DescentBB

I still can't get fedora 6 to boot up. The install seems to go fine, but I get nothing when it reboots and loads from the hard drive.

Did you cover the SATA issue last time? I know both Debian and FreeBSD didn't boot at all until I turned on PATA compatibility mode in my BIOS.

I don't think there is such a setting in the Abit NF7-S, just the option to boot from the SATA.

try explictly disabling the PATA controllers, and making sure booting from other devices is also enabled.

If I did that, there'd be no access to the install cd, but I did unplug my current primary drives so that the raptor was all that was hooked up.

Well, apparently I cant get anything to boot from sata, I just tried xp and it didn't go either

that's what I was worried about, some motherboards have issues it seems with booting from external controllers.

you might have to waste a ide disk just for booting.

Hmmm I don't have a spare IDE, XP is on one, and its full, the other is failing, and the raptor was my spare.

I'm hypothesizing here, grub can be on C, and I could have it load either xp on c or fedora on d right? does grub need its own partition? or have grub on c, xp on d, and fedora on e I'm confusing myself

Okay, I moved things around, got fedora on an Ide drive, install went fine, all default and now I get an error loading operating system at bootup. *sigh*

Did you install grub to the MBR? Did you also mark the boot partition bootable? Dunno how Fedora Core's installer would present the option to you. You can fix the MBR from the Windows install CD recovery console (FDISK /MBR).

It didn't give me the option using all the defaults. If I go into the advanced settings and change anything the installer crashes - but then I don't know much about how linux (or fedora for that matter) likes its partitions set up - I just assumed it would put grub on there since it didn't give me the option.

Okay, I did an upgrade over the existing install and it added the bootloader to it, and now I'm posting from Fedora!

now I can't get nvidia drivers to install, says I need to shut down x-server or something?

Ya, the X server is what drives the display. X clients (programs) send requests to the X server to draw stuff on the screen. If you want to install new video drivers and/or use them, you have to shut down and restart X. My guess is that the nvidia package you're installing wants to automagically configure your xorg.conf to use the drivers, requiring no manual intervention.

Hmm okay, well, lets see if I can figure out how to do that! God I feel like such a noob! LOL

ahhh both monitors working now. I forwhent trying to shut down x and did the Yum path, only the tutorial said i should change out fedoras default i586 kernel for an i686 kernel, but none was there to be found so I left it alone, and installed the i586 nvidia driver after a little digging, now all is well

Well, I'll have to say once I got out of gnome and into KDE I started liking it alot better. the gnome interface is slick but kde is alot easier to use and has some nice features.

Capm wrote:Well, I'll have to say once I got out of gnome and into KDE I started liking it alot better. the gnome interface is slick but kde is alot easier to use and has some nice features.

x2
although I use KANOTIX atm, but I think I might switch to Sabayon - both are very up to date and have excellent Hardware Support (got it running on my SATA drive without ever touching the BIOS) - works like a charm

Yeah, I'm not a fan of Gnome either, but Xamindar uses it for some weird reason..

Welcome to the family.

I always found Gnome > KDE. If most of my apps are going to be using GTK+, I'd rather my desktop did too. The KDE libs are also HUGE, I'd rather not have them in RAM if unnecessary.

Capm wrote:Okay, I did an upgrade over the existing install and it added the bootloader to it, and now I'm posting from Fedora!

now I can't get nvidia drivers to install, says I need to shut down x-server or something?

Make sure you have the driver installer downloaded and in an easy to get to directory. Edit the /etc/inittab file and change the default run level from 5 to 3. Reboot, change to that directory, install the driver. Then edit the /etc/inittab file and change the default run level back to 5 ... reboot ... BOTTA BOOM!

Capm wrote:Okay, I did an upgrade over the existing install and it added the bootloader to it, and now I'm posting from Fedora!

I am having the exact same problem you originally did with a new FC6 install. Can you tell me specifically what you did to get it to boot? You loaded an upgrade to FC6? I Installed from the 5 FC6 CDs from http://linux.softpedia.com/progDownload ... ad-41.html

I don't see an upgrade to this install anywhere ...


This particular box specs are :
Athlon TBird 1.4
ASUS A7V266
1Gb PC 2100
Maxtor 40Gb ATA 100
GeForce 7600GS/256 AGP
Viewsonic Q19WB-2 19" Widescreen

Thx,
D

Bump

I was installing from the DVD, but how I did it was I did the default install, then I rebooted, ran the installer again, except this time I did the upgrade option, (upgrade f6 to f6 ) which is where it gave me the option to install the boot loader.

Thx man

I think I can fix this without so much effort after all. Apparently when I boot up FC6 it sets my monitor to an out-of-range frequency. I forget where the default monitor resolution and frequency is stored ... if I knew I could boot into state 3, change it, and reboot to state 5. Anyone remember where the monitor resolution/frequencies are stored?
Thx,
D

Do you have a card with a dvi and a vga out? I found that during the install, the dvi port wasn't set right, and the vga port worked fine, once I got it to boot up though, all was fine

That jazz is in /etc/X11/xorg.conf

Look for the \"Monitor\" section, where you can set horizontal sync, vertical refresh, and other bizarre stuff, and the \"Screen\" section, where you can edit which screen resolutions you want to use at which bit depths (in my experience, X defaults to the highest resolution, so you may want to play with removing the highest and what not).

Capm wrote:Do you have a card with a dvi and a vga out? I found that during the install, the dvi port wasn't set right, and the vga port worked fine, once I got it to boot up though, all was fine

Nope ... I am using the VGA port.

Jeff250 wrote:That jazz is in /etc/X11/xorg.conf

Look for the "Monitor" section, where you can set horizontal sync, vertical refresh, and other bizarre stuff, and the "Screen" section, where you can edit which screen resolutions you want to use at which bit depths (in my experience, X defaults to the highest resolution, so you may want to play with removing the highest and what not).

I think that is all I need ... will check it out tonight.

Thanks,
D

Confirmed that I am using VGA.

I used recue mode to boot into console mode and went to /etc/X11/xorg.conf ... there is no 'Monitor' section in it. IIRC I had this problem immediately after installation and never got a chance to use the GUI setup features ... hence the monitors section never got installed in the file.

I understand that there is an Xconfigurator program somewhere ... will look for it and see if that will handle my needs unless someone has a better idea.

wait, what?

Have you tried the dvi port? maybe its turned around on your card (I have two monitors, so it was of little consequence that 1 didnt work during installation) I don't remember if it stayed that way until I installed the nvidia drivers or not, it may have.

You might want to download the latest version of the install cd's with all the updates already applied.
Link and see if that doesn't help you. F7 is only a few months off too.

nvidia's drivers will always set the analog monitor as the primary one under linux, and there isn't a way to overide it.

Fliptw the problem is that when I install FC6 and it goes to reboot/config the first time, the X server fails to start. I thought it was because I have a widescreen monitor so I tried it with an old 1280x1024 Gateway CRT ... same problem.

I have tried FC3 also and I can get it to boot but as soon as I install the latest nVidia driver and reboot ... same problem.

Capm I'll dload those now and try once again ...

Could it be the GeForce 7600 GS is too new to be compatible with FC3/6?

I have installed 3 and 6 at least 15 times now and I am getting very frustrated ...

Thx,
D

Unfortunately the bit torrent has been running since I posted that last message and has stalled without even finishing the first CD.

Finally got the CD's dloaded and burnt. I tried an install with them and same problem. I think I am going to punt this video card and downgrade to a GF3 or a Radeon 9800 instead.

punt fedora first.

what exactly is the error that X gives?

Radeon 9800 Pro / 128 works just fine. Posting with it now!

Why wouldn't a nv 7600 GS work? I hate that, I spent like $125 on it a few weeks ago.

you tried the latest drivers from nvidia?

No, I can't even log in to download them. In fact, I never even get to the post install setup. The most telling symptom is that right before I would expect the graphical login screen, the monitor goes out of frequency range.

well, thats fedora's problem.

do the install with what ever works, then get the latest drivers from nvidia.

Capm wrote:Do you have a card with a dvi and a vga out? I found that during the install, the dvi port wasn't set right, and the vga port worked fine, once I got it to boot up though, all was fine

I have tried 6 different video cards (nvidia and ati) ... replaced the dvd/cd drives ... replaced the ram (3 sets) ... replaced the hard drive (3 drives) ... replaced the NIC ... tried various versions and burns of FC (3, 4, and 6) ... all to no avail. All in all I have installed FC 15 to 20 times now and every damned time I do the initial reboot the monitor goes out of frequency range and goes black. I have started up in init stage 3 and monkeyed around with manually configuring the xorg.conf file. I have installed various drivers from the vcard manufacturers ... not a damned thing worked.

Well, I was going to give it another try tonight and as I remounted the original vcard (nv 7600 gs) I saw that dv port and remembered this post. I thought ... maybe ... just maybe ... maybe I am having the opposite problem that you did. So, I slipped a dv to rgb adaptor onto the dv port and connected the rgb cable to it. VOILA!! The fkn signal is coming out of the damned dv port. I am so pissed ... but relieved.