Slackware Rules!

[Zema Bus]

Just installed it on a machine, duel booting with XP so that it can crunch & fold. I was expecting it to be a long project getting Slackware fully going with X like it was the last time I installed it, in '97 I think. The last time, I had to manually download all the packages individually and install them one by one. I think I worked on it for a week. Now you just download two ISO's & create the CD's and you have it all! It's not really any harder than installing Mandrake now, particularly if you've already had a little experience with Linux; The installer does most of the work, you may have to do a few minor things to get it the way you want it, but even Mandrake usually needs a little tweaking and adjusting. It couldn't install LILO for some reason, so I booted with a floppy and used a utility in X to set it up. I didn't have to do anything network-wise to get on the internet as soon as I brought up X - I just opened a browser window & it just worked! I kept Grogan's excellent tutorial up on another computer for reference as needed, it was like having Grogan right there offering suggestions as I went along! :beer:

[Grogan]

Good, I hope you enjoy Slackware, Zema :-)

[Cool Canuck]

That's great Zema. Wish my install at work went that smooth. No printer, No sound, No network. On the bright side, it gives me something to do.

[ralpha6]

Good job Zema :thumbsup:
I hope you enjoy Slackware as much as I do ;)

[floppybootstomp]

it was like having Grogan right there offering suggestions as I went along!

Now there's a scary thought :?:

Good news, ZB :) After reading G's tutorial, I'm very tempted to give Slackware a try myself.

Well done :)

[BobGuy]

Have fun Zema. :D

Gort Klatuu Barada Slackware. :lol:

[TJM4FUN]

Now this is more fun. Installed on a IBM T20 Laptop as a 3rd os.

At home, everything working after my mental block about lilo, so
network on ethernet, and sound were working.

So I try at work, now I have to use a token ring card in the pcmcia
slot. Boot sees it but no config. At Grogan;s suggestion I tried hacking the rc.inet1 file, and got it to work. also did a second hack
so I think it will now activate whichever nic is connected to an interface.

That felt good, so, why not compile a new kernal, get rid of all the stuff that errors on boot due to a 'overkill' install.

All went well, cept I lost the t/r card and sound. Not a big deal, as I suspect it is user error. Laptops are probably the worst to configure, as nothing is quite as a standard pc. (as in what module/driver handles the hot plug of pcmcia, the swappable cdrom/floppy...etc) It's also rather diffcult to get exact chipset versions for some of the integrated io, can;t really pop the card and read the numbers off the chip.

I may have narrowed the problem down to adding the built in modem in, as now I have some irq errors all relating to serial device hogging up all the resources. looks like it might be an easy fix, just another quick compile as everything is already in place.

But it does boot up real fast now, and is very snappy. A noticeable improvement over the default 486 based kernel.
Kernel is now the 2.4.24, size went from 1300kb to 874kb.

(and before anyone asks, yes , lilo is edited and rebuilt right. :lol: )

[TJM4FUN]

Well, the modded script appears to work fine.
The new compile seems to work fine at home, since it uses the default ethernet adapter. will have to sort out the pcmcia stuff to use at work.
Sound is still out, alsaconfig is also apparently impacted by this irq issue.
I knew I shoulda left the modem out!

[Zema Bus]

Thanks guys. CC & Tim, I don't have sound working either (I notice an error on startup), but then I haven't been using sound on this computer anyway, since it's otherwise (when booted in XP) just a UD cruncher :)

[TJM4FUN]

Well after alot of experimenting, I found the problem.
Seems it needed to have isa=y for some reason.
Also have sound working, I found the correct card in the config menu, so I selected it in. Now it works.

So all is good here, now on to fixing up kde.

[Grogan]

Ohh fuck... yeah, I noticed that in your dmesg, now that you mention it. It's something you'd have had to disable on purpose. Your token ring adapter is actually treated as an ISA device over top of PCMCIA, it seems. I never thought to check that. So I guess it gets two interrupts... the cardbus portion gets IRQ 11 which is shared, but the actual adapter gets IRQ3.

tr0: ISA 16/4 Adapter/A (short) | 16/4 ISA-16 Adapter found
tr0: using irq 3, PIOaddr a20, 64K shared RAM.
tr0: Hardware address : 00:04:AC:56:8E:93
tr0: Shared RAM paging disabled. ti->page_mask 0
tr0: Maximum Receive Internet Protocol MTU 16Mbps: 16344, 4Mbps: 6104
tr0: port 0xa20, irq 3, mmio 0xd0a81000, sram 0xd0000,
hwaddr=0004AC568E93

As for your sound, if it works with an OSS driver in the 2.4 kernel, great! Alsa is needless complexity.

[Zema Bus]

One thing I notice is that power management isn't working for the monitor to auto turn off after so many minutes. I can set it, but it doesn't actually work. I'm guessing it's because of the kernel - I used the same one I used to boot off the setup CD, bare.i I think was the one, instead of bareacpi.i. Do I need to swap out the kernel?

[TJM4FUN]

Well, there is an identically built kernel called bareacpi.i on cdrom 2, in a directory called kernel/bareacpi.i , if I remember correctly.
The kernel itself is called bzImage.
Now, this may be risky depending on the machine, but it worked on the laptop, so you could give it a shot.
(of course I find out way after the fact that the laptop doesn't do acpi). Your pc may need acpi to handle it's power functions.

Warning: this is not exactly proper, and may have unforeseen consequences. I had Grogan as coach on chat when I did that....
I may be crazy, I'm not stupid!
There way I did this, from a command line, do a su , you need root
auth.
cd /boot
rename (mv) vmlinuz-ide-2.4.22 to ovmlinuz-ide-2.4.22 (assuming you installed the bare ide kernel)
Now copy the bzimage file to /boot as vmlinuz-ide-2.4.22
then relink the symbolic link:
ln -sf vmlinuz-ide-2-4-22 vmlinuz
rerun lilo to be safe.
the system map is the same for both kernels, so you should reboot and acpi should be enabled.
This may help, or you may run into acpi problems. If you do, at the boot option, select whatever the slack option is on lilo, then add acpi=off at the boot = ???? at the bottom.
This is quick and dirty, the right way is to recompile the kernel for the machine, which is highly recommended, as that kernel is a 486 version, and it will run much better customized for your processor. (and I mean it is NOTICABLY faster).

[Zema Bus]

Thanks TJ, I think I'll take a look at Grogan's how-to on recompiling a kernel and see if that looks doable.

[Cool Canuck]

Originally posted by Zema Bus
One thing I notice is that power management isn't working for the monitor to auto turn off after so many minutes. I can set it, but it doesn't actually work. I'm guessing it's because of the kernel - I used the same one I used to boot off the setup CD, bare.i I think was the one, instead of bareacpi.i. Do I need to swap out the kernel?
I found that you do not need acpi but you do need apm. The acpi is mostly for laptops to turn off HDs and reduce processor speeds. For a desktop, you need apm to get the screen blanking and a proper shutdown with the "halt" command.

I don't have any acpi functions selected for my kernel (2.4.24) just apm. In the General Section select "Power Management Support" and a little farther down "Advanced Power Management BIOS Support". I have mine built as a module so it needs to be loaded through the rc.local file. It does not load automatically.

[Grogan]

ACPI shutdown does power down the computer. It is for more than laptops, and power management... it is a specification for controlling hardware.

[Cool Canuck]

I should have choosen my words more carefully. :)

With the 2.4.24 kernel options, selecting acpi support, opens the options which are have little to no use for desktops. You don't require apic kernel support either to get apm to function.

If all you want is proper shutdown and screen blanking, you just need the apm.o module.

I haven't played with the 2.6 kernel yet. It might have the button function working in it and then you will probably need acpi for that to work. Dunno.

[TJM4FUN]

Originally posted by Zema Bus
Thanks TJ, I think I'll take a look at Grogan's how-to on recompiling a kernel and see if that looks doable.

I think you'll find it as easy to do as the install. I would recommend that you not jump to the 2.6 kernel right away. do the 2.4.24 upgrade, as with the stock 9.1 cd install, all the requirements should be met.
For reference, tho, you should write down the vid card chipset, the sound card type and version, to have handy for the compile. the dmesg command is good, but with a generic install, it might not have your exact hardware configured. Also you should have the chipset for your mobo, and the chipset for any raid hardware if you use it.
I only say this so you can configure the kernel to your exact hardware, which leads to a faster system. for your power issue pay particular attention to the apm and acpi section.
I would also advise you to go thru each section and verify that if you are using it, that any submenus are set correctly. it's easy to miss a default setting you may not want.

Follow his excellent how to, and you'l be up in no time.