Re: Debian Sarge install report
On Fri, Sep 30, 2005 at 01:13:26AM -0700, J Busser wrote:
> It cost me the equivalent of a whole weekend completing the install,
> but that was mainly because of time taken learning the stuff below. I
> offer it only to remind people what it can be like for newbies.
>
> Anyhow the following is what I (had to) learn:
>
> 1) to overwrite Windows XP onto the serial ATA (SATA) hard drive on
> which I had originally had a pre-final (testing) version of Sarge. I
> finally figured out how to do the Windows XP install, after much time
> tracking down the software drivers that I needed to have available,
> and preparing the files in the required floppy disk configuration on
> account of Windows XP shipping without SATA driver support. During
> Windows XP installation, you cannot even offer these files on a CD,
> they can only be read from an A: drive floppy disk!
>
> 2) to shrink a Windows NTFS partition without having to use
> commercial software under Windows. I found a nice tutorial on
> resizing Windows XP's NTFS partitions without damage using the
> Gentoo-based "System Rescue Disk" at
> http://www.madcarters.com/content/view/1/59/
> http://www.madcarters.com/content/view/3/0/
> http://www.madcarters.com/content/view/3/59/
>
> - I tried it, and it worked :-). I mainly wanted to try this, to help
> assure the Windows-dependent that it is possible even for someone who
> has never before installed Linux to set up a dual-boot machine. I
> could not tell with certainly whether resizing the partition would be
> easy or possible with Debian. Reading online I had the impression
> that although Debian includes "partman" the installer may not support
> resizing an NTFS partition.
>
> - Some extra time was lost learning to use the Windows software to
> burn the downloaded Gentoo as an ISO (which kept burning as a file
> until I figured out the unclear software).
>
> 3) why Sarge proved impossible to install from the business card ISO
> that I downloaded. Which is why I gave up preparing a dual-boot
> machine but think I could do it now/next time, if that should become
> important to me. The Sarge install kept hanging 7% of the way through
> the base install. It was not a matter of my not waiting long enough,
> for each time my progress fully died after about 5-10 minutes, with
> no further progress after waiting an extra *two* hours. I got excited
> when I learned online that conflicts between CD drivers and SATA
> drivers can impede a Sarge install and require reducing the selection
> to the bare minimum until later. But this only partly helped, I got
> stuck at 40% of an install. The larger netinstall CD worked, so
> either the more-complete CD is advisable with SATA drives, or I had a
> defective download/burn of the businesscard ISO.
I have never used the business card cd. I only use floppies or netinst
cd. I am not even sure what the business card cd contains to be honest.
> 4) when I first chose the video card driver(s) to use under Debian
> Linux, the closest choice for my Aopen GeForce4 seemed they should be
> for my VIA chipset but that choice proved not to run under xfree86.
> So I researched and figured out to re-run and reconfigure xfree86 to
> select the vesa drivers.
Any geforce card has an nvidia chip. Driver is nv.
> 5) At first, I had trouble trying to run a windowing system --- maybe
> I failed to select "Desktop" during the install. The problem came
> apparent after I tried to install and run kde. When at the command
> line I typed startx I got complaints about "no screen".
>
> This was fixed after I ran:
> apt-get install x-window-system-core
> dpkg-reconfigure xserver-xfree86
> and changed my video card setting from via (chosen from my chipset) to vesa
>
> When I next logged in, KDE would present the login prompt, but could
> not proceed, complaining about
> /home/<me>/ lacking an .xsession file, no session managers, window
> managers, or terminal emulators found; aborting.
You probably got xdm (not kde at all).
apt-get install kde should fix it it.
> Running "tasksel" allowed me to fix that by including (activating)
> the "Desktop" option. one being that in designating.
>
> But I am "up" now and very much enjoying Debian.
Great.
Len Sorensen
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