pmpatrick

Installed the KDE version yesterday and everything is running great. This is a really solid release. Congratulations to the Mageia devs and everyone involved in this project; your future looks very bright to me. It is so nice to have a community based project like this that isn't subject to the dubious business whims of upper management. Best of luck.

Thanks ian; I can now rest easy. :D

I don't think it's unusual for the Mageia devs to want their own forum hosted on their website. In fact, that's pretty much the norm for any distro that I can think of. You have to remember that what happened with this forum and mandrake/mandriva was an aberration.

The old timers will remember how it all came about. Basically, back in the day, mandrake setup a quasi-official forum moderated and run by a mandrake employee, Tom something or another(if anyone remembers his last name please post it as it is driving me nuts). At this time(2001-2002), mandrake was easily the number one desktop distro around and ubuntu wasn't even a gleam in Mark Shuttleworth's eye. Tom was a very good guy and well liked by the community. Sometime later, mandrake shifted its business model and decided that it wanted to try making money selling service to desktop users through the official mandrake website. Unfortunately, the service mandrake offered was inferior to what you could get at Tom's forum for free. The inevitable finally occurred and Tom was terminated by mandrake and pretty much just disappeared; it was all very mysterious at the time. As a result, Tom's forum was in limbo for awhile and some of the forum members got together and started this forum. Ever since, Mandrake/mandriva has been, to a greater or lesser extent, somewhat ambivalent at best and downright hostile at worst, when it came to this forum.

The Linux sound system is a complete mess. It's not just PulseAudio.

That about sums up my feelings on this topic. And I don't think signing petitions will do any good. Kernel development has been driven by the commercial linux companies that market to the enterprise like RH, Novel, IBM, Oracle, etc. Servers don't need sound and the big names in kernel development aren't going to devote any resources to linux sound development; they have their own agenda.

I'm beginning to wonder about the health of that hard drive; that's pretty odd behavior. If you have adequate external storage, I recommend backing up your data now. Also, go to the the hard drive manufacturer's website and download their hard drive diagnostic utilities iso; all the major hard drive manufacturers have them for free. Run the diagnostic utility in thorough mode and see if any problems are detected.

Other things I would try - boot with any linux livecd and see if you have any problems picking up sda1; boot up mandriva and immediately after booting up run:

$ dmesg | grep sda*

That will print out all the kernel messages relating to sda. See if any I/O or read/access errors are reported. Those types of messages can mean a hard drive that is starting to fail.

Try mounting with just ntfs instead of ntfs-3g:

# mount -t ntfs /dev/sda1 <mount point>

Also, check if sda1 shows up with cat /proc/partitions after running mknod.

Finally, is sda1 shown in Mandriva Control Center > Disks? If so, is any further information given about sda1? Is this a standard ntfs windows partition, i.e. not a Windows Dynamic Disk?

Fdisk clearly shows that sda1 and sda5 are being picked up by the system. Please also post the output of:

$ cat /proc/partitions

If sda1 and sda5 are not listed in the above(likely), you can manually create the device files for them in /dev using the mknod command. To test for sda1 run as root:

# mknod /dev/sda1 b 8 1

If mknod runs without error and creates /dev/sda1, try mounting it and see if it works.

I don't know what type of sound card you have but I'd be willing to bet it's some version of on-board intel sound on your motherboard. I finally got tired of having my sound fail every other kernel update and bought this turtle beach sound card which has excellent linux support:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16829118103

I haven't had a sound problem since. If your running a desktop with a spare pci slot, it will be the best $25 you've spent on computer gear in a long time.

I would probably wait for someone who knows a little more than me to drop by and help you out. It's usually un-needed to re-install with linux.

 

It looks as though your system is ok, just that KDE4 isn't working properly. Some one should be able to help you complete the update from the command line. And then you'll be sailing smoothly again.

To update from the command line, login on the command line like you did before and run:

$ su

<enter root password>

# urpmi.update -a

After updating the repos, you can update all installed packages with:

# urpmi --update --auto-select

That should be /dev/sda7 not dev/sda7. I would suggest you use this example for you FAT32 partitions:

/dev/sda7 <mount point> vfat umask=000,iocharset=utf8 0 0

You can choose whatever directory you want for a mount point. Traditionally, most people put mount points in the /mnt or /media directory, thus the suggestion that you make your mount points in the form /mnt/fat*. The addition of "umask=000" in the above line will ensure that you have read/write access to all your FAT32 partitions, which is what most people want. Without the umask option, a mounted FAT32 partition defaults to read only.

Re your question about the difference in form for your root partition and what's been suggested for your FAT32 partitions, that's because mandriva and most other distros set up fstab using UUID instead of device files. Device files for partitions are typically in the form of /dev/sd** or /dev/hd**. UUID(universal unique identifier) is an alternative way of uniquely identifying a partition using a lengthy 128 bit number. You can use either method with fstab but it's just easier to use device files.

As far as your two swap files go, you can have as many as you want; it won't hurt a thing. Almost all distros, including mandriva, will detect the existence of swap partitions during the installation and automatically set up mount points to use any and all existing swap partitions.

You also need to post your /etc/fstab file. You can either open the file and copy and paste it here or run the cat /etc/fstab command in the terminal and post the output here.

The fstab file is what controls mounting. You probably just need to edit these entries to get your FAT32 partitions to auto mount at boot:

/dev/sda7 7358 14717 59119168+ b W95 FAT32

/dev/sda8 14718 22032 58757706 b W95 FAT32

/dev/sda9 22033 30515 68139666 b W95 FAT32

and:

/dev/sdd1 * 1 9729 78148161 b W95 FAT32

Mandriva usually sets up in entries in fstab for FAT32 partitions but they are generally set to not auto mount. It's an easy thing to change.

I doubt your battery is bad; your motherboard is too new for that to be a likely cause.When the cmos battery starts going you get symptoms like the date and time resetting. Without a good cmos battery, the cmos cannot retain its setting when power is removed and it keeps resetting to the cmos defaults. From what you describe, the most likely causes are/were bad ram or a failing power supply. It's almost surely a hardware issue, however.

If you want to test your ram use a utility called memtest. A lot of livecds like Parted Magic have memtest as a boot option:

http://partedmagic.com/

Just boot up with Parted Magic and select Memtest from the boot options. Let it run for a couple hours and see if any errors are reported.

You need special equipment to test a power supply.

ls -l /bin/su

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

My permissions on su are different:

$ ls -l /bin/su

-rwsr-xr-x 1 root root 31696 2008-03-07 14:16 /bin/su*

The "sr" indicates that su perms are SUID. You can change the permissions on your /bin/su by logging in as root on a virtual console like you did before and running:

# chmod 4755 /bin/su

and then checking to make sure you have the same permissions as I do by running:

# ls -l /bin/su

It should change the permissions but su permissions and changes to them are usually done by security applications. The one mandriva uses is called msec which runs as a demon and it can reset any changed permissions that it doesn't like. The front end for msec is found in the mandriva control center>Security>Set up security level. I suspect that you may have setup msec at a very high security level; one which doesn't allow ordinary users to su to root and open other administrative applications. To check all this out, I would recommend you login to a gui root session by doing the following:

1. Reboot and when you get to the grub screen hit F3 and then "3" instead of "1" like you did last time;

2. That will take you to a command line login prompt. Login as root and run:

# startx

3. That should start your defalt gui(kde or gnome). You will have full root privileges from within this environment so be careful. Check out your security setting in mcc and see if anything looks off.

If you go to a virtual console by hitting Ctrl-Alt-F1 can you log in as root? After doing that, you can get back to a gui by hitting Ctrl-Alt-F7. Also, post the output of:

$ ls -l /etc/passwd

and

$ ls -l /bin/su

If you can login as root from a virtual console but can't su to root, it could be a permission problem with su.

Boot into run level 1, i.e. single user mode. That will take you to a root prompt without the need for a password. To do that hit F3 as soon as you see the mandriva grub selection screen which will bring up the kernel options menu; select Default. You will then see a line across the bottom of the grub menu that starts with:

Boot: *************

to boot to run level 1 you just type "1" without quotes at the end of that line and hit the Enter key. Sometimes there is so much stuff that you can't see the end of the Boot line but if you just type 1 and hit Enter, it should go. The boot messages will eventually tell you it's going into single user mode and dump you to a root command prompt that looks something like this IIRC:

sh#

Type in your command to change your root password:

# passwd root

and change the root password to anything you want and then run:

# sync

# reboot

The should reset your password for you.

There's not much you can do about it other than use another kernel or change your hardware. You say your system was OK in mdv2009. I would try installing and using the most recent working mdv2009 kernel; it should work fine in mdv2009.1. Or you can wait for a kernel update which may fix your problem. I can tell you that with my Promise Ultra 100 controller I've been waiting for nearly two years and libata has yet to be fixed to use this device properly. There's not much incentive to get this old hardware working in libata, particularly since the device will work fine even in the newer kernels if the kernel is compiled with legacy ide support enabled. When that's the case, ide devices will be designated hdx instead of sdx which indicates that libata is not being used for that device. The last mandriva release to do that was mdv 2008.1. With you controller card, it worked in fairly recent kernels so the aberrant behavior in the 2.6.29 kernel used in mdv2009.1 is obviously a regression which may be fixed in an subsequent kernel. Alsa is pretty messed up for intel sound in the 2.6.29 kernel as well so I suspect a kernel update in mdv2009.1 may come out fairly soon to address some of these issues.

Could it have something to do with the fact that the problem disk is a parallel ATA whereas the primary disk is SATA?

Absolutely. Post your IDE controller chipset if you know it. If not, post the output of:

$ lspci

You can also get a good idea of the hard drive performance of sdb by running as root:

# hdparm -t /dev/sdb

Post your hdparm output as well.

I suspect there may be a kernel issue with libata and your ide controller. I've seen these symptoms on Promise Ultra IDE controller cards and others. It's a kernel issue with libata and some older IDE controller chipsets.

I tried that to no avail. People on the fedora forum are reporting the same problem after a kernel update there. Onboard intel sound on ICH8 and ICH9 chipsets seem to be the ones primarily effected. Some report that they get sound after inserting and removing headphones which would indicate a problem with mixer settings which is reset after plugging in and removing the headphones. Didn't work here so will have to wait for a kernel update.

I don't know if this is another kernel regression or not, but the kernel originally shipped with mdv 2009 had very serious issues with onboard intel sound devices. Those issues were cured by a kernel update shortly after mdv was released. Over the past week, mandriva issued a kernel update on mdv 2009 for security reasons. After installing the new kernel via mandriva update, those old intel sound problems are back with the new kernel. I'm getting no sound whatsoever after the kernel update just like I did with the original kernel.

For those interested, the old kernel that worked with intel sound was 2.6.27.5 and the new kernel were sound doesn't work is 2.6.27.7. Booting to the old 2.6.27.5 restores the sound.

pmpatrick: the kernel update that fixes many of the hda-intel sound issues has already been released as an official update yesterday.

Thanks for the info adam. Will check it out next week when I have time.

Personally, I feel your pain - my hardware hates mdv2009. You can see in the errata that there are reported problems with intel integrated sound devices that use the snd_hda_intel module. With my motherboard, intel ICH8 chipset, I can't get the integrated sound card to work at all so don't feel bad. On the beta and rcs leading up to mdv2009, I had the same buzzing sound problem and was able to correct that the same way you did but on mdv2009 I get nothing. My suspicion is that the alsa driver in the kernel used by mandriva has issues with intel sound devices as I have seen erratic behaviour with intel sound and the alsa driver for the past year. Have seen some posts that kernel-linus works but haven't got around to installing that and I see that there are some updated kernels in testing that appear to be addressing this problem. Will probably just wait for a fix.

Won't go into my other hardware issue(Promise Ultra 100 IDE Controller card) as that hardware is not widely used and won't effect many. My main observation is that both my hardware issues are kernel problems. The Promise bug has been around for over a year and has never been adequately addressed, probably because it's old hardware not in general use. I'm more puzzled by the intel sound issue with the current alsa driver as intel integrated sound is widely used and will effect many users. Maybe it's just my bad luck in the selection of the hardware I use, but it seems to me that these kinds of regressions are becoming more and more common, i.e. stuff that worked before stops working when you update a kernel. I don't lay the blame at mandriva's door for these kernel issues as there is not much they can do about it - if they don't have a very current kernel in a new release, they will get complaints because there isn't support for new hardware and the extent of any regressions is not fully known till after the kernel has been out for a while.

There are numerous kde4 bugs listed in the errata. Among them is:

9.17 KDE 4 applications cannot run as root via su

I assume that's one that you ran into if you tried to launch the file manager of kwrite with root privileges suing su in a konsole.

Personally, I find kde4.x to be not much better than beta quality at the present time but it does show promise. I suppose we can debate the wisdom of choosing kde4.1.x as the default for a kde installation since kde3.5.10 is much more functional and stable. However, all the other distros have taken a similar course in choosing kde4.x over kde 3.5.x in their current release; even slackware will move to kde4 in its next release. With some effort you can install kde3.5.10 on mdv2009 if you want to and that may be the best solution if you have too many issues with kde4 and want mdv2009. For me, I'll just keep my mdv2008.1 installation and play around with 2009 in my spare time until things look more stable.

Here's a procedure using the command line that works for me using mdv2008.1:

1. Insert the cd you want to make an iso of but do not mount the cd drive when the window pops up. Just hit the cancell button;

2. Run:

# isoinfo -d -i /dev/hdd

In the output note the blocksize(should be 2048) and the volume size which will depend on the amount of data on the cd;

3. Using the above information run:

# dd if=/dev/hdd of=my.iso bs=2048 count=<volume size> conv=notrunc,noerror

If that doesn't help, then I would suspect that this is a kernel problem with your particular hardware, in particular with the way the ide controller is being handled. I note that your cd drive is designated hdd whereas both my sata and ide optical drives are designated sr0 and sr1 respectively. That would indicate to me that a different driver module is being used for your ide controller.

Yes. Whatever ubuntu boot menu you had before when you installed ubuntu will reappear when you select the ubuntu option in mandriva. Another advantage to using this method - if you update your kernel in ubuntu, it will make the usual changes to ubuntu's menu.lst so you can have the option to boot your old or new ubuntu kernel from the chain loaded ubuntu boot menu. All the boot options you have in ubuntu are preserved when you chain load. The only downside is you have to make two selections to get into ubuntu, one from the mandriva boot screen and a second one when the ubuntu boot screen comes up.

I think the easiest way to handle these types of problems is just to chain load your original grub on ubuntu using mandriva. The syntax is pretty simple:

title Ubuntu 8.04, kernel 2.6.24-16-generic
root (hd0,8)
configfile /boot/grub/menu.lst

When you select ubuntu from mandriva's grub, it will load ubuntu's grub so you will see the ubuntu grub selection screen you used to see before installing mandriva. You then select the ubuntu boot entry you want from that second grub screen.

Click on the "Easy-Urpmi" link above and follow the directions for adding the additional mandriva software repositories to your urpmi database. The lame packages are in the plf repos IIRC along with a lot of other packages that mandriva can't distribute for legal reasons like win32 codecs. Once the repos are set up the packages you need will be visible in mcc.