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My old faithful Netgear WGT634U, died of a Lightning Strike. I was checking up on eBay and found a few Mini-ITX Motherboards. I have a spare Power Supply/HDD.

 

I am thinking of buying one of these, to use as router + torrent dler

 

Intel D201GLY "Little Valley" Mini ITX Motherboard

VIA EPIA

Jetway VIA Motherboards

 

Any suggestions?? Probably will be using Linux on the machine.

Both www.mini-itx.com and www.epiacenter.com have a lot of useful resources about mini-ITX boards.

 

My advice would be to get a Core2Duo board with an Intel chipset that matches Mac hardware. That way, should you decide to run Hackintosh it will be easier to do. Even if you're not currently planning to run OS X on it, it gives you the flexibility in the future should you change your mind.

 

As you're planning to run Linux, I can recommend the following:

3D graphics - if you want 3D graphics (most people do) then go with either Intel or nVidia. Don't bother with ATi as it's too much hassle on linux and definitely stay well away from VIA. VIA's linux support for its (onboard) graphics cards is amazingly {censored}. If you plan on buying a separate graphics card make sure it's nVidia. I can't stress that enough. nVidia provide proprietary drivers for Linux, FreeBSD and Solaris. ATi only does it for Linux and their driver doesn't provide the GLX_EXT_PIXMAP_TO_TEXTURE extension in OpenGL that is fundamental to 3D desktop effects (hence you have to use XGL rather than AIGLX, which is a hassle that can be completely avoided by using Intel or nVidia). VIA? If you buy VIA, forget about 3D.

 

In summary: Core2Duo + Intel chipset + nVidia graphics card (optional)

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