Hard drive, sound, network, problems
 

I just installed BLAG (9001), and I'm having some problems. I'm a newbie and I checked around before I posted, so please bear with me.

My first problem is my sound card (generic Aureal Vortex 2). The card is detected, auto-configured, but the test sound does not play, and I get various error messages related to mixer whenever I try to use it. When I looked into using this card, I didn't find any problems like this, so what's going on here?

Second problem, the install (which is sitting on an old Seagate 3GB) refuses to let me mount my 40GB Windoze drive. I've checked Red Hat's docs (the BLAG site directs to 'em), and I can't find a solution. Every other Linux load I've messed with has had no trouble with this, so I'm awfully confused.

Last and least is my joke of a nic. It's a Realtek 8139C, it was detected flawlessly, but it won't detect an IP. I think I've figured the solution (it seems a common problem), but not sure on the execution (all of the answers I've found have been too technical for my LinuxIQ). I was wondering if anyone could point me to a walk-through for this fix.

Thanks.

1.)

2.) check output of fdisk -l to be sure your lin box can't see the second hard drive. how are the drives hooked up, ie primary ? secondary ?. what filesystem is the windrive formatted? ie fat or ntfs?

3.) check the output of ifconfig eth0, or ifconfig eth0 up, then ifconfig
check man page on ifconfig for details.

there should be ** a how-to directory in /usr/doc that contains walkthrus for most of these things, if not check with linux.org, and tldp.org also check as many man pages you can find on related subjects.

2) Not sure how to do that (I said I was a newb), but I did check the hardware lists in Gnome and the drive is recognized. And it's fat, sorry I didn't mention, 98SE is the only Windows ver. I'll use.

3) See, you already lost me. Where the hell is the basic 'how to find stuff' doc? I need that.

usr/doc eh? I'll make sure to look there first in the future (shouldn't that be mentioned somewhere in an FAQ?). Thanks for your help, getting that network worked out will at least let me get some new packages installed (once I figure out how to do that).

hehe, it's problably mentioned in the faq in /usr/doc/faq's :)

your system should have a man page viewing tool, manviewer, xman, man page browser, something.. use that and check for any commands/filenames you hear on this board, if theres a man page on it, it will tell you about it, then if you still don't grasp it, just keep posting.. we'll keep answering...

Yeah, BLAG has all the man page tools, but the only folder where I found any man files (I think it was usr/man) didn't have much of anything in it (I think I opted to install documentation, so this isn't good). I've been to that database, but I have to find a way to get these files to my Linux load. I still haven't been able to get BLAG to recognize any of my fat partitions, even after creating a small one on the same drive as BLAG. I also haven't found a problem like mine anywhere. Is there some newbie crap I'm missing?

If I need to, I'd be more than willing to ditch Blag and go for something else (read; easier), the only thing is that it would have to fit on the 3 GB drive, which means it couldn't take more than 2 or so gigs (got a 512 meg swap file).

Failing all of that, I have an old but operable burner in the Crapaq upstairs. If I burn those man files to a CD with Nero, will there be any problem with the files, or can I do that?

ok,

one issue at a time, mounting fat's
do you have a gui installed? and x up and running?
have you used a command prompt, or xterm?

i need to know all that to know how to help..

check on the manpage link here on linuxquestions.org, they have a complete set of manpages that should help..

also check the links to newbie guides as they will be of tremendous help.

Ok, I'd just like to clarify; I know a lot about computers, I just don't know crap about Linux. So just for the record, I ain't completely dumb.

I have Gnome installed, it was the only full GUI included with BLAG. As far as I know, X is running (I thought most GUIs required it?).

I haven't used the prompt, I'm scared to death of the thing. I've read too many stories of it being way more complex than DOS ever was (and I liked DOS).

The problem with going getting man files is that I have no way to get them to the Linux load, remember? If I'm to help myself, I must figure out how, and that means figuring a way to get files aquired in Windows to Linux. That's why I need to fix this mounting problem.

I've checked the links, I've run searches, I can't find a problem like mine (for the mounting issue, I mean). It may be that I'm not searching for the right terms, in which case I'm screwed anyway.

btw, thanks again for your help, I'm painfully aware of how hard I've managed to make this.

getting lin help is not what it used to be.. , you don't get told rtfm and ignored now...

if you have a gui/window manager (gnome, kde, window maker, etc) then x is up running and configured..

if you liked dos, then forget anything you hear about CLI the command shell, it is dos with 100 times the power, it's actually less confusing, because
command --help
man command
either of those will give you a guide on how to use any command.
try starting an x term, or rxvt thru gnome, and type man man (enter obviously). it is longer than it needs to be, but will tell you some usefullo things, man -K "Query" will search all manual pages for the string query..

your other option, is to search the gnome help files for hours trying to find out if you have gui tools to do these things, some do some don't i use the console, and i use dos..

check the links in the signiture of this post they came from another lq user, and give good basic information, the one on how to ask a question is how it used to be, but still gives a lot of insight.

hopefully this information will set you on the right track, manpages on cfdisk, fdisk, mount, should help, also the linux documentation project at www.tldp.org has a full list of how-to's for linux.

keep posting..

ok, I want to make sure I got all this straight.

An 'X term' is a terminal, sorta like the command prompt in windoze.

If I need help on something, I type 'man x' where x is the command I want help with. Assuming my linux distro has the documentation, I'll get a useful (if sometimes long) help file.

I hope this doesn't sound too stupid, but.. what sig?

New stuff:
I've figured out where my 40GB should be in Linux (I used the PC Linux Live CD to see where it listed the drive), and BLAG isn't listing it. HOWEVER, the hardware manager lists the drive, and has all the configuration info that PC Linux listed.

The same Live CD, that wouldn't have anything to do with my Realtek nic a few days ago, suddenly finds and configures the card with no trouble. I was hoping you might have a guess how that happened, cause I thought Linux wasn't going to suprise me like that.

From all my browsing, I'm quite sure I can get any network and sound problems worked out, but this hard drive issue won't go away, and I still haven't found a problem like mine. All the drive how-tos just tell you how to mount the drive, they just assume that Linux will give you the option. I'd be annoyed if this wasn't more fun than windows.

yes for the sake of simplicity an xterm can be thought of as the equivelent of a dos prompt or command promt in win. (for simplicity)

you type x --help for simple help or man x for a lot of help

your right there was no signiture, let me look,
THese are from Nu-Bee Member of LQ
http://www.catb.org/~esr/faqs/smart-questions.html
http://www.linuxnewbie.org/nhf/Shell..._Commands.html
http://www.linuxnewbie.org/nhf/Insta...ith_Linux.html

a good thing to try, especially in the begining, try one problem at a time, or not, i never do. just seems like good advice..

you said your live cd saw the drive? what exactly does that mean?
what is the output of
fdisk -l
not sure why it all the sudden found your nic, different kernel, somthing came unloose in the system, it was more humid, you had it hooked up to a hub, never know really.

send the output of fdisk -l and we'll go from there..

Ok, I've been pretty distracted lately (folks dragging me to plenty of new-year family get-togethers), so all I've really done is figured out that I can't just enter that fdisk command, it gives me a weird error (which I will post tomorrow, I didn't think to write it down) that makes me think fdisk just isn't there. However, I can man fdisk and get all that good stuff. I did have time to read a few man files (these things are slick!), but I haven't found anything that helps me with any of my problems. Just thought I'd let you know I haven't dissapeared.

And I did read those (articles? how-tos?) that you linked to... there ought to be a link to that at the main forum index. A lot of the other interest specific forums I visit have something like that.

btw, I noticed you're in Iraq. Mind if I ask what unit you're with?

you can try cfdisk /dev/hdb
and it should give you a listing of all partitions on hdb
man cfdisk

All the man files you've mentioned so far have been accessible, but both fdisk and cfdisk produce the following messages, respectively:

bash: fdisk: command not found
bash: cfdisk: command not found

Not being familiar with this prompt, I may be doing something wrong. I sure hope I am.

try these
/usr/bin/fdisk
/bin/fdisk
/usr/sbin/fdisk
/sbin/fdisk

not remembering, it should be in an sbin directory

also does your distro have a package manager program, like pkgtool pkgview anything? if slocate is installed you can try locate fdisk to find out where it is..

None of those directories worked. I don't think BLAG has a package manager, I went through the installation options very carefully, and I don't remember seeing one.

I think I'm gonna find another distro. I've d-loaded a few others, I might as well try 'em out. It really stinks, I like this one.