danleff

By default, KDE is installed in Mandrake, unless you told the installer not to include it during the installation (if you elected to customize the packages to install). You should have also seen a window that asked if you wanted KDE as the default GUI. If you have no GUI when the system boots into Mandrake, then the problem most likely is an incompatible video card. ATI cards are known for this. Did you test the video card/monitor settings during the install? What laptop is this? If either of you truely do not have KDE installed (elected not to do so during the install) it can be installed from the Mandrake cd disks, from within the install/remove utility from within Mandrake's control panel. To see if KDE is installed you can do the following; To add programs (and check to see if KDE is installed) in Mandrake, go to start (Mandrake star)-->system-->configuration-->configure your computer (insert your root password when prompted) Choose "software management" -->install Type in KDE and click search If you don't see the packages that imroot mentioned, then you have KDE installed. Let us know if this is the case or not.

Quote: Mandrakelinux-10.1-Official-Mini.i586.iso <--- anyway what is this file for? i download it coz it a iso file You don't need the mini iso disk, the others are the correct disks, only three. The mini disk is good as a rescue disk, or to install the distro from a hard drive. Make sure that you burn them at a slow speed, say 4X or 9X, as iso files like to be burned at a slow speed. Also, make sure that you burn as an image, don't just burn the iso's as a data disk. For example, if you are using Nero to burn the images, choose from the dropdown menu file-->burn image, for each iso file.

Whew! (wipes his brow)... This was easier than I thought. I can't tell you how many times I missed something like this on my installs. Make sure you write down the drives and their configurations and place it in a safe place. Nice troubleshooting! But... (signature)

I found directions on the Firefox web site to install. See if this matches your package and where you extracted Firefox to. First post where you currently have the Firefox package on your system. The package should be called firefox-1.0.installer.tar.gz. If you were able to run the command mkdir -p /usr/local/internet/firefox, then use your file manager to navigate to that directory and see if it is there. Have you extracted the package yet? If so where? The directory, after extracting it should be called firefox-installer and should be in the same directory as the gz package. These are instructions, for reference for us to use later. ignore them for now; Quote: tar -xzvf firefox-1.0.installer.tar.gz cd firefox-installer ./firefox-installer

I think the confusion is first about making the directory, then installing Firefox from within the directory. If Mozilla is already on the system, the recommendation is to install Firefox in another directory independent from Mozilla, as there are apparently some issues with Firefox and Mandrake. Maybe iamroot will clarify his instructions, or I will post again when I have some more time later.

This is OK. Shoot, I got so into the Linux partitions that i neglected the vfat. This is still fine. there are two ways that you can do this to reclaim the unused space(actually three). Let me post some more when I have some time later this evening. The /home partition does not have to be that large, but this is where you are going to place any files or packages that you download or files that you create in Linux. I always find that having sufficient space on the home drive is useful. You now have 1 primary partition and one extended, where your Linux partitions are logical partitions within the extended space. This is fine. Now, I recommend that you make your next partition a primary vfat. You can do this via the FC3 install disk again, or by using another partitioning utility like PartitionMagic or 7 Tools Partition Manager, a free XP environment partitioning utility. I will post more later.

try this for now; Get a freshly formatted floppy disk and have it ready toinsert into the floppy drive. Boot in to rescue mode from the 1st install cd of fc3. At the boot prompt, type in; linux rescue (hit the enter key) When that is done, insert the floppy disk into the drive. Then chroot into the mounted filesystem chroot /mnt/sysimage (hit the enter key) then type in grub-install /dev/fd0 (hit the enter key) Give that a few minutes to complete (there is a delay). Take out the Fedora install cd. Reboot, making sure that the bios is set to boot first from a floppy. See if grub gives you the menu to boot to Fedora or Windows. Then we will look more closely at the Grub file.

Quote: i tried to update the bios as described in intel site. First of all, did the bios update complete without issue? Did you get a message stating that the bios update completed? And, are you sure that the bios update was for your specific motherboard and revision number? Not just the motherboard, but the exact revision number, as well. The unfortunate thing is that folks sometimes think that the first thing to do in these situations is to update the bios. True, you could have had a virus that corrupted the bios, but was there any real indication that you had/have a virus? Do you have any anti-virus software on the system? The other thing to look for are error messages during boot. Are there any that may indicate a problem? Do you have a system that has Windows pre-installed and has a rescue cd, say a Dell, gateway, HP system? Intermittant booting problems can be caused by a variety of problems, including; A failing Power supply A failing memory module A failing hard drive A failing motherboard battery A virus that affected the MBR As the system boots, look for any error messages that may give a clue about what is going on. post any that you see. Listen for any unusual beep codes that may occur, other than the normal ones that you usually hear during boot. Take the case cover off, if possible and listen for any noises that may be unusual, such as a constantly cranking hard drive during boot. Let us know what you seem to find.

hehe... and to think that I use k-mail, because I know how to import all my Outlook Express mail!

I have a Yamaha that works great. Yes Creative cards, Ensoniq, and Soundblaster Live work well (not the adulterated legacy ones found in Gateway and Dell systems). What motherboard is this? And yes, what exact distro and version? If you go with a add-on PCI card, just make sure that you disable the onboard sound in the bios.

The "lo" is just your local network interface, don't worry about this. It seems that there is a problem; eth0 Link encap:Ethernet HWaddr FF:FF:FF:FF:FF:FF does not seem right. It should have a valid hardware address. Is the D-link set up via USB port? We have a real networking expert onboard. Hopefully he will see this post.

Ok, I think i got it now, thanks! Look at the system. It looks like your Windows drive still has the MBR intact for Windows. The linux drive has Grub on the MBR of that drive. I would leave both drives in the system, the Windows drive as primary master, the other as primary slave or secondary master or slave, depending where the cdrom drive(s) are set at. If the system boots to Windows w/o the Linux drive attached, I would reinstall Fedora and tell it to do a fresh install, allowing Grub to install on the MBR of the primary master, hopefully which is hda. When you get to the partitioning section of the install, tell Fedora to format the second drive completely for the install. The best solution would be to re-partition the second drive ahead of time, to assure a fresh install and to wipe the MBR on the second drive. This assures a fresh start. But, if you don't have a partitioning tool to do this, we can suggest some. But let's see what you got on the re-install. Then, see if you get a correct boot to Windows and Fedora. Again, make sure that you do not swap out drives at all.

Ok, thanks for the clarification. In terms of the hdg drive. the bios does not give a message that the drive is found during boot, or in the bios setup? Bear with me. Is this a Compaq, Gateway or Dell system? When you disconnect the hdg drive completely from the system, what is the result? If the bios does not recognize the drive at all in setup or the boot messages, suspect a hard drive issue, such as a badly corrupted drive, improperly set jumper, faulty drive or poor connection. Check all these things out. Make sure that the connections to the hdg drive are solid and correct. Is the hdg drive set as slave, or cable select? I assume the setup or jumpered something like; hda = primary master (XP drive) hdb = primary slave (data) hdg = Is this secondary slave or cable select? (Linux) How are the cdrom drive(s) designated per the jumpers? Let us know exactly what you have.

I think that you may have misunderstood the partitioning scheme to set up your system. You do not set up the mount point for a fat32 partition during installation, only the partitions that you will use for Linux. This will not work. 1 - 7gb - winxp 2 - 7gb - fc3 (root) 3 - 20gb - vfat partition (usr/var/ E: ) 4 - 100mb - boot 5 - 900mb - swap (448mb ram) /usr/var can not be set up in this manner. When you speak of a share partition that is fat32, what you want is a partition that you can share Linux and Windows files in. Why not try a simple partitioning scheme first. To explain; 1 - 7gb - winxp # is your XP installation 2 - 7gb - fc3 (root) # which is the / designation during an install. 3 - 20gb - vfat partition # this does not get a Linux partition mount point during the install. This will be your shared partition, not part of the Linux install. /usr/var is a part of the Linux install, which is why you have the problem. 4 - 100mb - boot # this is optional. Did you set up Grub or Lilo on the MBR, or to this partition? 5 - 900mb - swap (448mb ram) # this is fine I would start over, since you apparently tried to install /usr/var to a fat 32 partition. Are you able to boot right now to both XP and Linux? Partition your system, as follows, if this is your first Linux install; 1 - 7gb - winxp #leave this alone 2. - 100 mb - /boot 2 - 7gig - fc3 (root) 3. 900 mb - swap 4 - 10 gig - /home 5. - ~ 10 gig fat32 not mounted as /, or /home, or as /usr/var.

Quote: Hey everybody. I'm a first time linux user trying to setup a dual boot system between XP Pro and FC3. I originally had XP Pro installed on my main drive Is XP still the primary master drive? You did not change the drive designations or jumpers, did you? Just to clarify, currently, are you able to boot to either Windows and/or Fedora? If you can boot to Fedora, post the grub.conf file as it currently stands. Windows will not see the Fedora drive, beacause it is a linux partition. Windows refuses to see Linux partitions. So you will not be able to see the Fedora partition from within Windows as a normal partition or drive.

Well, now that you got this far, let's set up the drives the way that they should be, at least from my perspective. Jumper your Win ME drive back to primary master. Jumper the Fedora drive primary slave. Make sure the cables are connected properly, the Win drive on the ide cable to master, the other to slave. Then see if Win ME boots on it's own. If you altered the MBR on that drive, it probably won't. If it does, we will go from there. If it tries to boot into the grub shell, reboot with the Fedora install disk and rescue mode. Change grub to the following for the Windows install; title Windoz rootnoverify (hd0,0) chainloader +1 Make a note of where the Fedora root is, say; (hd0,0) or whatever. Post here on the forum what it says root is (and what it says if there is a rootverify tag). Save your changes and reboot. See if Grub will boot into Windows at the grub menu. if it does, we will go from there to recover Fedora. Windows likes to be the first install on the master. Also, there is no need to swap drives for a Fedora install, this just confuses the process.

So, did you buy the book? It describes details for installing Fedora Core. Take a look at Amazon. Look at -->search inside--> table of contents. Go to your local Borders store and look for it, or browse the other related books. To get an idea of Linux filesystems, etc... try reading the article at JUSTLINUX. Realize, that Linux looks at hard drive partitions as filesystems. Forget what you know about Windows 98 and read some Linux documents. Really, you will begin to understand it soon. Your system meets (barely) the minimum system requirements for Fedora. See this thread. expect that the system will be slow with this distro. You may want to consider another distro, like Libranet, or Vector Linux, which should run better. Or, consider more memory, if possible. There should be no problem reading floppies in Fedora. What are you trying to do in order to read and write to a floppy? I will look at my Fedora install and try to walk you through it. I think that I mentioned before, Lexmark printers are a bear. They are just now starting to support Linux, but your specific model is a problem. Just for our reference, look at the Gentoo Lexmark how-to.

What version of Mandrake are you trying to install? What speed did you burn the cd disks at? Or are they official release cd disks?

How about posting what games that you are looking to install? Wine is not the best choice for many Windows based games. Others can give you specifics on what flavors of Windows emulators work best with certain Windows games. On many distros (flavors of Linux) wine is implemented in different ways, in many from the command line. You can tell if Wine is installed correctly, by getting to a terminal window and just typing in wine..then hit the enter key. This should show you what version of wine is installed. To get an idea of windows games and Wine usage, look at Frank's Corner. This will give you an idea. Look to the left about known working games.

It seems that Belkin has designed their driver files this way. If you don't have the drivers cd, how about asking the folks at Belkin if this is possible. I could not extract them either. But, a quick e-mail may get a response from Belkin, or at least a link to an answer on their web page. I could not find one.

Yes, there are usb KVM switches, but I have not tried any out. I can only speak about the PS/2 switches. They work fine. What I can say, is if one of the systems is a legacy system, like the Dell Web PC, then you are bound to have some issues. So, if you have a system, or one that is " Built for Windows" like this, keep in mind compatability in general. But now you have made me think about this. Some that I looked at state compatability with Linux, some do not. Let's see if anyone else has had experience with this.

The download version has 3 iso's to get. Let's also make sure that you got the right ones. What is the exact name of the first iso image that you downloaded? Is it Mandrakelinux-10.1-Community-cd1.i586.iso?

If the modem does not work, and you set it up, or attempted to do so) during the install, then chances are that it is a so-called "winmodem" designed to work in Windows only. A lot of systems now come with these, since they are inexpensive modems. If this is a Dell or Gateway system (or otherwise), knowing the model number would help identify this. Also, if you could boot into Windows, you could get this information easily. So, do you get a boot option to get into Windows?

Also, from my perspective, it depends on what distro and version that you plan to use. If you have NTFS as the filesystem for XP be careful of Mandrake 10 and Fedora Core 1. There are issues with installing these versions next to an XP installation with NTFS. These seem to be corrected with Fedora Core 2 and Mandrake 10.1. So the question is, what distro and version do you plan on using?

The easy way out in Fedora...go to the start menu-->System tools-->file Manager-Superuser mode. This will give you direct rights to mount and transfer any files from any partition, as long as it is mounted. Remember, you mounted the drive a root, so it needs root privileges to access the drive.