Project: Vista S.F.F.

[blk03MitsuES]

i'm putting blue industrial on the side for now as i dont really have a budget for a new system and the VIA c3 i found would look funny inside the big frame...

if you're a follower of my dumb useless and boring threads, you will know that i came across a VIA c3 system.

well i have been taking my laptop to work for a while now and i dont really like moving it around from home to work and vise versa. not that i'm lazy it's just that i feel like i'm going to drop it or something bad is going to happen to it. so i want to make a pc for my office. being broke and looking to purchase a condo dont really help out much as to saving for a brand new spanking system. so, i told my wife to look around to see what i was usually doing at the office on the laptop. and i guess all i do is use MS Office(word and excel), Firefox, winamp and a little of Photoshop and illustrator. so i realized the little VIA c3 1ghz, 256mb ram, 60gig hd, and ethernet connect would serve me right. so......

first of all "vista" is the name of the company i work for and SFF, well i'm sure you know it stands for small form factor. with that said here are my plans

OS
XUbuntu or Ubuntu 7 or Ubuntu Ultimate 1.2

Hardware
ECS mobo
VIA C3 1ghz processor
256mb of ram(can take up to 1gig)
4 external 1 internal USB 2.0 PCI card
160w PSU
60 gig 72,000rpm HDD
Slim cdrw/dvd combo drive(might or might not go in)

Case
plexi case, pieced together by me as in not an already made kit. clear plexi glass.

mobo is a little taller than 9 1/2 inches and a little smaller than 7 1/2 inches. just by that alone you can see its going to be a small case. and it's got to be wide enough for the pci cards. i already got one for the USB 2.0 as it only had USB 1.0. the other two things that will go inside the case are 60gig HDD and PSU. i got a slim drive cd rw and dvd combo that i dunno if i can fit into the case, physically i can but looks wise i dunno.

[blk03MitsuES]

first update

the system was pieced together and installed XUbuntu 7. Everything worked fine so then i tried Ubuntu 7. ran kinda slow provably due to the fact that it barely met the 256mb of ram requirement. i then tried re installing XUbuntu but for some reason the live cd couldnt format the HDD, something about boot not found in the partition.... after a couple of times, i got tired of the same message so i loaded ubuntu 6 as version 7 stopped loading from the hard drive. 6 formatted the drive and installed without a glitch. so today i'm going to try installing XUbuntu yet again.

it's sunday morning and i dont feel like getting up just yet but as soon as i do, i'll take some pics of what i got so far......:bunny:

[.Maleficus.]

Sounds cool man. Were you installing Feisty? Or Edgy? I wasn't aware that Feisty came out already... Damn, I might have to check it out. Gentoo is nice and all, but installing from source for every app. takes ages... Not to mention manual updating...

Also, I recommend you download System Rescue CD (http://www.sysresccd.org/Main_Page) so you can format everything very easily in the future.

[blk03MitsuES]

i promised. and dont think i just got out of bed cus i actually just got back lol.
i just had lots of things come up during the day.

http://www.bvcmfg.com/DSC00750.JPG
that's the room where i do most of my work, play a little 360 and get to sleep when wifey is pissed lol
http://www.bvcmfg.com/DSC00751.JPG
my everyday system. nothing special. 2.2gh AMD, 1 gig of ram, 80 gig HD. ah yes, you can see the disassembled 2.5" screen
http://www.bvcmfg.com/DSC00752.JPG
close up of the case
http://www.bvcmfg.com/DSC00753.JPG
here's the VIA system. original case but i had two add the fans since it didnt have any.
http://www.bvcmfg.com/DSC00754.JPG
running Ubuntu

i couldt get XUbuntu installed for some reason. so i just got tired and dont remember which version i finally installed but i think its Feisty 'cus gnome wouldnt load on the Ubuntu Ultimate versions.....

[blk03MitsuES]

i went to check and its Ubuntu 6........

[Omega]

Run Ubuntu Ultimate.

It's made of awesome.

[blk03MitsuES]

Run Ubuntu Ultimate.

It's made of awesome.

i tried ultimate 1.2 but when i tried loading it was telling me Gnome couldnt load and therefore some settings were not available. figured maybe it was cus i was running off the cd but i didnt get that message when fiesty loaded. so i didnt want to go through the trouble of installing it to find out something was not going to work.

[Luke122]

Good choice on Ubuntu.. I keep telling people to check it out, and once they do, they are hooked! Easily the most friendly flavor of Linux I've used, and despite the learning curve (which is not too bad), most people are 100% comfortable with it in just a few days.

And once I get some stable ATI drivers for my gpu and get WoW running in Wine, good bye XP. :D (on my home machine at least)

If I'm not mistaken, you can actually upgrade your install of Ubuntu through the add/remove programs to the newest release. I'll have to confirm this, but I'm pretty sure that's what I did with one of my other PC's here.

[blk03MitsuES]

Good choice on Ubuntu.. I keep telling people to check it out, and once they do, they are hooked! Easily the most friendly flavor of Linux I've used, and despite the learning curve (which is not too bad), most people are 100% comfortable with it in just a few days.

And once I get some stable ATI drivers for my gpu and get WoW running in Wine, good bye XP. :D (on my home machine at least)

If I'm not mistaken, you can actually upgrade your install of Ubuntu through the add/remove programs to the newest release. I'll have to confirm this, but I'm pretty sure that's what I did with one of my other PC's here.

yes sir it is possible


sudo aptitude install xubuntu-desktop

i noticed you can install lots of things from either the command or through the synaptic something something. but the thing i dont get is, for it to install a package thats not somewhere in the PC, do i got to be hooked up to the net?

[Luke122]

Yes indeed.. must be hooked to the net. The software repositories are just hosts on the internet that provide the install libraries to your PC.

[blk03MitsuES]

well i got the case completely stripped... so i pretty much only got the small mobo, hdd, psu and usb2.0 pci card in a basket. the case had a removable mobo tray.

[blk03MitsuES]

just closed escrow about two weeks ago, last week i spent it replacing the carpet with tile, painting the inside of the house, landscaping work, cleaning, moving and my fulltime job at the office...... do i need to say i havent had time for my project or does the first part give it away?
anyways, i've had some time at work to contemplate every type of case materials and shapes.

shape - box
Frame - 90 degree aluminum bars
panels - clear acrylic
Dimensions - 10" L x 8" W x 6" T
components - Via C3 Mobo, 20 gig HD and PSU
Time for completion - sometime in my lifetime
OS - Linux Mint

[calumc]

i have to say linux mint is great, ive gone straight from xp onto it and am absolutely lovin it! it even comes with beryl preinstalled! for anyone that doesnt know what beryl is put it into youtube and youll see......
o ya and the development team are mad :p

[SgtM]

Congrats on the house. I just closed on mine on the 14th.. Started moving yesterday. What part of So Cal are you in? I spent 3 years at Camp Pendleton (Oceanside).