So I wanted to install Debian Sid and...the installer dumped me into a shell and...then I figured I'd try installing Sarge, and...the same thing happened...

D'oh! It appears you can only install Debian from the Woody CDs. I downloaded Sarge and Sid ISOs and the, er, installer-that's-not-an-installer dumped me to an "ash" shell in each. Not what I was expecting.

So, why doesn't it say, prominently, somewhere on Debian's site that you can only install from the stable distro? Or am I missing something?

And, how can I use these CDs when I change "stable" to "testing" (testing is my choice now) in /etc/sources.list, then type "apt-get update", then "apt-get dist-upgrade", to update my computer? It's going to want to grab everything off the 'net.

Did you download the sarge beta installer?

Obviously not! I read about it on Slashdot and the Debian site, but nowhere did it say I had to download a separate installer; nor have I seen any instructions on how to use it with Sarge or Sid CDs.

(Oh, and make that "/etc/apt/sources.list".)

yes you can use the cd's to upgrade after installing woody.

apt-cdrom add

But, if you have fast internet, just use the net install cd and all your packages will be current at that time.

I tried installing Woody and upgrading, but it turned out to be a disaster. So I downloaded the beta installer and started over. (The disaster was the same after the second attempt, so I needn't have started over.)

I tried using my Sarge CDs but when it came time to download packages, it kept asking me over and over to put in the first CD. So I installed it from the 'net.

After it was done, X didn't work (AGP 8x, Apollo chipset, agpgart doesn't recognize aperture size error, as discussed elsewhere on this board) except using the VGA driver. Network didn't work until I stopped and restarted it manually. Sources.list wasn't able to find the NVidia kernel, and I think I made it worse by trying to fix it. Not that I have any confidence that installing the NVidia kernel would fix the X problem. The floppy, DVD, and CD-ROM drives weren't in fstab (gee, it's kind of hard to install from CD if the CD isn't mounted).

So forget it. I'm typing this from a K6/266 box running Woody (highest best use for it, probably), so I know Debian can be installed. But for now, I'm tired of endlessly screwing with it, and am reinstalling Knoppix.

Now that I've happily reinstalled Knoppix, and installed the NVidia drivers (thanks to a script from the Kanotix "Knoppix clone" and some instructions on how to modify XF86Config-4 and bootmisc.sh from the Knoppix.net forums), would someone please tell me...

What does one have to do to get X working with the "agpgart" module and the "nv" server on Debian Sarge? With a stock 2.4.25-1-386 (or, in my case, -k7) kernel? With an AGP 8x, GeForce 4-based vid card, and an Athlon 2600+?

I wanted the 2.4.25 kernel because there are pre-compiled deb's for both ALSA and lm-sensors for it (NVidia, too).

Asking because one of these days I'm going to get a second hard drive and try again. Thanks for any help.