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This is starting to get ridiculous...


Guest greeneggs
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Guest greeneggs

Does anyone really understand (or even care) what I'm going through lately?.

 

I guess it's not good enough that I was diagnosed with something that will require painful tests and surgery on my "things" or that I have been put on a 1-month course of Cipro which has horrible side effects. It does'nt matter that I am not allowed to "release myself" for an enitire month, no caffeine, no dairy products, etc. It's not good enough that I'm going through horrible emotional trauma as a result of these things and have nightmares.

 

No, NOW I can't even use Linux!!

 

Ok, so I get some helpful, well-meaning people giving me advice to try this and try that or some vague description of someone else's experience and OF COURSE I appreciate it but the unfortunate reality is that not a single one of these thing has worked so far even though I have tried everything. All I want to do is get Linux working so I can get my mind off of my problems without having to be a Linux guru. Is this too much to ask?

 

Thank's in advance for the flood of solutions I know I'll be receiving shortly.

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Greeneggs.

 

Is there anyway you could run somekind of hard drive diagnostic in windows to help eliminate a physical hard drive problem?

 

And I'm sorry to say but you will eventualy have to learn a little command line stuff. If anything it will get you far more confident with linux in general.

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I too am a GUI type of user and felt similiar about Linux about a year and half ago.

 

Let's pretend we are talking more about cars. We all can jump in any vehicle and drive right off if it has an automatic, right, but now we have the option of using this new one with a standard tranny. We also know we are gonna get better gas milage now, and it is going to run much faster (NASCAR doesn't use automatics). But we can't just jump right in before knowing how to work the clutch first, unless we want to burn it up and break the transmission.

 

See where that rambling is going? Now back to your problem.

 

I am thinking maybe, seeing the other problems around the community, that MDK 9.1 for some reason is not being installed correctly (I had a problem with install which turned out to be a simple USB mouse plugged in --- where it should be -- but caused havic on the install).

 

Now this could be the way you are installing, or the filesystem you are choosing to install to, or could be the many problems that Mandrake failed to address, until they issued their latest updates.

 

Once you get to the point you have a working system, whether the gui works or not, you may have to spend some time on the command line to get it working the way it should. At that point, you will be rewarded with the system you have been dreaming of.

 

Until then, I believe many here will be willing to work out the problems with you --- but you need to specify the exact errors you get, preferrably one at a time, and don't be making hastly decisions on typing commands you are not familiar with (you wouldn't be dumping in strange oils in that new tranny?)

 

I believe your next step is to get Linux running, hopefully at a point you can run either KDE or gnome, and then we should install those updates first before running any thing else. Maybe time to start at the beginning--- one more time?

 

http://www.mandrake.tips.4.free.fr/install.html

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Guest greeneggs

Ok, I am so desparate to get this problem resolved that I am going to do exactly what I am told and I will take any advice I am given regardless of wether I think it will work or not. This is making me really mental.

 

Here goes...

 

Both HD's are fine

256M of RAM is fine

I'm running Mandrake Linux v9.1 (final)

My favorite food is pizza

 

Here's what happens...

 

I turn the computer on using the on/off button. I get a window with the following options:

 

Linux

Linux-noftb

Failsafe

Floppy

 

I choose "Linux" and hit "enter".

 

Next, the blue window with the light-grey border appears and I see lines of text being scrolled down the screen as Linux is being loaded.

 

1/2 the time, it will freeze up on a line of text so that I have to shut the computer off manually and try again.

 

When the stupid thing finally does perform a small miracle and boot up I get a black screen/shell that says the following...

 

Mandrake Linux release 9.1 (Bamboo) for i586

Kernel 2.4.21-0.13mdk on an i686 / tty1

Localhost login (blinking box)

 

So I login and STILL have a black screen

 

What now?

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greeneggs,

 

When you installed did you create a password for 'root'?

Did you create a password for 'user' ?

 

can you type 'su' and the password for 'root' and get a prompt

that says something like 'root@localhost' or something like that?

 

If so you should then be able to type 'startx' and go into the graphical

'X'

 

But you really want to get into the graphical GUI as 'user' so when

you get that login prompt you should type in your pre-selected 'user'

name,then your password, then type in 'startx' , always of course, without the quotes.

 

Oh, and about those stalls during boot, don't be too hasty, it is normal

to halt after detecting the scsi card for 10 seconds and sometimes it

will pause a little at 'dependences' so give it a little time. Also try to

read ( you have to be fast) some of the text scrolling by during bootup.

You will pick up a little more info as the number of bootups increase.

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Guest greeneggs
greeneggs,

 

When you installed did you create a password for 'root'?

Did you create a password for 'user' ?

 

can you type 'su' and the password for 'root' and get a prompt

that says something like 'root@localhost' or something like that?

 

If so you should then be able to type 'startx' and go into the graphical

'X'

 

But you really want to get into the graphical GUI  as 'user'  so when

you get that login prompt you should type in your pre-selected 'user' name, then type in 'startx' , always of course, without the quotes.

 

Oh, and about those stalls during boot, don't be too hasty, it is normal

to halt after detecting the scsi card for 10 seconds and sometimes it

will pause a little at 'dependences' so give it  a little time. Also try to

read ( you have to be fast) some of the text scrolling by during bootup.

You will pick up a little more info as the number of bootups increase.

 

I have done exactly this (ie; "startx") both under user and root and all I get is a message telling me that the "command cannot be found".

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I believe this really ain't as bad as it looks and glad your persevering through all this.

 

At this point, we should try and see if kde starts and also take notes if not.

[scoopy@localhost scoopy]kde$

or

[scoopy@localhost scoopy]startx$

 

Also, lets note on where it hangs during the boot up process --- we will want to fix that problem sooner or later. (I am still working on the 10 minute delay with sendmail on my boot up process)

 

Also remember, I am a GUI user and shy away from that command line stuff and favor pepperonis on my pizza, so hopefully, the command line users will jump in to help as needed here.

 

EDIT: just seen previous info posted as I was typing this. Try "kde" and maybe try whatever it is for gnome or any other window managers that may be install. I don't know the others offhand.

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Guest greeneggs

Here's what I get when I end up on that black screen and type "startx" as root and without the quotation marks...

 

[root@localhost teddy]# startx

bash: startx: command not found

 

PS: I've also tried KDE$ and startx$ (with the dollar sign)

 

Still no luck ::sigh::

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startx is actually just a script passing parameters to start up the x server.

 

in other words: it's what brings up the GUI. and for some reason, that file doesn't seem to exist anymore. or atleast isn't in any of the path's which are searched when looking for commands.

 

try this after logging in: whereis startx

 

see if it returns anything.

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Guest greeneggs

Ok, latest update. I just typed whereis into that "black screen" after first logging in as root and here is what I got...

 

[root@localhost teddy]# whereis startx

startx: /usr/X11R6/bin/startx.autologin /usr/bin/X11/startx.autologin

 

So it appears to be there. the question is how do I access it and how do I get KDE to come up automatically each time I boot so I won't have to go through this every time?.

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ok, try typing in:

 

startx.autologin

 

and see what happens. it would appear to me that you setup your system to automatically log you into a username at startup, and something went wrong with that configuration. once we get you into a graphical interface, we'll take you through the steps to fix it so you just go straight into graphical interface.

 

oh, and if startx.autologin doesn't work, try (must be root to do this):

 

cp /usr/X11R6/bin/startx.autologin /usr/X11R6/bin/startx

 

and then just type in

 

startx

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Just for comparison I ran "whereis startx" and came up with something just a bit diff.

[code[startx: /usr/X11R6/bin/startx /usr/bin/X11/startx[/code]

I also searched a bit for other window manager's start commands and found these:
startkde
gnome-session
fvwm
icewm
twm

not sure about these, but you can try:
gdm
xdm

If you can get any kind of window manager up and running, I can get you to the kde setup options.

Are we able to download an rpm to this drive? If so, another option is to install xtart, which (I believe) would give you a replacement for the xstart. (xtart is on CD3).
Or you could just try installing this from the command line, that is if this is working.

[root@localhost teddy]#urpmi xtart

 

if it installs, then type xtart in place of xstart, and it should give you the options of choosing kde, gnome, or fvwm.

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Clearification:whatis searches a database, so only tells you what should be there.

 

which startx

shows the current commands/paths available

 

 

 

First thing you need to do is su to root

su <Enter>

Password <enter roots password <Enter>

 

then try startx (maybe there's a weird security X auth prob or something). If that doesn't work do (and we'll see if anything /usr is available)

 

urpmi Xtart

if not, try

/usr/sbin/urpmi Xtart

 

if it works, it'll pop out your CDROM and ask for a install cd 1,2, or International3. Insert the correct cd and Xtart will be installed. After Xtart is installed type

 

Xtart <Enter> (that is, X upper case and tart)

 

if all goes well you'l be presented with a list of Desktop Environments and Window Mgrs. to go into gui with.

 

 

If none of the above works do

ls -a /usr

-is anything listed?

 

If that doesn't return anything, and you're still root, do

mount -a

then

ls -a /usr

 

 

you could also try

 

service dm start

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