Hardware Report : Li-Viri Asus CrossFire Motherboard / Athlon64 X2 / 2gigs Ram / x1900 AIW / Via Envy Sound card In : Mepis Linux 7 Beta 5 by : je.saist While AMD has yet to add official CrossFire support to their Catalyst drivers that doesn't mean that users should avoid their CrossFire Motherboards. Seeing as how this system was also built with Donators Money, I think it's in my best interest to show where the donations go.  Motherboard: The motherboard is Asus's MR32-MVP. This uses the R580 Crossfire edition chipset with an SB-600 southbridge.  I like the layout of the motherboard, nothing is really in a truely bad position. This motherboard also shipped with a few features I really liked. Notice the Red and Blue plugs on the left hand side? Those are the Firewire and USB ports. In the lower left hand corner is a set of white pins that are used for the various system LED's, power switch, and reset switch. Asus includes with this motherboard risers for each of these 3 plugs, with each wire clearly labeled. So the cables that come from the case plug into the risers, which then plug into the motherboard. It's a small touch, but it makes it easier for older cases where you'd have separate leads for each wire. Another nice touch, although it's one I didn't use, is the use of a coaxial audio output on the back side. The only complaint I have is that the motherboard did not ship with the hard-bridge for crossfire cards... that has to be picked up separately. Processor: The processor in use is the AMD Athlon64 X2 6000+. At 3ghz, what else can you say besides "this thing is fast"   An interesting tidbit is the Kpowersave report  Network : This motherboard uses the Marvell 88E8001 Gigabit LAN Controller. As shown below, it has been picked up.  Memory: The memory comes from Patriot, it's their 2gig dual channel memory kit.  With stock timings of 4,4,4,12, it's pretty fast.  Storage: This motherboard uses the AMD SB600 Southbridge to handle most of it's storage. As shown, that isn't a problem for Mepis Linux.  This motherboard also has an external SATA port powered by a Jmicron 360 SATA controller, although I don't have any SATA On-The-Go hardware to test with. USB Controller: The AMD SB600 chip also handles USB support. However, since the keyboard and mouse I'm currently using came from Apevia and use the PS/2 ports, I popped an ATi Remote Wonder II reciever on to make sure the USB ports were working.  Sound: The sound card is Chaintech's Via Envy based AV-710. (yes, I have one to send to Warren so that he can get optical out working)  X.org: Okay, the final part... graphics. The X-server screen doesn't really say anything about what graphics are in use...  but the Catalyst control centers shows that the Radeon x1900 is on a x16 bus setting.  And Cedega confirms... yes, this system is very much Operational.  Take me back to the Guides. |