amd

[Larry Hartman]

I don't want to frighten you, but if this AMD machine has an ATI video card, 
you may experience less than desirable performance.

You will need to use either 1) the open source ATI driver that typically comes 
with Linux, or 2) download  and install the proprietary ATI driver that ATI 
devs build...the latter option will require some steps.  

In either case there will be no direct rendering.  The first option will be 
suitable for most office/adminstrative/3d low-end graphics apps.  The second 
option will give you much enhanced 3d capability but could cause annoying 
bugs.  Usually ATI releases new drivers to fix bugs about once a month.  ATI 
is in the midst of deciding whether or not to release the video driver code 
to the open source community, which will mean much better, more stable, 
increased performance drivers....

Also, If you are purchasing a laptop with an ATI card, I highly recommend that 
you do not get a laptop with the Radeon XPRESS 200 Mobility...this is the 
worse case scenario and has received by far the most complaints/requests for 
help on the Ubuntu forums.  The other ATI video cards appear to work 
reasonably well.  I have managed to live with my laptop X200M for 8 months 
now, but have spent hours learning how to get it to work and dealing with 
bugs....it is a lot easier with Ubuntu Feisty, but still no fun.

On the wireless side of the house, I also highly recommend that you stay away 
from the Broadcomm Corporation BCM4318 [AirForce One 54g] 802.11g Wireless 
LAN Controller (rev 02).  Broadcomm has not released any Linux drivers, all 
efforts to make Broadcomm work are open source reverse engineering.  While 
most of the Broadcomm cards appear to be working well, the one I mentioned 
above--found in laptops--has the most issues, and receives the most attention 
on the Ubuntu Forums.  If you go with this card, you may not get your 
wireless to work with encryption.

Like I said, I am running kubuntu 7.04 with both of these devices, 7.04 plays 
much better with these devices than any previous version--so progress is 
made.  So I dont want to turn you off, just give you pointed advice on what 
is known not to work well.  If this is your first time with linux, kubuntu is 
a good choice and worth the effort in learning.

I am immensely enjoying linux, but knowing what I know now, would not have 
bought AMD/ATI/Broadcomm and have gone with Intel/NVidia setup.  The 
community is exerting pressure on these companies, but it may take some time 
for them to move fully in our direction.

Larry

On Monday 18 June 2007 06:18:01 am Phil Pinkerton wrote:
> If it helps I installed Ubuntu 64bit on an amd64 with no problems I here it
> will also work with Ubuntu 32bit and in some cases it seemd the 32 bit
> Ubuntu works better than the 64bit.
>
> phil
>
> On 6/18/07, guido dom <guido.dom at gmail.com> wrote:
> > Planning to buy a AMD desktop pc, I wonder if (K)Ubuntu 7.04 can be
> > installed on 32 bits AMD PC's.
> >
> > Vermits ik de aankoop overweeg van een (32 bit) AMD desktop PC, vraag ik
> > me af of (K)Ubuntu daarop kan geïnstalleerd worden.
> >
> > Thanks/Bedankt
> >
> > --
> > Tel:+32 (0)58 239804  +32 (0)497 538736
> >
> > Nog een mooie dag toegewenst.
> >
> > Guido (dompie) Dom
> > --
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