for a couple weeks now i've been trying to switch to freebsd, but i always run into problems. once i get past these problems i think i'll be on my way.

i have two main problems. i've searched google some but still haven't found anything that will help me answer these questions:

1) i can't connect to the internet! i remember one time installing freebsd 5.2.1 and being able to connect, but i just recently installed (on the same machine) freebsd 5.2.1 over again, and not having the same luck. i'm guessing maybe i didn't select packages needed to get on the internet? anyways, in the install everything looked good and it configured my network interface (which it recognized correctly) without problems. i can even do an ftp install if i want, but there's no internet once the whole system is installed!!! i edited /etc/hosts to match my hostname and domain name, but it still didn't work.

2) my mouse isn't working perfectly. i guess i can't complain, cause it does work. but it seems to lack smoothness - sometimes it's hard to click things on target because the cursor will move slow, then FAST, then slow, then FAST across the screen, and it gets annoying. i edited my XF86Config to several different settings without it working. by the way, it's a 7 button optical ps/2 scroll mouse.

so now i have to go back to linux cause i can't get past those stupid problems. blahhh, i've heard so many good things about bsd and i can't get a decent system up and running with it to actually try it out.

How are you connected to the internet?

What are the contents of /etc/resolv.conf ?

Can you ping stuff by ip? Are your startup scripts correct? Do you have the right route?

There a lots of questions even to the first problem you have... we need more information. If you could install by ftp you should have a connection.

i'm connected to the internet through a Broadcom ethernet port on my motherboard which is hooked up to a router on a cable connection.

i don't have a resolv.conf file in /etc

i don't know a lot about networking and all that because i'm used to the OS setting it all up for me. i'll try to answer the other questions though: i'm not really sure how to ping stuff but when i tried "ping [ip address of 'name server' that it gave me when configuring dhcp in the install]" i got results. i'm not really sure what nameserver means. i also did "ping [IPv4 address it gave me in the install" and that worked too. when i try to connect to websites through lynx or mozilla it gives me an error message immediately"Alert!: Unable to connect to remote host."

i dont know about startup scripts (where are they located, what are they?) and what the right route is, i'm a complete newbie to freebsd and networking.

Hmm. What error are you getting when you at attempt to connect to the net.

You can always make a resolv.conf file and fill it with information like
my.nameserver.com
my2.nameserver.com

I think a year ago this was the same problem I had and thats how I solved it.

The file needs to be populated with lines that read:
server address_of_nameserver

Note: you can't put the name of the site because you don't have a nameserver to resolve that yet. Use ip addresses.

sether, can you ping stuff by name? Like "ping yahoo.com" or do you get an error?

>>i'm connected to the internet through a Broadcom ethernet port on my motherboard which is hooked up to a router on a cable connection.

Agree with frob23, see if you can ping something and your router. If so, you need a nameserver.

See what's in your /etc/resolve.conf. Put the ip of your router there.

My resolve.conf and router's ip.
nameserver 192.168.2.1

my 2 cents: for the mouse, if you don't Got To Have a 7 button, go to walmart (etc) and buy a generic $9.99 2 button wheelmouse, do XF86Config with Auto, SysMouse, #7 for the IMPS mouse if you want, and then edit the /etc/X11/XF86Config file to add \

"ZAxisMapping" "4 5"

to the Pointer segment.

luck -O

yay, i'm on the internet! it was resolv.conf that was the problem. i read about someone else that had that problem but i didn't understand what i needed to change. thank you guys very much for your help.

is there any way i can get my 7-button mouse to work smoothly? i don't need all 7 buttons, i just figure it's more of a problem with the mouse itself than it is with the extra buttons. if not, that's fine, i have a spare mouse.

thanks again for all your help! now that i can setup the basics on freebsd i won't be dependent on linux or any other os anymore.

I'll take a stab at that one. I had a Labtec optical mouse that I had that type of problem with and it was actually an article that mentioned something about a default setting for Windows (sort of) that hhelped me figure it out.

In your mouse section of your xorg.conf file (or the XF86Config file), you might want to add this extra line:The value you can play with. The default mouse resolution for the generic Windows mouse driver is 300, so anything higher than that will make your mouse movement more finely tuned, making for a smoother glide across your screen.

You'll have to restart "X" for this change to take effect (ctrl+alt+backspace will work). If this is your problem, it should go away with this option.

And, you should be able to get the rest of the buttons to work with a bit of hacking at the ZAxisMapping and Buttons options too. Good luck. Hope this works.