Not sure where to post this so I appologize in advance. I’m currently deployed to Iraq and we have internet access to our rooms. It’s a slow 15k download speed and it took me 5 days to get the 64bit DVD. I used downthemall in firefox, but unfortunately it errored at the end. What are my options for getting a DVD? I’m ready to make my switch from windows but can’t get a hold of the distro I want :(. Any help/suggestions would be greatly appreciated.
Have somebody download, burn, test and send the DVD by mail. Any other solution will confront you with the horrible download speed.
Happy New Year and welcome to the forums.
There is a remarkable utility in Linux called wget. With it, I have downloaded installation DVD over slow connection which took several days. wget can continue from where the download stopped. It is possible to run wget on several computers, each downloading a portion of a large file. Probably there is a similar utility in Windows as well.
If you don’t have a Linux computer there, then download opensuse Live CD, or some other live but smaller Linux. Run the OS and you will have the wget.
Thank you both for the tips! 
Regroup and devise another strategy. 15k for a DVD download is hopeless. The live CD would be easier and if you use bittorrent you only ever have to download it once, even if it errors, all you do is a re-check of the pieces.
Or as suggested, get one mailed from home.
On 01/03/2010 10:06 AM, caf4926 wrote:
>
> wukilla;2097412 Wrote:
>> Not sure where to post this so I appologize in advance. I’m currently
>> deployed to Iraq and we have internet access to our rooms. It’s a slow
>> 15k download speed and it took me 5 days to get the 64bit DVD. I used
>> downthemall in firefox, but unfortunately it errored at the end. What
>> are my options for getting a DVD? I’m ready to make my switch from
>> windows but can’t get a hold of the distro I want :(. Any
>> help/suggestions would be greatly appreciated.
>
> Regroup and devise another strategy. 15k for a DVD download is
> hopeless. The live CD would be easier and if you use bittorrent you only
> ever have to download it once, even if it errors, all you do is a
> re-check of the pieces.
> Or as suggested, get one mailed from home.
If you have most of the download, you can use a torrent program to fix whatever
is wrong AND only the faulty parts will be sent again. I have not done this,
but you should download the torrent setup file and start the torrent download.
Then kill the process and move your bad DVD image over the one that the torrent
started, then restart the torrent. If I got this wrong, someone will correct me.
@lwfinger
This is correct. BUT I tried this recently with an 11.2 image and it wasn’t having any of it…
I hasten to add: I do know what I’m doing here;)
I have done this before with such downloads but it just wouldn’t do it this time. So I packed me bags on that after 3 attempts.
I didn’t need to do it anyway. I was just trying to start sharing it more quickly. I had the full dvd downloaded several days before release from the Novell servers, but it came down over ftp/http
So my plan was to start a torrent, stop it, make sure the names matched, remove the torrents .iso and copy in the full one, then do a re-check.
Like I say - No go, can’t recall why now.
So, if I’m understanding you correctly. I can do an install from the live CD which is much smaller? Then load up any programs I desire after that? I’m not familiar with Suse’s live cd’s. I have some linux knowledge, used gentoo for awhile, but it’s been well over a year and I’ve forgotten some stuff. I’ll try to locate the live cd. Again, thanks for all of the assistance!
Yes, that is what we are saying
Software.openSUSE.org
I presume you attempted a restart with downthemall? The utility supports pause and restart, and IIRC I have seen it pick up an interrupted incomplete download (that is, without starting over). I suspect its recovery ability depends upon the particular cause of the download problem. YMMV.
Any download method you use will at 15K be bandwidth constrained. Bittorrent will not be an advantage in this respect as it will be the functional equivalent of downthemall using 4 concurrent threads. But what is very important is its error checking and ability to recover “chunks”.
On 01/03/2010 11:46 AM, wukilla wrote:
>
> So, if I’m understanding you correctly. I can do an install from the
> live CD which is much smaller? Then load up any programs I desire after
> that? I’m not familiar with Suse’s live cd’s. I have some linux
> knowledge, used gentoo for awhile, but it’s been well over a year and
> I’ve forgotten some stuff. I’ll try to locate the live cd. Again,
> thanks for all of the assistance!
The downside is that all the packages have to be downloaded over the net,
whereas they are already on the DVD. If your connection is flaky, it may be
difficult doing the install.
Quick update. Bit torrent is a no go, I believe they are blocking it. So I’m back to downthemall but this time with a live cd which should be finished in a few more hours. I started it last night. My fingers are crossed :).
The chance of successful download is high.
Don’t forget to check the iso file.
Instead of burning a CD, you can copy the file onto a USB memory stick in a special way, and install from the stick if the computer allows.
Depending on hardware, here is where problems will begin…
What sort of computer do you have? Have you researched its compatibility with Linux?
I haven’t done any research on compatiblity yet. It’s a Asus G60 laptop. I’ll do a bit of research on it but i’m confident that there shouldn’t be much of an issue. If I can get to the console and reach the internet, I’ll find a way to fix it :)!
Just another thought fwiw . . .
Since you will eventually want to install software (and updates) not on the LiveCD, that is, from a repository, and given your location, you may want to find a mirror as geographically close as possible. Here’s a list: