I'm sorry if this has been asked earlier, but I couldn't find anything in a search like this.

I'm a total newbie to Linux. I've done a little with Debian, but not a whole lot. For example, I can't compile a kernel, and I can't get my nforce2 integrated NIC to work under Debian. I've done a fresh Deb 3.0 install, and I have no idea what to do.

I tried installing nVidia's binaries but I am completely clueless. I know there's other threads devoted to this, but again I'm a complete newbie. I have no idea what to type or what dependencies to get, etc.

Thanks in advance.

I suggest trying to search again ...

I've just searched the board for nvidia and nic and
had a link to a fix for your problems within 30 seconds.


Cheers,
Tink

To install the nforce2 platform drivers, you need to download the *.tar.gz file from NVIDIA, not the *.rpm file. Unpack the file by typing:

tar -xvzf <filename>.tar.gz

Then move to the newly created nforce directory:

cd nforce

Compile and install the drivers with (must be done as root):

make
make install

Now insert your network driver (as root):

insmod nvnet

To make sure the network driver is automatically loaded after reboot (as root):

kwrite /etc/modules

The text file that opens has a list of modules (drivers) that load during boot, add a line with "nvnet". Save the file and exit kwrite.

You are done!

Your sound and network drivers will be installed now, but you have to configure networking. For Debian, a very simple way to do it is using netcardconfig. You can down load the DEB file from here: http://www.xs4all.nl/~groenewe/knoppix/Packages/

Install it using "dpkg -i netcardconfig*.deb" and run it with "netcardconfig". It requires the pump package for DHCP. It is also made for a Debian testing system so it may have dependecy problems on Debian stable, I'm not sure.

Hope that helps and good luck.