[CentOS] Centos-compatible motherboards

On Fri, Dec 27, 2013 at 12:44:02PM -0600, Johnny Hughes wrote:
> On 12/27/2013 07:11 AM, Fred Smith wrote:
> > On Fri, Dec 27, 2013 at 03:40:43AM -0600, Johnny Hughes wrote:
> >> On 12/25/2013 09:51 PM, Fred Smith wrote:
> >>> Hi all!
> >>>
> >>> I'm toying with the idea of spending some Christmas money on a new MB and
> >>> CPU to upgrade my desktop.
<snip>
> >> I personally have recently built 2 different systems with with the Asus
> >> M5A99X Evo R2.0 motherboard.  This one does not have a graphics card ...
> >> everything does work with CentOS-6.5 and RHEL7B1.
> >>
> >> It uses AMD CPUs and I have used several AM3+ CPUs, including Sempron
> >> 100, FX-6150, and FX-8150.
> >>
> >> https://www.asus.com/Motherboards/M5A99X_EVO_R20/
> >>
> >> One of the nicest features is it will detect and set a working BIOS
> >> memory timing with a press of a button on the board ... if you try
> >> something manually that is incompatible, a simple press of the button
> >> and reboot will get you back to a working config.

> > Johnny:
> >
> > I assume it has UEFI and "secure boot"? did you disable the secure boot
> > feature before installing? (AFAIK Centos doesn't yet support UEFI/secure
> > boot????)
> >
> > I have an existing pair of drives holding Centos in a software Raid-1
> > configuration, and I'm assuming I can simply move them to the new
> > board, boot and be off to the races. Can you comment on that assumption?
> 
> The software raid-1 should work fine ... plenty of room for drives on
> that board.  As long as you have a normal file system on sata dirves, it
> should boot.  You may need to reconfigure the hardware (obviously,
> different network cards, audio, video, etc.)
> 
> The version of the BIOS that I currently have does have a secure boot
> turn off feature. (1302 x64 is my BIOS version) Looks like there are 5
> newer versions of the BIOS than the one I have installed now.

Ok, so I bought the board and a FX6300 CPU to go with it. pulled the 
swap-eroo and after some trepidation (trying to make sure I had everything
plugged in correctly, so I wouldn't let the magic smoke leak out) fired 
it up, tweaked a bunch of BIOS settings, then did a real boot and up it 
came! found the Raid-1 pair, found everything and seems to be "just working".

Only problem was networking. the network config specified the MAC address,
so it didn't find that port (obviously, since it isn't there anymore)
and it then manufactured an eth1 (as if from whole cloth), which got an
address from DHCP and networking is up. but since I run a mail server on
that box, it needs its static IP address so the forwarded port 25 will
work. to fix this had to work thru 2 or 3 issues but after head-banging
for a couple hours got it all straightened out.

thanks for the hints on what seems a good board!

My Folding At Home client seems to be screaming right along, too!

Fred

-- 
---- Fred Smith -- fredex at fcshome.stoneham.ma.us -----------------------------
                    The Lord detests the way of the wicked 
                  but he loves those who pursue righteousness.
----------------------------- Proverbs 15:9 (niv) -----------------------------