Building a system that works right away?

Hello, I'm a system programmer so I'm not new to Linux. Therefore, I'm pretty sure I should expect problems at every turn when trying to start SL: video drivers, libraries, various setup options, links, to name a few...

Since I don't exactly like to futz around with any of that stuff, can someone recommend a setup or distribution that's known to work right out of the box?

Also, I'm planing a new computer altogether, so I can go with any video card that will work (ATI, nvidia, integrated intel if necessary). Would 512MB of video ram help SL considering the ton of textures that can be on the screen at any one time?

Thank you a lot for any constructive response!

Max

I got very good results with Sabayon Linux, which is based on gentoo. Everything you need and more is preinstalled, if you use the DVD version. You could even call it bloated, heh, but everything just works after installation - Videocard drivers, all libraries you need for SL and more. And yes, I guess more videocard RAm would help indeed to cut loadtime. But do yourself a favour and get an Nvidia card. Not cause i dont like ATI, but the ATI linux drivers are horrible compared to those for Nvidia.

-Asriazh

I started with a live Ubuntu 6.10 Edgy Eft CD install. This takes roughly 1/2 hour. After install, login to the new system, open your browser, and goto http://www.albertomilone.com/nvidia_scripts1.html

You will want read the page regarding this procedure and how to do it correctly. This is by far the fastest way I know how to do it for nVidia. I have used several other Linux Variants, and nothing beats the setup time/ease like Ubuntu. IMHO.

HTH


CPU: AMD 2.0 GHZ
Memory: 1012 MB
OS Version: Linux 2.6.17-11-386 #2 Tue Mar 13 23:30:30 UTC 2007 i686
Graphics Card Vendor: NVIDIA Corporation
Graphics Card: GeForce FX 5200/AGP/SSE/3DNOW!
OpenGL Version: 2.1.0 NVIDIA 97.55
LLMozLib Version: 1.1.0 (Mozilla GRE:1.8.0.10_0000000000)
Packets Lost: 4/1437 (0.3%)
Viewer Digest: b1081508-d63c-01df-e6ff-11bbbd1e70a5

Hello and thanks for the replies.

Between Gentoo and Ubuntu I would choose Ubuntu because it's an animal that I know. About the video card, I'm easy one way or the other. If nvidia works better, than so be it.

However, I am not sure what level of video card to get. Does SL do almost everything on the CPU, or does it really use the video cards as much as it can?

One question about Ubuntu. I happen to have it already installed on an Athlon 64 and I noticed that it doesnt have any 32-bit libraries as far as I can tell. Would that be something I get with apt-get or is it possible to download and build the SL client locally?

Thank again.

Max

A good video card usually makes the biggest difference - and for Linux, right now, I'd generally have to recommend nVidia's cards for the quality of the (proprietary...) drivers. The amount of video RAM isn't particularly important for SL past the 256MB mark though (128MB is typically fine too).

I had to install 32 bit libraries for X64 Etch to run SL. apt-get did the trick and I'm pretty sure it's the same for Ubuntu...

As Asriazh mentioned, Sabayon works like a charm out of the box.

I changed from XP to Sabayon now, and the gain of speed is heartwarming.

You install the DVD and everything is there.

My favorite distro now.

And with the new init system, boot time is shortened.

As it is basically Gentoo, you can use the normal portage tree and overlays.

Im surprised noone recommends Fedora Core. Second life runs great on my system, and Second Life works practically out of the box.

Debian on an Dell Inspirion 5150 laptop 1g ram and a 64meg nvidia goforce.
Used the Nvidia installer and SL works fine. As I'm an electronics tech and self taught on computers I would say that any distribution would probably work for you.

mandrivia 2007, im using the free version so i had to install nvidia drivers, but it almost worked right off the disk ... my experiance

installed free version .. this doesnt come with the kernel source strike 1

downloaded the (wrong) kernel source and ran the rpm ... then installed the correct kernel to match the source (it was an upgrade anyway)

rebooted into "safe mode" ran init 3, logged in ran nvidia.run package rebooted again

ran SL

im slightly above novice with linux i found the whole ordeal quite smooth and it took less than 5 min after the first boot

my only beef is the free version didnt come with the kernel source ... if you buy one of the pacages off their website it does, but it also comes with nvidia brand drivers so you shouldnt have to do anything but install it

Meh.
What they said.
I think just about any Debian based distro is going to do the trick with minimal foul ups. That includes Debian, Ubuntu, Kubuntu and any of the others. I'd be suprised if Mandrake, Fedora and Suse have any real problems either.
They key thing seems to be a half decent nvidia graphics card. Here's how I did it...
Think of a budget. "I don't want to spend more than £100" for example.
Then do a scan through your fave online stores for cards around that price.
Now suffer reading through 100's of online benchmark tests for cards that are not quite exactly like the ones you think you've found...
Now buy one.
Wooo!
Oh and RAM. You need RAM. Lots of it. At least 1GB I'd suggest, though if you use a minimal window manager, 512MB might just about scrape it.

[I used to love ATI cards, so if any one wants to stand up and defend them, please do!]

Good news guys, it worked right out of the box. I got a new machine and I know that the system admin installed the nvidia drivers for me, but other than that, it's a fresh install. No need to figure out how to install any extra packages or read FAQs that don't work, which is both great and surprising.

The OS is CentOS 4. The machine is an HP media center converted to Linux: AMD64 5000+ dual core, 2GB of ram, integrated nforce 6150, etc.

In short, this rocks. Windows is now relegated to VM Ware.

If LL needs help with debugging crashes, porting to 64-bit, etc etc, i'll be happy to give a hand.