Hi eveyrone, i am new to the forums

i have been trying for weeks to install Debian etch 4.0r4 and 4.0r4a with no success --- i constantly get kernel panic errors...


NOTE: I am trying to use two 3Com 3C905B-TX REV B Fast Etherlink XL PCI cards i got in 2002 from my old job when they were upgrading everything ( both work just fine on my windows machines, i even stuck them both in my windows machine one-at-a-time to make sure that they work and each one does )


today i had the bright idea of pulling out one of the two 3Com NIC cards i put in --- this gave me a simular but different error message

then

i pulled out the other 3Com NIC

and as soon as i went to install, everything went thorugh smoothly with no problems.. except that i dont have a NIC card


i'm wondering if the issue is driver related, but i'm new to linux and therefore have no clue on how to have the cd-r image i downloaded fron debian's mirrors to use any specific driver or even how or where to specify it look...

the machines i am tyring to install it on :

Dell Dimension V400
Dell Dimension 3000
Dell Optiplex GX1
Dell Optiplex G110

All intell Pentium II or Pentium III processors with onboard VGA
All have between 384 and 640 MB RAM



any ideas on what may be going wrong?

also

any thoughts on if i should try to have the Debian Etch 4.0rX installer use drivers other that what comes in the downloaded images? ---if so--- how would i go about doing that?

*bump*



.

Please do not bump threads.

You may need the 3com driver for your nick.

3Com Software Library - 3Com Linux drivers
http://support.3com.com/infodeli/tools/nic/linux.htm

I would try using the Lenny netinstall cd. If that doesn't work you may want to take a look at sidux or ubuntu. Or try a Knoppix livecd, if it has net figure out what it is using and install it in your debian install.

Thank you cragevil, also i'll not bump anymore on these forums -_-



do you know where i can get information on how to use a specific driver during the installation process?

or do i have to wait until the o/s is installed before i can install drivers for pci cards like my NICs ?