This is the base model that I was going to get:
http://www.shopping.hp.com/webapp/sh...=d5000t_series
I was going to make a few tweaks, and end up with the following specs (quoted for ease of reading):
Will I experience any driver problems or any other errors with those specs? As for the brands of several of the items, such as the RAM, Bluray burner, and modem... I really don't know. I assume its whatever HP usually uses, but I can't find it on their website.Windows Vista Preinstalled (it better come with back-up discs so I can virtualize later...)
Intel(R) Core(TM) 2 Quad processor Q9300 (2.5GHz)
8GB DDR2 RAM
1GB NVIDIA GeForce 9800GT, 2 DVI, HDMI adapter
1.5TB 7200rpm SATA 3Gb/s two hard drives (2x750GB)
I'm not sure about the modem... this PC will be sitting right next to the router, so I'm not investing in wireless. I'm having trouble finding what kind of modems come preinstalled on HP's... but modems tend to work by default, so that shouldn't be an issue with Ubuntu.
BluRay Burner/Reader (again, don't know brand. I'm sure the HP website lists it somewhere, but I'm overlooking it... :\) ...wait - can ubuntu burn/play Blurays anyway? I can't get my laptop to acknowledge the existence of a blank DVD in the drive, let alone burn with it... Bluray can present more problems. Does anyone have any experience with Bluray and Ubuntu?
SoundBlaster X-Fi Extreme Gamer Sound card
I really want to get Windows out of my life. Sadly, I can't, so my plans are to emulate Vista (I'd like to avoid dualbooting if possible) so I can run my Zune software and games... I've been missing out on too many games lately Are there any problems with VirtualBox'ing Vista to play DirectX10 games... such as Gears of War or Crysis, to name a few examples?
The following two questions are slightly off-topic, but I might as well ask in one topic instead of making three of them.
I was looking at Ubuntu Studio. Has anyone ever used it? What's it like? I assume its pretty much the same as Ubuntu, in that I could run all programs I run in Ubuntu on it, and everything generally works the same as in Ubuntu?
Finally, is there a great TVersity-like program that can make my PC a media server, streaming media to my PS3/360/other PCs? Preferably supporting the file formats that the PS3 reads (MP3, Atrac, and WMA, I believe - I'm not sure if ogg is supported or not, tbqh).
Sorry for this long mess of questions, but I'm finally getting a new computer (first in six years, so I'm very, very happy), and I want to avoid Windows any time I can, but I don't want to give up my Zune and games (one of the reasons I'm opting for a pretty high-end PC like this) just to do that. Thanks for any help.
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