Re: Drivers-EMERGENCY>HELP IMMEDIATELY
On Wed, 26 Jan 2000, Hutchinson, Floyd wrote:
> I install Debian version 2.1.r4 on a Dell Optiplex GX1. But I am having
> trouble locating the drivers for the ?3com Fast EtherLink XL 10/100MB TX?
> and ?ATI Rage Pro Turbo AGP 2x?. Can anyone help locate these drivers and
> help me with installing them. Thank you.
>
>
The driver for the Ethernet card must either be compiled into the kernel
or loaded at runtime as a module. The video card is supported by X Windows
by selecting the correct xserver that supports the particular video
card. As the two problems are not related, I would first get my network
connection up and then work on getting X installed.
When you installed Debian, you should have been gone through a process
where you set up the devices for your machine. The network device
(Ethernet card) should have been included in this. The availability of
device drivers for specific cards is a function of the Linux kernel
version. As new kernel versions are released, they have, among other
things, support for more devices. The kernel version for Debian 2.1 is
2.0.36, which is a little dated, but still very functional. If your card
is supported by that version of the kernel, then you should have seen it
on the list of cards in the device configuration part of the
installation and should have selected it. Another alternative is to
include that driver when you recompile the kernel, but this is a couple of
steps after the initial install ... and frankly is a bit more to bite off.
Its hard for me to judge what advice to give you as I don't know what
happened during the install or your level of knowledge of Linux. My first
reaction would be to have you do the basic reinstall over and make sure
you are able to select the Ethernet driver for your card and get it
working that way. There are other ways to do it, but aren't quite so
simple.
For X, you must read the documentation for XFree86 or XF86Setup, which is,
IMHO, the easiest way to install X. The XFree86 docs will tell you what
video cards are supported and which xserver provides that support. Then
you must install (in the normal Debian way(s)) the necessary X software
packages, and run XF86Setup.
Whew... Hope this helps...
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