Geting Etch is a major head ache
 

Hi,
i just wanted to ask if there is a way to Buy the Etch DVD's. I am currently using Mandriva Free 2007 and was thinking about trying out Debian. But the only DVD's that are being sold are for the Stable release which is now ancient. The Full DVD download for Etch is around 8 GB and that would take ages. I cant use netinst Cd cause it does not support Wireless Cards.....

What can i do???? i it possible that i get Sarge and then upgrade to Etch? Or any one has anyother ideas on what can i do?????

No Debian install disk is going to support wireless. Even cards that are included in the kernel require firmware, which is not allowed on the Debian install disks, as it is closed source.

So the simple answer is install using a wired card until you get the firmware for your card, and get it working.

Getting the full DVDs is 100% unnecessary, unless the machine will never have an internet connection. Regardless, the DVDs will in no way allow your wireless to work, so you're wasting 8 Gb of download bandwidth if you get it.

Peace,
JimBass

I don't know about France, but in the USA, you can generally use a wired connection in public buildings like libraries. Also, I have heard that internet cafes are a popular item in Europe. There must be several ways for you to get a wired connection for a few hours.

Or search for linux magazines in newspaper stands ( term translated via web, is it ok? ).

Here in Italy i have found one with a etch snapshot dvd.

hmmm... That might actually work... ... and i am not sure about wired connection in public buildings since its all Wifi here.

But yeah, i think checking out the IT magazines might work..

But just out of curiosity, does'nt this kind of hinders ppl from actually getting debian. i mean, it should not be that difficult to sell Etch dvd's along with Sarge's.

Is is possible to upgrade from sarge to Etch..... like if i buy the sarge disks, install it and then do an upgrade... i could download the firmware using my existing mandriva installation before getting rid of it.

well its just an idea...

The vast majority of wifi routers also have ports for a wired connection.

It isn't only Debian that doesn't include firmware, very very few distros include it, for the same reason they don't include NVidia or ATI drivers, they aren't open source. Some of the newer "hold your hand" style distros talk about including proprietary drivers (see Ubuntu), but they never seem to go through with it.

Neither sarge nor etch will have firmware for wireless NICs. Etch is not yet stable, so Debian doesn't "officially" release it until it is stable.

It is very easy to upgrade from Sarge to Etch, simply by modifying the /etc/apt/sources.list, and changing every mention of stable or sarge to testing or etch. Then apt-get update and apt-get dist-upgrade, and you'll have etch. If you make yourself a CD or USB stick with the sources for ndiswrapper and firmware for your card, you could install it to a net install Etch machine, but you may also need to make sure you get a C compiler on that.

Peace,
JimBass

Etch has daily snapshots - it would be a waste for anyone to be selling Etch D/DVDs at this point in time. Once Etch becomes stable, then vendors will start to carry the stable Etch.

I usually install Etch (and sometimes Sid) from my Sarge dvds. You'll need to use the 'expert' or 'expert26' boot options to do it, though.

I have no idea what you guys are talking about. I always install Etch using my wireless cards, both my laptop's and desktop's wireless cards are detected during installation. I get a dialog asking what network adapter I want to use. I always pick the wireless, since the wired is not hooked up to anything. I have never had a problem.

What cards do you have in your machines SweetLou? I'm very curious how you got that to work.

Peace,
JimBass

you can also install etch with the debian installer cd. there are 2 new ones that come with either kde or xfce. you can get them here. this link is for the i386 architecture, but there are others. it has a very nice gui install that works great. when you boot it, at the prompt type installgui

the iso you want is called debian-testing-i386-kde-CD-1.iso for KDE or debian-testing-i386-xfce-CD-1.iso for XFCE. for gnome i'm not so sure, probably just the standard net install cd will do.

good luck

Thanx a lot guys. And yeah now that you have mentioned it, i remember i had to download the firmware for mandriva as well.

I did not know that you could install Etch from the sarge disks, so i guess now thats the way i would go. I kind of like 'hording' up the installation disks...lol (it saves a bit of time if you happen to have a 'not so fast' internet connection and i find it easier to try various piece of software that come with it (and they are cheap, at distrowatch at least).

So wish me luck and lets c if i can get Debian to work for me. And until the Debian disks arrive, i think i would give a try to Ubuntu (its 7 something). I just burned it today. What i am looking for is actually a nice distro that is not very tricky (LFS...any one or slackware), but at the same time, allows me to learn a bit more about linux...Mandriva is nice and g8 for the beginners (which i am, in fact), but after a while all that hand holding kind of stops you from learning things....

Why am i saying all this here since, it serves no purpose at all, well i am in office and dont want to work at the moment ...sooooooooooooo


ne ways, Thanx guys for all the help.

Both are older Linksys cards, 802.11b. The laptop's is a wpc11 version 3, the desktop uses a wmp11, I forget the version.
There was nothing I had to do to get it to work, the installer sees each card. I don't use madwifi or ndswrapper, so I assume there cards are supported by the kernel already.
A couple of etch installs ago, the installer would work, but would not configure the /etc/network/interfaces file correctly, but the last couple of times, it has.

some of the Kernel Devs really don't like those drivers, to them its a violation of the GPL, and well they wrote the kernel, who are we to argue.

You download the etch iso netinst with your mandriva.
You burn it, install it.
At the end when it ask you if you want to take the rest from internet
-You go to an alternate console, mount your mandriva /, copy the firmwares to the / of etch and check your wireless is working.
or
-You say no, reboot to a very minimal etch, copy the firmware and reboot (to be sure) then when wireless is working you go on.


or
You go to the beach or work ;) and wait that etch is released (less than 1 month probably?)
:)

Linux Pratique France of this month has Knoppix 5.1.1. I haven't seen any mag giving Debian (a few month ago there was one but can't remember)