From owner-freebsd-questions Mon Nov 27 17:38:50 2000 Delivered-To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Received: from guru.mired.org (okc-65-26-235-186.mmcable.com [65.26.235.186]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with SMTP id 0857A37B479 for ; Mon, 27 Nov 2000 17:38:48 -0800 (PST) Received: (qmail 33240 invoked by uid 100); 28 Nov 2000 01:38:46 -0000 From: Mike Meyer MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Message-ID: <14883.3238.844868.291778@guru.mired.org> Date: Mon, 27 Nov 2000 19:38:46 -0600 (CST) To: biz@bacon.cs.uchicago.edu Cc: questions@freebsd.org Subject: Re: but what box?? In-Reply-To: <104810482@toto.iv> X-Mailer: VM 6.75 under 21.1 (patch 10) "Capitol Reef" XEmacs Lucid X-face: "5Mnwy%?j>IIV\)A=):rjWL~NB2aH[}Yq8Z=u~vJ`"(,&SiLvbbz2W`;h9L,Yg`+vb1>RG% *h+%X^n0EZd>TM8_IB;a8F?(Fb"lw'IgCoyM.[Lg#r\ X-Message: You should get a better mailer. Sender: owner-freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG Precedence: bulk X-Loop: FreeBSD.ORG biz@bacon.cs.uchicago.edu types: > i have looked at the hardware compatibility list, but it is more > modular than what i need. i'd like to just know of an existing box, > NOT custom built, from a known vendor (or just widely used in freebsd > community). Well, the Sony VAIO is reported to work really well, but that's a lousy config for a server. Which is the problem with most "off-the-shelf" boxes. To get a reasonable server config off the shelf, you'll have to buy hardware you don't need (internal modem, high-performance video card, etc.). If you want a high performance box, your best best is to order a system from someone on the list at . Yeah, it may be custom, but some of them have standard configuration you can buy. If you poke around, you might even find someone who'll preinstall all the software you need for your list of services. I ordered from ASA, and have been very happy with the hardware, though I reinstalled the OS the day I got it (because that happened to be the day that 3.0-RELEASE was released). For a low-end server, it doesn't really matter. All you need is a builtin ethernet that's supported, or a PCI slot for an ethernet card. Everything else you're going to use is so standard as to be immaterial: one IDE HD, one ATAPI cdrom, keyboard, mouse, and a video card that isn't going to leave console mode. The builtin modem won't be usable, but probably isn't avoidable. Don't pay extra for a DVD drive or CDRW or USB or FireWire or ...), though you'll probably have to buy one or more of them. For my last such box, I bought a Toshiba BookPC, because I wanted something to cram on a bookshelf and forget about. The TV-out to a TV-in card saves the space of a monitor, even.