Can anyone help me find a good distro ?

[H_TeXMeX_H]

Maybe I have a really buggy BIOS (I think I can say for sure that I do, because I have had no problems using any linux distro on my desktop) (my laptop is buggy piece of shit)

Gonna try slackware next (I didn't realize that you don't actually need a floppy drive to install it ... while their site says otherwise:

Slackware Linux doesn't require an extremely powerful system to run (though having one is quite nice . It will run on systems as far back as the 486. Below is a list of minimum system requirements needed to install and run Slackware.

    * 486 processor
    * 16MB RAM (32MB suggested)
    * 100-500 megabytes of hard disk space for a minimal and around 3.5GB for full install
    * 3.5" floppy drive

Additional hardware may be needed if you want to run the X Window System at a usable speed or if you want network capabilities.

http://www.slackware.com/install/sysreq.php

[Orethrius]

Tex, post the results of lspci and maybe lsusb so we can get a better idea of your hardware - so far, I haven't seen the laptop vendor / model information but I could've just overlooked it.

EDIT: The Handbook is a TERRIBLE resource for first-timers, it's only really good for reference purposes.  Use the x86 Quickinstall or the amd64 Howto depending on which architecture you have - there used to be a Quickinstall for amd64, but I've been unable to find it of late.

EDIT 2: Found the amd64 Handbook, still can't find the Quickinstall.

[worker201]

Yeah, that's the minimum.  If you have a bootable cd drive, you are well beyond Patrick's idea of minimum.  If you can't get Slackware to run, then I know you've done something wrong.  Be advised that Slackware tends to be a bit behind in things like versions of gtk, kernels, drivers, etc, and their basic setup may seem like FC2.

[toadlife]

I have a few questions ... how many programs have been ported to BSD ?

Well, as of now, there are over 16000 apps in the ports tree.

I need openoffice, hplip, xsane, madwifi, k3b, and most importantly dvorak keyboard support !

All of those things except for madwifi are available for FreeBSD/PC-BSD in the ports tree.  madwifi however, you won't need, as FreeBSD already comes with drivers for atheros based wifi devices.

[H_TeXMeX_H]

what about dvorak ?

and here's the lspci and lsusb

Code: [Select]

drax@ubuntu:~$ lspci
00:00.0 Host bridge: Silicon Integrated Systems [SiS] 645xx (rev 03)
00:01.0 PCI bridge: Silicon Integrated Systems [SiS] SG86C202
00:02.0 ISA bridge: Silicon Integrated Systems [SiS] SiS963 [MuTIOL Media IO] (rev 14)
00:02.1 SMBus: Silicon Integrated Systems [SiS] SiS961/2 SMBus Controller
00:02.5 IDE interface: Silicon Integrated Systems [SiS] 5513 [IDE]
00:02.6 Modem: Silicon Integrated Systems [SiS] AC'97 Modem Controller (rev a0)
00:02.7 Multimedia audio controller: Silicon Integrated Systems [SiS] AC'97 Sound Controller (rev a0)
00:03.0 USB Controller: Silicon Integrated Systems [SiS] USB 1.0 Controller (rev 0f)
00:03.1 USB Controller: Silicon Integrated Systems [SiS] USB 1.0 Controller (rev 0f)
00:03.2 USB Controller: Silicon Integrated Systems [SiS] USB 1.0 Controller (rev 0f)
00:03.3 USB Controller: Silicon Integrated Systems [SiS] USB 2.0 Controller
00:04.0 Ethernet controller: Silicon Integrated Systems [SiS] SiS900 PCI Fast Ethernet (rev 90)
00:0a.0 CardBus bridge: Ricoh Co Ltd RL5c476 II (rev aa)
00:0a.1 CardBus bridge: Ricoh Co Ltd RL5c476 II (rev aa)
00:0a.2 FireWire (IEEE 1394): Ricoh Co Ltd R5C552 IEEE 1394 Controller (rev 02)
01:00.0 VGA compatible controller: nVidia Corporation NV17 [GeForce4 420 Go] (rev a3)
drax@ubuntu:~$ lsusb
Bus 001 Device 001: ID 0000:0000  
Bus 004 Device 002: ID 054c:0069 Sony Corp. Memorystick MSC-U03 Reader
Bus 004 Device 001: ID 0000:0000  
Bus 002 Device 002: ID 046d:c50b Logitech, Inc. Cordless Desktop Optical
Bus 002 Device 001: ID 0000:0000  
Bus 003 Device 001: ID 0000:0000  
drax@ubuntu:~$

I'm off to install slackware (*crosses fingers*)

[toadlife]

what about dvorak ?

lol. Every OS supports the dvorak keyboard layout.

[piratePenguin]

If you're BIOS is buggy you MIGHT be able to try linuxbios.

http://linuxbios.org/index.php/Main_Page
http://linuxbios.org/Supported_Motherboards

Do I wish mine was supported or what..
It mightn't be able to boot FreeBSD yet.

[H_TeXMeX_H]

If you're BIOS is buggy you MIGHT be able to try linuxbios.

http://linuxbios.org/index.php/Main_Page
http://linuxbios.org/Supported_Motherboards

Do I wish mine was supported or what..
It mightn't be able to boot FreeBSD yet.

It is not supported ... and if it fucks up ... game over

Anyway ... using slackware 11.0 right now. It's actually quite nice ... it only took me 4 tries to install it ... here's some install notes in case someone else has problems:

I recommend using the "huge26.s" kernel unless you're trying for a server or a minimalist distro ... it's the only one that supports my Logitech USB mouse properly. (would also recommend JFS since you have the option)

Install lilo to MBR despite the "unsafe" warning.

If using the huge26.s kernel, after you install you gotta mount the DVD or CD again and installpkg /extra/linux-2.6.17.13/kernel-modules in order for ethernet and other things to work (might also wanna install kernel-source and k3b while you're in there).

Had to edit /etc/X11/xorg.conf for:
# dvorak keyboard
Option     "XkbLayout"     "dvorak"
# allow mousewheel
Option     "Protocol"      "Auto"

Remember to "adduser"

Damn lilo timeout is set to 1 min something by default ... had to change /etc/lilo.conf then run /sbin/lilo for a more reasonable value.

Other than that ... it's pretty straight-forward.

[toadlife]

So how is slackware treating you Tex?

I wanted to install it and try it out, but the install CD didn't support my Areca RAID controller.  There might have been a kernel on there that would have supported it but I didn't get into it that far.

[H_TeXMeX_H]

It's great ... the first distro I really like ... cuz everything works as it should (with a bit of tweaking). I got everything I need to work perfectly ... hplip (hp-toolbox actually works unlike in FC), madwifi, nvidia drivers (hate to have to use em, but I can't play games without it). And, its very stable so far. It's really just what I need, supports many filesystems, has logical, easy-to-use packaging system, has many choices of packages ... with many more on the net, many window managers to choose from ... etc.

For RAID support you could either use the ataraid.i (2.4.x kernel w/ IDE, ATA, RAID support), raid.s (2.4.x kernel w/ SCSI, RAID support), or huge26.s (2.6.x kernel supports pretty much everything ... but is huge )

Pre-built slackware kernels are here in case I missed one that also supports RAID:
ftp://slackware.mirrors.tds.net/pub/slackware/slackware-11.0/kernels/

[Calum]

Thank you for that review tex! it is excellent to finally see someone saying that slackware is a good distro.

i am sick of seeing people say how they wouldn't recommend it to a new linux user etc. in my opinion slackware is straightforward and does exactly what it says on the tin. it has the advantage as well that in a world of increasingly distro specific and GUI centric configuration tools, slackware is comparably more straightforward to configure, and does what a person would expect any *nix system to do, without too much extra distro specific research. with an ethic like that, it can't fail to be a good choice for a certain (and reasonably sized) segment of the potential linux userbase.

[worker201]

Well, but Slackware has a default runlevel of 3, which means command line interface.  Lots of people will be scared shitless just to see it.  All the curses config screens can be kinda daunting at first as well.

Of course the question has never been answered - if you can't use a command line (or navigate a curses menu), should you even be allowed to use Linux?

[piratePenguin]

Of course the question has never been answered - if you can't use a command line (or navigate a curses menu), should you even be allowed to use Linux?

Uhh, "Linux" (as well as "GNU/Linux") is a massive generalisation and one area the hundreds of individual operating systems based on GNU/Linux do not share is usability.

New users who aren't all that interested in how things work should definitely stay away from Slackware (and Gentoo etc), while not necessarily Ubuntu (and Fedora Core etc).

Slackware is a great OS for those who are new to GNU/Linux and are interested in how things work, surely among the best ever for this purpose. That's why I spent something like six months on it (after being amazed by what I seen on Mandrake) and then went to Linux From Scratch and then to it-just-fucking-works Ubuntu.

[H_TeXMeX_H]

Well, one thing I'd like to say is that if you are new and want to install Slackware, do read a guide before you try ... something like this (this will also help with the fear of curses interface and command line). Nothing in Slackware is more difficult than in any other distro ... and oftentimes is simpler and easier than most other distros.

The way I do things (I don't read the manual ) I probably would not be able to install slackware without first using a more GUI intensive distro, but with plenty of opportunity to learn command-line (like FC ... too bad it kinda blows )

[Calum]

Well, but Slackware has a default runlevel of 3, which means command line interface.  Lots of people will be scared shitless just to see it.  All the curses config screens can be kinda daunting at first as well.

oh dear. anybody that can't figure out how to type startx, or init 4 shouldn't be using slackware (or *ix) in my opinion. That's beneath the level of acceptable newbieness. In fact actually, i wouldn't be so brazen as to say they shouldn't be using it, but i would say that if they do use slack and they don't have at least a page of helpful one/two word commands to familiarise themselves with then they should expect a bit of a learning curve.

Of course the question has never been answered - if you can't use a command line (or navigate a curses menu), should you even be allowed to use Linux?

in a word, no, but see above.

New users who aren't all that interested in how things work should definitely stay away from Slackware (and Gentoo etc), while not necessarily Ubuntu (and Fedora Core etc).

they sure should. If they don't want to know how their PC works, then they should probably get somebody else to use it for them (check their emails, listen to their music etc). I am sure these don't-want-to-know-how-it-works users have had to deal with a number of issues and quirks during their windows life, so they can't complain that linux isn't suddenly as smooth as silk for them, especially if they won't make the effort to shift mentally to the new paradigm.

Slackware is a great OS for those who are new to GNU/Linux and are interested in how things work, surely among the best ever for this purpose. That's why I spent something like six months on it (after being amazed by what I seen on Mandrake) and then went to Linux From Scratch and then to it-just-fucking-works Ubuntu.

and most people probably should try out a few to see what they think.