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ok, so it appears I am in gnome. I want to use kde. also regarding the large taskbar in gnome, I just right clicked it and selected Properties/Small taskbar. pretty easy....! I still want kde though.

I just installed redhat 9 from 3 iso discs that I got from the nluug.nl netherlands ftp site. All CDs passed the md5 sums, and all CDs passed the "linux mediacheck" at the boot: prompt. I thought the install was fairly easy & intuitive for a noob like me. I also thought the displayed info & help at the left of each install screen was helpful & informative (better than mdks chintzy info at the bottom of the install screens). So far it seems to be working ok. I'm not sure if I'm using gnome or kde or ? The taskbar at the bottom of the screen is taller than I like, but the icons in the taskbar are quite large - its eating up my screen space. Anyway, the menu button at the bottom left is a red hat, not a bare foot or a "K" - so I'm not sure what I'm in. I noticed during the "personal desktop" install that it just wanted to install gnome, but I also selected "kde" manually. I'll use this thread during the next day or so while I am exploring my new RedHat install... :) I'm sure I'll have a few problems or questions...

thanks cybr - I have just finished downloading all 3 RH isos from nluug.nl ftp site (netherlands). Maybe this was the site Ixthusdan was talking about :? he said nnlug... I got pretty good speed from there (71 to 74 KB/s for first 2 discs and 88 KB/s for the 3rd) Anyway, now to do the md5 sum check, and burn with Nero on my win2k box, and then attempt to install on my linux "play" box... It'll be a miracle if it goes alright... :lol: /arnold impersonation... "I'll be back"

footnote to original post: I tried downloading the RH CD 1 from redhat and was averaging around 47KB/s. Too slow, so I cancelled it. Then I took a chance with that paypaldownload site that advertises the "fastest" downloads on the internet. Paypaled them my 99 cents, and started the download.... 37KB/s !! What a ripoff ! I cancelled the download and emailed them a complaint. They refunded my paypal account immediately. Moral of the story: I should have listened to tyme, Ixthusdan, and cybrjackal, they were right.

I've been messing around with linux off and on for about 2 years, but I only have a couple months of actual experience during those 2 years... I admit I haven't really tried to sit down & devote my full potential to learning it (too much other stuff to do - family - kids, job...). I also grumble about it, but I still want to learn it and haven't given up yet.

I agree with most everything chris z said. I've got about 7 years experience with DOS, 12 years with windoze, some programming experience (cobol), and lots of general computer experience, but I still get frustrated trying to do simple stuff with linux. Like burning a CD...? I can't even try it, cuz I can't even get k3b installed. I remember back when I burned the first CD of my life (with Nero) it took me just one try (with the wizard) to get a perfect CD. After that first time, I decided the wizard was just too dumb, and I just started doing it all myself. Not that hard to click New Compilation, drag some files from the right window to the left window, then click Write CD, sit back for 5 minutes and presto, great CD. Even the Audio Editor, and Properties (fade-ins, fade-outs, etc) are very intuitive and take almost no learning time. I've burned a hundred CDs with nero, and I think I was pretty much an expert after just one evening. Now, I'm not praising windoze or MS - Nero's not an MS program obviously (its too good) :lol: I admit, I did not like windoze back when it was getting popular (1990? 1992?). I had been using DOS for 5 or 6 years by then, and could do everything fast with dos - didn't want to learn the dumb new windoze thing... I don't think I even touched windoze until 3.1 had been out for quite a while... Maybe its just that now I'm older, f/t job, family, blah blah, - like I want to come home after a long day of work and screw around for 6 hours trying to just install a stupid program under linux. If I was say 20 years old or less, and no job, no family, getting money handed to me from mommy & daddy, with 12-16 hours a day to screw around, maybe I'd be a linux geek by now. Not that I'm saying anyone here is that way... :lol:

I find that most linux mags that I browse thru are a little too geeky for me. I just want to learn basic, normal stuff first, and also "home" stuff like burning CDs, watching/burning DVDs, ripping audio, blah blah. When I browse thru a linux mag, I'm usually looking at pages of code & crap. Although, I admit, Linux Format seems ok. However - its too damn expensive ($10 or so where I live in the US)

ok, I just realized that when I posted that, that I was still a subscriber to Maximum PC magazine. Oops. However, its mostly a hard-core hardware mag, not really an "MS" mag. Anyway, I have just received my final issue, so now I officially don't subscribe to any computer mags. Too bad there's no good linux mags for noobs like me.

ok, how about red hat ?? the main reason I wanted to try deb was apt-get for easier s/w installing. But is RH using apt-get now ? I know, at least on this board, that most of you feel that mdk is better than RH, but with RH you have tons of info available online, and tons of books available about it, and probably better support from the RH company itself. I thought I saw somewhere that RH had gone to apt-get, or was going to in an upcoming release... ?? thanks PS: and I can still come here for RH advice - cuz this is the best board I've found yet for help :)

I'm dissapointed in the whole software install thing. I wanted to install k3b under mdk 9.0. Got the rpm, but got a bunch of dependencies - cdrdao, and some others. I installed cdrdao from rpm (installed ok) but when I did the other dependencies - I got some conflict errors with other stuff. Tried the urpmi setup (zarb.org) but although a couple of the selections seemed to go ok, I got some errors on some of my urpmi selections. Anyway, when I urpmi anything - it just says something like "file or dir doesn't exist" or whatever - I can't remember. I can't believe what a hassle just installing some stupid software is. And mdk is supposed to be the most user-friendly distro...??? 1. how do I see how my urpmi is set-up, and how do I add more locations to it and how do I put the CDs back into an "install" location (I think I removed my CDs from install sources) 2. I wanted to try debian (there's a couple of posts under Other Distros) but guess like cybrjackle says - might as well learn a little under mdk first before jumping into deb.

:lol: I knew someone was going to say something like that... :D When I was typing that post, I was expecting to get something like "this guy can't do mandrake and he wants to try debian..." I'm sort of new to linux - although I tried out mandrake 8.1 for about 3 months back when it came out in 2000. I actually had better luck with 8.1 - I installed some rpms, fixed my nvidia 3D, learned a little vi. With 9.0 I just can't get any software to install - dependency this & that. and when I install a dependency - I may get conflict errors. Urpmi doesn't do anything either. I wont go into it here. Guess I'll post a question or 2 under installing mandrake, or software, or whereever.

Hi - I have an older box (pentium III 1-Ghz, 256 RAM, 40 Gb drive, TDK CD-RW) that I am screwing around with linux on. Currently I have a mandrake 9.0 installed on it, but I don't have any important files or data on it so far. Since I am not having much luck with mdk (I hate rpm, and I haven't gotten anything by urpmi either) I wanted to install debian over it. I was wondering if debian would replace my entire mandrake install (if I wanted) or if it would install alongside mandrake. I think I ended up installing mandrake something like: /, /swap, /home, and all the rest of the space as share. I'd like to try out debian just to see what its like. I figure its more difficult than mdk, but maybe if I can at least get a good install, I'll be able to actually install some software - like k3b or whatever. I just can't say how dissapointed I am in the whole software install thing, at least under mandrake (although I'm sure alot of it is a "user" problem :? ) From what I've read about debian, it seems to be generally liked. The only thing that I've read about it that I don't like is how "behind the times" it is - something like 1.5 years old for the "stable" release.

I was browsing around for other distro download sites, and I came across this place: www.paypaldownload.com I think you pay them 99 cents thru paypal, and you get a super-fast d/l of whatever distro you want. I was wondering if anyone has any experience with this site... I am a member of paypal, and I think its worth 99 cents to get fast d/l's of different distros. Here's a quote from their home page: btw - what's would be the ISP speed limit for a typical DSL user (I have SW Bell DSL in Texas)

I wasn't defending the article, just mentioning it. I don't subscribe to any computer mags, especially PC magazine. I may browse some at a bookstore if there's an article I'm interested in. Reason I browsed the current PC Mag was cuz of a cover blurb about file sharing services that hide your ID, so I just picked it up to read that article, and happened to read the SCO thing too.

I don't know if PC Magazine knows what they're talking about but... In the sept 16 issue there is an article about the SCO suit, and PC Mag said that SCO brought in all their evidence to PC Magazine. The ending opinion of PC Mag was that they thought SCO had a valid point and that linux should re-write some sections of the 2.4 kernel to get around this problem. Anyway, I haven't really been keeping up with this thing, just thought I'd mention the article here...

thanks LZ !!! that's all it was. Works fine now. was I right when I said I didn't think supermount worked correctly under 9.0 ? Guess it doesn't matter, I don't mind mounting & unmounting.

I'm probably just not adding the icons right. I don't know about supermount. I thought it didn't work right in 9.0. I just installed 9.0 so I don't know if it installs by default or you have to activate it manually. when you right-click on the kde desktop and select cd-rom device, then select "properties" and then open the device tab, I'm not sure what to put there. I remember in the old mdk systems, you had kde icons for floppy and cd-rom, and when you inserted say a CD data disk, you just right-clicked the icon and selected "mount" and then later "umount" floppy is fd0 and my cd-rw is scd0

After a recent install of mdk 9.0, I don't have any icons for floppy or cd drive. I remember on prior installs of older versions of mandrake I thought it put the icons on your desktop for you. Maybe not, its been awhile. I thought there was a way to right click the desktop, select new and make a floppy icon and a cd icon :? when I make an icon that way, after clicking it, it just does nothing, or I just get some kind of Konqueror error

thank you tyme. BTW, I was also reading rcxau's post under Tips & Tricks called Easy urpmi, where rcxau gives a link (zarb.org) with instructions. However, when I go to that link, the instructions (item #3) look like they are "blacked out", so I don't know how to set it up correctly.

Hi I recently installed mandrake 9.0 powerpack, and I tried mandrake 8.1 almost 2 years ago. I remember when I used 8.1 that I could list all "Installed" software or list all "Installable" software. I do not see that in 9.0. and when I select k3b to install, it displays a message "everything already installed - is this supposed to happen at all?" What kind of message is that... :? I don't think I have k3b, unless the 9.0 powerpack installs it (I installed almost everything - Workstation, Gamestation, Multimedia, etc). When I downloaded a mandrake rpm for k3b, I just got half a screen full of dependencies problems. I was hoping that from 8.1 to 9.0 it would have gotten to be a little bit more of a user-friendly desktop solution.