is looking really good, as is Matrox G400 w/ its features)? Also, I would keep an eye out to see when AMD K7 will be released, on paper it looks good, but there have been no real benchmarks done. By the way, the K6-3 isn't always faster than an equally clocked Pentium III, it depends on the software. For applications that use a lot of floating point calculations (e.g. 3D rendering) that aren't optimized for 3D-NOW! instructions, a current Intel processor is always best. Best buy right now is the Celeron, even at the lower bus speeds (despite what Intel wants you to believe the jump from 66 to 100 MHz bus doesn't give a large improvement). If you really want to find out more about hardware performance, check out one of the many hardware sites (www.tomshardware.com, www.anandtech.com, www.aceshardware.com etc) The S3 Savage4 card probably won't be fully supported by XFree86 at its release date, but S3 is usually very well supported, so future support is almost certain, however waiting for support can be very annoying. As for soundblaster, rumor has it that one of the guys from the ggi project recently got a Creative Labs position as a driver programmer for Linux, so supposedly there is going to support for Linux in the future, whether FreeBSD will benefit, I dunno. It is also not known when the drivers will be out. Even OSS hasn't gotten technical docs from Creative for Soundblaster Live!, which really isn't a good sign. All in all, though, I think linux is faster to support new hardware, as it gets a lot of 3rd party support and a lot of press. I chose FreeBSD over linux however because of linux emulation: FreeBSD can run most linux binaries with no troubles. I would wait until you actually are going to buy the system, and see what hardware is supported then. Get a list of possible hardware for purchase, some that might be supported, and some backups that are supported, that way you can get a full working system when you install. Mark Bermal To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-questions" in the body of the message
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