payasam

Thank you, tux99.

RAM has been checked more than once, scarecrow, but HD controller is definitely suspect. In the past month I've had various otherwise inexplicable problems related to hard disks. Good to know that a 1000 MHz P-3 with 256 MB RAM is enough.

I have by now installed 2009.1 four or five times, with Gnome. The sequence of events each time has been this: first, applications have begun crashing; second, the machine has begun falling back to the log-in prompt; and third, booting has become impossible because of a "kernel panic".

My machine has a Pentium 3 processor running at 1,000 MHz and 256 MB RAM. One consultant has told me that only a Pentium 4 or above will do, and another has said that I need more RAM. I do not know what to do.

Here is what I said: "However, it is not recognised on my fresh installation of MDV 2009.1... The printer prints its test page as it should."

Important correction. The OKI4 business of which I wrote may have been responsible for the crashing applications but probably was not.

You are right, Ian, but as a Sanctimonious Old Fart (S.O.F., ver. MCML) I shall say that my bumping you off cannot be justified by pointing to the many murders for which the late lamented Bluebeard was responsible.

My printer has a self test, ds17, as yours probably does as well. The printer does not need even to be connected to a computer. I press a couple of buttons in the specified way and out comes a test print-out.

I should say here that I ran into what might be called a bug. One of the drivers I had installed, in my effort to see that the printer had all the software it needed, had to do with OKI4 printers. This set a "daemon" running, and that gummed up the works. All the applications I ran, kept crashing. I noticed the OKI4 messages on the scrolling screen and removed the offending stuff. All is well again.

Maybe you're right, David: but one expects continuity, old problems to have been solved, certainly not new and absurd ones.

Parallel port, David. Guess I need to go to Google.

[edit] Once I knew what to search for, finding the fix was immediate. It is to do a chmod 700 on /usr/lib/cups/backend/parallel. That should be done also on .../hal and .../usb when appropriate.

What a needless damn headache. This is not the sort of stupid problem one expects from a mature distribution.

Thank you, Yves. The easy fix did not work.

CUPS was installed, SS60, but I re-installed it just in case. Every time I've checked, the service has been running.

Can't set up the printer in MCC, ds17. No way it'll show up in an application.

I have a Samsung ML 1450 printer, which in five years has worked without trouble under every variety of Linux I have used, including Mandrake/Mandriva. However, it is not recognised on my fresh installation of MDV 2009.1. I have checked the software installed and have changed the cable. The printer prints its test page as it should. Could the trouble derive from the fact that I am running Gnome after upgrading an earlier installation of Mandriva One (KDE 4)?

Scarecrow, thank you; but if I am to spend money, I'd rather do it on a dedicated film scanner which is properly supported by the free tools of Linux.

I have it, John, thank you. Don't know if iscan runs without it.

Thank you, John and Ian. Unlike many Epson scanners, the V100 is not supported by sane. It's only USB, John, but that isn't a bother.

I have an Epson V100 scanner, set up with the iscan package from Avasys. Mandriva One, xsane 0.995, GIMP 2.6.

The image I see in the preview, with correct colours and brightness and contrast, is not what is saved as a TIFF file, nor what comes up in the GIMP. The help file speaks of ICC profiles in colour management but I have found no option for that.

[edit] What I wrote above was of iscan 2.3.0. I have since installed 2.19.1 and am able to scan in the GIMP with the iscan option that shows up. I have not yet tried xsane, either by itself or as a GIMP plug-in. Scanning is nowhere near as quick and easy as it was in Windows (one negative at a time rather than up to six), but at least it can be done.

Thank you, pmpatrick. I was about to come here to announce that my problems are over because I have re-installed 2009.1. As user remained the same and /home was not disturbed, I am in effect back to what I had made and not a thing is lost.

The security level I choose is always "normal", so that cannot have been the cause of the difficulty with the root password. I lost patience because of other difficulties: printer did not function, USB stick was not recognised, audio was dead, etc.

I could log in as root, pmpatrick. Here is the output you asked for:

ls -l /etc/passwd

-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 1184 2009-05-08 19:44 /etc/passwd

ls -l /bin/su

-rwxr-xr-x 1 root root 38532 2009-03-05 22:32 /bin/su*

If there's something to be done, I shall need to be told what that is. I get the feeling that now we are getting somewhere.

To all. There is a file named passwd in /etc. Anything I can do to it?

No idea what this means, if it means anything: Login Manager accepted the root password, which is otherwise still described as incorrect.

Thank you, demonseth17, I shall try your method.

I am inclined to think, because the password is apparently accepted but does not show up on booting normally, that there is something wrong with whichever file or sub-system handles the password business or conveys the information to the system.

Did not work, gentlemen. As there is no longer a "failsafe" option, I went the "F3" - "1" route and -- apparently successfully -- re-set the password. Yet I get the "insufficient rights" message, and the password is declared incorrect when typed in after SU.

Something strange and disturbing. The system said "Bad password. It is based on a dictionary word." The password I had typed in was preceded by two numerals and was a notably filthy word from an Indian language. Which dictionary does Mandriva mean?

I booted from the Free DVD, Ian, chose Rescue, and later asked for partitions to be mounted. Typing "mount" gave me more than the two lines I have reproduced. It went through the list of partitions. However, there was nothing in common like the /mnt/sysimage of which you spoke. That is, I could not figure out where the partitions were mounted.

It didn't work, Ian. That is, I could not make it work. Typing "mount" gave me:

rootfs on / type rootfs (rw)

/proc on /proc type proc (rw)

... of which I can make neither hoof nor tail.

I have upgraded 2009.0 to 2009.1 using the DVD but now have major problems.

When attempting any system work such as Add Media or MCC or Configure Computer, I get an "Insufficient rights" message.

I cannot do SU, because my root password (which was not changed) is rejected: "incorrect password".

I cannot shut down from the main menu: only the "Log Out <user>" option is available.

Thank you, Cliff. Yes, "highlight all" does work, which is strange and makes for a round-about way of searching.

Thank you, Tyme. Looks like I'm in for some painful navigation, then.