11.2 Installation Trouble (Epic-sized Story)

English Install/Boot/Login
1

Hello all, n00bie here!

First of all, why I want Linux. I had a Dell 4100 () running Windows ME (). I tried to install some drivers for a USB Wireless networking adapter, but the Drvier Readers wouldn’t read the drivers. I installed multiple drivers to no success. In short I want Linux so I can get internet on a crappy Desktop computer.

So I burned 11.2 KDE to a CD and popped it into my Dell 4100 running ME. To get it to boot from CD I had to run it in BIOS (Ctrl+Shift+ F10 at boot screen).

So the CD starts and I get the main menu. The first time I just click the first option (openSuse KDE CD) without looking and it eventually transfers to the KDE desktop, except where the box with the icons should be, is just a white box and the rest of the screen is black. So I just reboot.

I click installation and the install begins. All goes well until the box pops up with the options to reboot now or reboot later. The first time I got to this spot I clicked now, but when I rebooted the computer with the CD out, all I got was a black screen with this symbol:

_

blinking at me in the top left corner of the screen.

So put the CD back in and rebooted. I clicked install again and went through the whole process over again (mistake?). Then I chose “reboot later” when the box came up. I waited as a black screen popped up for about 30 seconds, then it went to a green screen that had lots of lines of code on it. At the bottom of the screen it said:

Username:

So I entered my username. Then:

Password:

popped up right below it. I tried to type in my password but the keyboard became unresponsive. So I just hit enter. It said “password incorrect” and “Username:” popped up again. At this point i tried hitting almost all of the keys on my keyboard. The only ones that would do anything were Ctrl+Alt+Delete, which led to a reboot.

I’m not done with my story but at this point I have a couple of intermediate questions.

  1. WTF happened with the keyboard when it got to password? I was thinking maybe I had to reboot without the CD before I got to this step? But that would probably just lead to the black screen with the blinking
    _

  2. The first option, KDE LiveCD (or something along those lines), what exactly is that? A sample of the desktop maybe?

  3. Once I install this, I won’t need to keep the CD in to run Linux, it should just be my computer’s default OS, right?

Continuing with the story. At this point I was very far past frustration. So I just clicked the first option again and this time it loaded up the KDE desktop. Does that mean it’s installed? I don’t think it does because the time on the clock was not set at what I had set it to in the installation.

Also, I noticed in the KDE desktop it was running super slooooooooooooooooooow. Any way to fix this?

So here I am now, wondering if I even installed openSuSE Linux onto my computer so that I can get wireless internet on a crappy desktop. Hopefully someone will read this whole thing and answer one or two of my questions.

I leave you with one last question. What would you do if you were in my situation?

-Reinstall openSUSE with help from Forum members
-Buy new computer
-Buy a more compaible adapter
-Install different OS
-Other???

Thank you all very much.

2

A machine running ME is unlikely to have the resources to run a full modern GUI.

How much memory? Minimum 512 meg
What processor? What speed? minimum 800 mhz (for reasonable response)
What graphics chip? How much graphics memory? minimum (128 meg)

You might get away with less but it will not be a very responsive system even with all the eye candy turned off.You might consider a light weight distribution like Puppy or DSL (**** Small Linux)

3

The “My Computer” tab in the Desktop Folder of KDE is telling me the following:

RAM: 245 MB
Free Memory: 20 MB

Fhttp://willowtreehome.com/Merchant2/graphics/00000001/Village/LET-U.jpgCK

Speed: 997 MHz

Graphics Chip: nVidia GeForce 2 MX/MX 400

I can’t find the Graphics memory but I’m sure it doesn’t really matter with that size RAM

4

Ok if the graphics chip is on the main board and not on a separate card it is sucking memory from the system memory. and making the available system memory even smaller 245 meg rather then 256 meg.

The processor is fast enough but the memory is just at the edge of bootable and graphics memory are way to low for either KDE or Gnome desk tops.
You might want to try the Xfce4 desktop. Try reinstalling and do NOT select gnome or KDE but other and Xfce4.

OOPS You said you installed via the KDE CD. I’m guessing you do not have a DVD drive in this machine. And Xfce4 does not come on the CD’s just the DVD, but can be downloaded.

Do you have Internet connection on this machine? Probably need to be hard connected since we have not gotten to getting the Wireless working.

If so then at the grub menu (boot screen) type 3 to get to a terminal screen. Log in as root type Yast use the tab key to move about the screen (no mouse!). Go to Software-Software Administration. Select patterns and check Xfce4. If you have Internet this will then down load and install the Xfce4 desktop. Quit out of Yast. Type reboot -n.

At the log in screen at the bottem left there is a menu to choose which desktop to start. select Xfce4
See if that is better.

5

I don’t have teh interwebz on that computer. Is there another openSUSE or any other mainstream Linux distro that would support a very small RAM and can be downloaded by CD? I just want an OS that will recognize the drivers of this wireless USB adapter so I can get internet. Thanks.

6

Puppy, **** Small Linux (DSL), Crunchbang, Feather Linux, DeLi… I suggest to start with Puppy.