Christoff

Cheers dude, tho I've gotta admit I'm not the most patient person in the world & just finished wiping & re-installing... Now that things seem to be working as they were I'll have another crack with the nVidia drivers - that link you left seems useful. FIngers crossed...

Bonjour. I'm in need of the same info as Kylotan here, except I'm much more of a newbie than him... Had things running sort of smoothly, just with unused areas either side of my screen using the closest fit I can, which is currently 1080x760 I think (I use 1280x800 in winXP). Or at least I did before I fiddled with something & now I'm booting into a terminal and when I 'init 5' I get a blank screen... I did need to boot into a terminal to install the nVidia driver I downloaded BUT get the same message about kernels & downloads not working as Kylotan... Being fairly new to this I've been searching for info & found some helpful sites specifically regarding Linux on my laptop, unfortunately they seem to assume some knowledge that I don't currently possess... Following some of these instructions I tried editing a file /etc/XF86 (i think) but although I could edit it as instructed it wouldn't let me save it (I was logged in as root). Kylotan - I did notice that my boot-sequence fails on 'eth0' but all my ethernet based intenet type stuff works fine despite this... I running my 1st Linux install of mdk10.0 ce (dual-bootingXP) on my Dell Inspiron 8500 with a nVidia GeForce4 4200Go 64Mb DDR video RAM 4xAGP, & according to Dell I have a 15.4" WXGA Ultrasharp Wide Aspect Screen. If any of you old timers have some idiot proof advice it'd sure be appreciated. Incidentally, thanks for this forum - had a post on a different topic & had some excellent response. Chris.

Hello again. Well, I got the nVidia driver (seems it's fairly generic suiting most cards). I got the terminal up & did the 'init 1' to shut down X & co BUT this caused the fault that I experience when I power down (lots of screwed up output on screen, mainly lines etc.). I'm sure there's still stuff going on there as I can see movement (lines of the console processes?). I'm guessing the power down prob is related to my X environment settings. I'm off now to investigate ways to start MDK without a GUI, then will try the driver installation... Fingers crossed. Any suggestions welcomed. Incidentally, should I be starting a new thread for this? Not used to using forums so do let me know if I'm not behaving!

Ah - sorry just remembered a quick question... I can't seem to get a clean 'shut-down'. When I log out & choose 'switch off computer' it flips out a little to a messy screen where I can see movement for a few seconds (progress bar?) but the screen ends up freezing in this state & I have to power down with the button... Any advice appreciated. C.

Thanks to you all! I got the thing going in the end. Still some small probs to iron out tho. The 'speaker jack' suggestion was a cracker aRTee, I won't be leaving home without it for a while... I switched sound drivers from the default it found to another & like WilliamS the sound didn't return. Verbose mode on boot-up is useful, thanks to sitor. Sound seems to come & go though at the moment. Main prob at the mo is finding a driver for my graphics card - nVidia GeForce4200 Go since I have 2 big unused spaces either side of my desktop area... I did spend some time wondering where my taskbar was until I fiddled with the screen res. In windows I use 1280x800 but can't find that size option with my current Mdk10CE setup. Also having probs finding my existing Win network, but I'll keep fiddling & get there in the end! Thanks again for your assistance, I'm sure we'll be speaking again soon... C.

Hello world of Linux from another total newbie... I've been meaning for some time to have a good fiddle with Linux to see what all the fuss is about. I got Knoppix & fiddled a bit & now got a Mandrake 10.0 DVD from a magazine. I'm extremely keen to get it all running and start my new learning curve but I'm having problems that you may be able to help with. System - Dell Inspiron 5800, 256Mb RAM, 30GB HDD, NVidia GeForce4 Go 64Mb, Pentium 4 2.0GHz M. First prob was partitioning the drive as I wanted to keep the WinXP there for now(sorry!) but managed to eventually create a 7.5Gb space (should that be enough?). Installation looks fine up until the 'summary' where you can configure the un-configured bits. If I try to set up the Graphical Interface to my card I get a sample screen that's too narrow. If I choose the 'no it's no good' option the screen goes haywire & although I'm sure there's still things going on you can't see anything other than lines & garbage - and I did wait a while... If I choose not to configure it, it tells me I've not configured 'X' do I really want it? Tried yes & no but still probs further down the line. Then I wanted to set up my network card (Broadcom 440x 10/100 Integrated Controller) but my puny knowledge was highlighted when I seemed to get stuck in a loop of choosing a card, auto-detecting then choosing a card again. ANYWAY, I would like just to get the OS working then worry about these things later BUT when I choose to march straight through the installer without mucking around with these things I do reach the 'Congratulations you did it' type screen and re-boot the system without the DVD. It all looks good until I get around half-way along the progress bar then the computer emits a deafening monotone high pitched sound that's akin to 38 rape alarms... I mean this is loud. 1st couple of times I switched of in sheer terror. Then I tried covering the holes on the laptop to see if it would work regardless but it didn't... Please help if you can! If I've left out any vital info let me know... Thanks in advance.