SL Hardware Compatibility List

[redman]

This thread is about hardware compatibility under Scientific Linux.
Post your hardware and if it works or not. If not, add any steps/tweaks you did to make it work, etc.

Useful info to include in case of motherboards or complete systems is info on the (onboard) devices.
Discussion or problems related to specific hardware should not go here (and will be moderated).

[axel2078]

My system: Dell XPS L502X laptop

Specs:

CPU - i7-2620M
Video - Nvidia GeForce GT 540M 2GB w/Optimus
Memory - 8 GB DDR3
Storage - 750GB 7200 RPM SATA hard drive
Display - HD WLED TL (1366x768) with 2.0 MP webcam
Optical drive - 8X Tray Load CD/DVD burner
Wireless: Intel Centrino Wireless-N 1030 & bluetooth 3.0
Battery - 90 WHr 9-cell
Sound - JBL 2.1 Speakers with Waves Maxx Audio 3
OS - SL 6.1 x86_64 & Windows 7 x86_64

What works out of the box without extra configuration:

wireless
bluetooth
sound
video (defaults to Intel HD 3000 graphics - haven't managed to successfully get nvidia driver installed yet)

What's not so great:

My battery life isn't as good as I'd expect for a 9 cell, but I think this is due to the Nvidia Optimus being turned on all the time even when not in use.

[NeoAmsterdam]

All of these computers use the built-in on-board video or a vendor-supplied stock video board. Bluetooth is not used on any of these computers, so you're on your own.

• Via Artigo A2000 with Scientific Linux 6.1 x86
  • VIA C7-D at 1.5GHz
  • 2GB RAM
  • 2×1tB SATA + 1×4gB CF
  • Known caveats:
    • Although it can run later versions of SL5, the hard disk interface is treated as PATA devices instead of SATA. This causes a major performance hit and massive headaches when upgrading to SL6.
    • Requires an external USB CD/DVD drive to install or an installation image for a bootable USB thumb drive.
    • Drivers for the 802.11 option are made for Ubuntu.
    • OpenSSL refuses to use Via's PadLock (hardware AES).
  • Current uses:
    • NFS NAS
    • MediaWiki
    • Torrents
  • Dual-boots with [stripped-down] Windows XP.
• Dell Dimension C521 with Scientific Linux 6.1 x86-64
  • Athlon 64 X2 at 2GHz
  • 512MB RAM (boosted to 1GB) 2GB RAM
  • 160gB 500gB SATA
  • Known caveats:
    • This model shipped with Windows Vista - remember to dd if=/dev/zero of=/dev/sda thoroughly.
  • Current uses:
    • Development box (C, FreeBASIC, SQLite; NASM eventually)
    • Severe ImageMagick abuse
    • The occassional nostalgia (EGA Trek and QuickBASIC)
  • Triple-boots with Windows XP 64-bit and Ubuntu 11.04 Multi-boots with Windows XP 64-bit, Fedora 14 for x64, Ubuntu 11.04 for x64, Haiku Alpha 2, and MS-DOS.
• Dell Vostro 200 with Scientific Linux 6.1 x86-64
  • Core 2 Duo at 2.2GHz
  • 2GB RAM
  • 80gB SATA
  • No known caveats.
  • General-purpose usage.
  • Dual-boots with Windows XP.
• Dell OptiPlex GX150 with Scientific Linux 5.7 x86
  • Pentium III 1GHz
  • 512MB RAM
  • 10gB HD (PATA?)
  • Known caveats:
    • This model shipped with a plain old CD drive, not a DVD reader - you'll need to make eight CDs.
    • Does not boot from USB devices.
    • Display modes (screen resolution) need to be manually set in /etc/xorg.conf
    • It takes an unreasonably long time to get past POST.
  • Current uses:
    • Samba share
    • Apache + FTP server
• OLPC XO-1 without Scientific Linux
  • Geode at 433MHz
  • 256MB RAM
  • 1gB NAND + 16gB SDHD
  • Known issues:
    • Uses OpenFirmware, not BIOS.
      Booting with OpenFirmware is not directly supported by Scientific Linux and OpenFirmware's BIOS emulation is still a work-in-progress.
    • Requires a "developer's key" (authorization token) to boot from anything other than the internal NAND.
    • Requires an external USB CD/DVD drive to install or an installation image for a bootable USB thumb drive.
      Note: The live USB creator shipped with Scientific Linux does not write a valid olpc.fth boot file, and the live USB creator shipped with Fedora will not recognize Scientific Linux ISOs as a valid OS.
    • Does not appear to support physical address extensions (PAE).
    • Requires specific video and wireless drivers (source code available).
    • Remapping accents and diacriticals on the keyboard may require some effort.
    • Definitely needs a swapfile.
  • Current uses:
    • Impressing the girls with its cuteness.
    • Impressing the suits by running Word, Excel, and PowerPoint simultaneously through Wine.
    • The best box for writing LaTeX documents.
    • Trying other OSs (and failing miserably and repeatedly )
  • Dual-boots with Release 11.2.0 (customized Fedora 14 stored on NAND).

This post has been edited by NeoAmsterdam: Oct 1 2011, 03:30 AM

[NeoAmsterdam]

Addendum in re: Dell Dimension C521 with Scientific Linux 5.7 x86-64

• Known Caveat:
  You must be supply noapic as a kernel argument or you'll never boot. You may see sporadic kernel panic-like dumps on the current tty as a result of this dysfunction. These messages may be safely ignored (but they are rather annoying.)

Dell PowerEdge 1800 with Scientific Linux 5.7 x86-64

• Intel Xeon (Nocona) at 3GHz
• 1GB RAM
• 100gB, CD-ROM, DDS-72 tape drive, and 3.5" floppy drive
• Known caveats:
  • After multiple attempts, I couldn't find a way to install SL 6. I'm not sure if it's because the computer's allergic to something in SL 6 or if it's a post-installation issue. I ended up burning 5.7 onto CDs.
    See "SL 6 on CD? yum upgrade from SL 5?" for more details.
  • The 100gB is composed of four SCSI drives apparently in a hardware RAID configuration. I don't know the specifics of the setup but SL's installer had no problem auto-detecting, erasing, initializing, and installing correctly.
  • Unless I come across some DDS-72-compatible tapes, I can't test the tape drive.
• Current uses:
  • MediaWiki
  • File Server (on a Windows network... still a work-in-progress)
• Planned additional uses:
  • In-house Jabber Server
  • Office automation (upload-overnight-presto!)

[joutlan]

Epson V500 Scanner after downloading the driver.....easy. Not out of the box, but works perfectly with SL. Links on this forum for the driver

Dell Vostro 1400 Laptop
Dell Vostro 3350 Laptop (Sandy Bridge, defaults to Intel Vid)
Dell Precision M6500 Laptop

Kirk out

[Nathan]

Dell Vostro 3550 works beautifully as well.

[Amirul]

System details

Motherboard: ASROCK Q1900M fanless
CPU: Intel Quad-Core Celeron Processor J1900
Memory: 2x4GB DDR3
Chassis: Generic casing & power supply
OS: SL6.5 kernel-ml-3.15.0-1.el6.elrepo.x86_64
Display output: HDMI

Everything works!