[gentoo-user] Current Dells and UEFI/secureboot (or other showstoppers)?

[gentoo-user] Current Dells and UEFI/secureboot (or other showstoppers)?

[Walter Dnes]

  The reason I'm asking is that I have 2 Dell desktops ("production" and
"hot backup") that are pushing 5 or 6 years of age, and I need to
replace at least one.  They simply can't keep up with HD video
streams...
* it could keep up with Youtube 480p videos fullscreen under ADSL 5
  megabit service.  The stream was the limit.
* after the speed was bumped up, it could keep up with Youtube 720p
  videos fullscreen under ADSL 6 megabit service.  The stream was
  the limit.  The download still couldn't keep up with 1080p videos.
* This week, I moved from "legacy 6 GAS" to "FTTN 7".  Unlike GAS, FTTN
  speeds are net, not gross.  So my Speedtest.net results jumped from
  approx 5.1-5.2 megabits to 7.1-7.2 megabits, and it can keep up with
  1080p streams.
* The "newer", more powerful, machine can play 1080p Youtube videos
  under Firefox in the "large player", but the load is pegged at between
  2.5 and 3.  For a 2-core machine, that's bad.  The leaner Midori can
  play the same video with a load between 1.7 and 2.1, which is pushing
  it.  Going to fullscreen, it stutters noticably under Firefox.  Midori
  can just barely keep up in fullscreen mode.
* The machine can play NHL GameCenter Live at the slowest stream
  (400 kbits/sec).  It doesn't even show the other options (800, 1600,
  and 3000)

  The 1080p video was http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=US3Px2sePWk  Note
that you have to manually select 1080p.  The "fmt=" option doesn't seem
to work anymore.

  The onboard Intel GPU is not the problem; it's the CPU trying to keep
up with Flash.  And before anyone asks...
* I'm running Gentoo with full optimizations
* I'm running ICEWM with no "desktop environment"; see my sig
So I don't think there are any more optimizations to be had, other than
a new PC.  Assuming there are no showstoppers, I'll be buying another
Dell.  They seem to last for me.

-- 
Walter Dnes <waltdnes@waltdnes.org>
I don't run "desktop environments"; I run useful applications

Re: [gentoo-user] Current Dells and UEFI/secureboot (or other showstoppers)?

[Philip Webb]

130330 Walter Dnes wrote:
>  I have 2 Dell desktops ("production" and "hot backup")
> that are pushing 5 or 6 years of age, and I need to replace at least one.
> They simply can't keep up with HD video streams...
> * I'm running Gentoo with full optimizations
> * I'm running ICEWM with no "desktop environment"; see my sig
> So I don't think there are any more optimizations to be had,
> other than a new PC.  Assuming there are no showstoppers,
>  I'll be buying another Dell.  They seem to last for me.

Why don't you build a custom machine ?  I've built  4  since 2000 :
it's cheaper & you get exactly what you want.
IIRC you live in the Toronto area : I bought all my parts
at Canada Computers on College St, which has an excellent website.
There's lots of advice via this list once you decide to try.

-- 
========================,,============================================
SUPPORT     ___________//___,   Philip Webb
ELECTRIC   /] [] [] [] [] []|   Cities Centre, University of Toronto
TRANSIT    `-O----------O---'   purslowatchassdotutorontodotca

Re: [gentoo-user] Current Dells and UEFI/secureboot (or other showstoppers)?

[Stroller]

On 30 March 2013, at 04:20, Walter Dnes wrote:
> ...
> * it could keep up with Youtube 480p videos fullscreen under ADSL 5
>  megabit service.  The stream was the limit.
> * after the speed was bumped up, it could keep up with Youtube 720p
>  videos fullscreen under ADSL 6 megabit service.  The stream was
>  the limit.  The download still couldn't keep up with 1080p videos.
> * This week, I moved from "legacy 6 GAS" to "FTTN 7".  Unlike GAS, FTTN
>  speeds are net, not gross.  So my Speedtest.net results jumped from
>  approx 5.1-5.2 megabits to 7.1-7.2 megabits, and it can keep up with
>  1080p streams.

Sorry, but the speed of your broadband is irrelevant. 

You can show the resolution and format of YouTube videos with:
   youtube-dl -F http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=US3Px2sePWk

(package is net-misc/youtube-dl)

Decide whether or not you need a new PC and make a new post - UEFI/secureboot is irrelevant to poor YouTube performance.

Stroller.

Re: [gentoo-user] Current Dells and UEFI/secureboot (or other showstoppers)?

[Walter Dnes]

On Sat, Mar 30, 2013 at 05:39:15PM +0000, Stroller wrote
> 
> Decide whether or not you need a new PC and make a new post -
> UEFI/secureboot is irrelevant to poor YouTube performance.

  I may not have been as clear as I wanted to be.  With the increase in
my download speed, the bottleneck to Youtube/etc performance is now my
PC.  I *HAVE* decided to replace it.  The only question is with what.

  As per the subject line, I'm asking if current Dells have any
showstoppers for Gentoo.  If not, I'll probably go with a Dell.  My
usage patterns may be different from yours, but Dells have lasted more
years for me than other brands or custom-built machines.

-- 
Walter Dnes <waltdnes@waltdnes.org>
I don't run "desktop environments"; I run useful applications

Re: [gentoo-user] Current Dells and UEFI/secureboot (or other showstoppers)?

[Alan McKinnon]

On 31/03/2013 00:20, Walter Dnes wrote:
> On Sat, Mar 30, 2013 at 05:39:15PM +0000, Stroller wrote
>>
>> Decide whether or not you need a new PC and make a new post -
>> UEFI/secureboot is irrelevant to poor YouTube performance.
> 
>   I may not have been as clear as I wanted to be.  With the increase in
> my download speed, the bottleneck to Youtube/etc performance is now my
> PC.  I *HAVE* decided to replace it.  The only question is with what.
> 
>   As per the subject line, I'm asking if current Dells have any
> showstoppers for Gentoo.  If not, I'll probably go with a Dell.  My
> usage patterns may be different from yours, but Dells have lasted more
> years for me than other brands or custom-built machines.
> 

I don't know what your budget is, but if you can afford a Precision, buy
a Precision. I'll give you some numbers.

We are 1600 staff in the company, more than half are entitled to
laptops. Low level staff are "encouraged" to get HPs and mid-level
Dell's. More senior staff can basically get any model they want up to a
maximum price (which is very generous). Two models are popular:

Precision M4700 - over 50 bought so far
Whatever Apple thingie Apple sells today

The procurement guy won't tell me failure numbers for Apple (he's
embarrassed). For the Dells, zero maintenance callouts for failure. To
break them, you have to drop them or hit them or stand on them to break
them.

This one of mine is an M4600, the previous model. It's 15 months old and
has given me zero issues just like the 5 Dells before it in a row :-)
Same for the wife's (she got one too)

The few fellows that got the 17" M6700 range reckon it is actually too
big and heavy, stick with the 15" models. Gentoo installs on this one
just fine, I use it in BIOS mode, but UEFI works great. I switched back
simply because I don't fully grok UEFI and BIOS is familiar ground.

All the other Linux users report the same results, including those who
bought the XPS range.

Two tips though:
Don't upsize a Precision to an optical slot drive, stick with the
standard tray (dodgy discs stick inside and cause woes).
Get the larger 9 cell battery, the 6 cell sucks on battery life

-- 
Alan McKinnon
alan.mckinnon@gmail.com

Re: [gentoo-user] Current Dells and UEFI/secureboot (or other showstoppers)?

[Stroller]

Sorry if I was terse in my previous reply.

On 30 March 2013, at 22:20, Walter Dnes wrote:
> ...
>  As per the subject line, I'm asking if current Dells have any
> showstoppers for Gentoo.  If not, I'll probably go with a Dell.

I would think Dell would probably be a very good choice.

I know that they support Linux on all their PowerEdge servers (RedHat and I think Suse and now recently they've added Ubuntu certification), and I wouldn't be at all surprised if they offered Linux-supported desktops, too.

I'd be surprised if there was a Dell that Linux didn't run on, TBH.

> My usage patterns may be different from yours, but Dells have lasted more
> years for me than other brands or custom-built machines.

Yeah, I have most always recommended Dell, myself.

Generally speaking they have best, or amongst the best, economies of scale when it comes to off-the-shelf desktop PCs. Gamers are never satisfied with the graphics cards in off-the-shelf desktop PCs, everyone else is.

It's all very well building your own PC - and I'll likely do that myself next time - until you're posting here saying "I'm experiencing random reboots and kernel panics, every 12 hours or so, and I don't know which of these dozen components to return to the supplier". You can spend hours debugging that - I've known such hardware crashes to be caused by RAM, by power supplies and even by floppy drives and CD-ROMs - and it's more than my time's worth, honestly. It's worth a hundred quid to me not to have to deal with that.

I've had amazing service on Dell's business support, even at the bronze level. An acquaintance's son's laptop died with a failed GPU and regular artefacts at 13 months old, warranty expired by a month. One snotty letter later, "sale of goods act, european law, up to 6 years" and a little Dell man was on his doorstep, very helpful.  

http://lists.us.dell.com/

I don't have experience of UEFI/secureboot, but I'll bet that the popular alarm is unwarranted. "Microsoft are trying to make it impossible to boot linux" is the sort of think we've been hearing since Halloween '98.

Stroller.