I decided to get away from the .RPM and .DEB based distros and move on over to Gentoo to "test myself".
well, i'm starting to think my test failed. after the graphical installer failed, I was FINALLY able to get through a text-based installer. I'm on a GNOME desktop now, and online (posting this on my gentoo machine), but I'm running into some serious problems with both my sound card and my video card.
the sound card is a Creative Labs, SoundBlaster 24-bit (ca0106), and i've had it working in suse, mepis, redhat, etc in the past, but now when I click the speaker icon in the tray, it says:
"The volume control did not find any elements and/or devices to control. This means either that you don't have the right GStreamer plugins installed, or that you don't have a sound card configured."
since i've always used distros that did it for me in the past, i've never had to deal with this before. I emerged ALSA hoping that would help find it, but it didn't.
ok, now on to the video card. I have an nVidia GeForce 6600 AGP. I read somewhere that you are supposed to emerge the
nvidia-kernel first, and then
nvidia-glx and then just edit xorg.conf accordingly. no big deal, right?
wrong.
I got
nvidia-kernel to emerge fine. but when i try to emerge
nvidia-glx, i get the following output:
Code:
localhost ~ # emerge nvidia-glx
Calculating dependencies ...done!
>>> emerge (1 of 2) media-video/nvidia-kernel-1.0.6629-r5 to /
>>> md5 files ;-) nvidia-kernel-1.0.7667.ebuild
>>> md5 files ;-) nvidia-kernel-1.0.8178-r3.ebuild
>>> md5 files ;-) nvidia-kernel-1.0.7167-r1.ebuild
>>> md5 files ;-) nvidia-kernel-1.0.8174-r1.ebuild
>>> md5 files ;-) nvidia-kernel-1.0.7174-r1.ebuild
>>> md5 files ;-) nvidia-kernel-1.0.7676.ebuild
>>> md5 files ;-) nvidia-kernel-1.0.7174.ebuild
>>> md5 files ;-) nvidia-kernel-1.0.6111-r3.ebuild
>>> md5 files ;-) nvidia-kernel-1.0.6629-r4.ebuild
>>> md5 files ;-) nvidia-kernel-1.0.8178-r1.ebuild
>>> md5 files ;-) nvidia-kernel-1.0.8174.ebuild
>>> md5 files ;-) nvidia-kernel-1.0.8178-r2.ebuild
>>> md5 files ;-) nvidia-kernel-1.0.8178.ebuild
>>> md5 files ;-) nvidia-kernel-1.0.7676-r1.ebuild
>>> md5 files ;-) nvidia-kernel-1.0.6629-r5.ebuild
>>> md5 files ;-) files/digest-nvidia-kernel-1.0.6629-r4
>>> md5 files ;-) files/digest-nvidia-kernel-1.0.7676
>>> md5 files ;-) files/digest-nvidia-kernel-1.0.8178
>>> md5 files ;-) files/digest-nvidia-kernel-1.0.8174
>>> md5 files ;-) files/nvidia
>>> md5 files ;-) files/digest-nvidia-kernel-1.0.8178-r3
>>> md5 files ;-) files/digest-nvidia-kernel-1.0.8174-r1
>>> md5 files ;-) files/digest-nvidia-kernel-1.0.7174
>>> md5 files ;-) files/digest-nvidia-kernel-1.0.7174-r1
>>> md5 files ;-) files/digest-nvidia-kernel-1.0.6111-r3
>>> md5 files ;-) files/digest-nvidia-kernel-1.0.7167-r1
>>> md5 files ;-) files/digest-nvidia-kernel-1.0.7676-r1
>>> md5 files ;-) files/digest-nvidia-kernel-1.0.7667
>>> md5 files ;-) files/digest-nvidia-kernel-1.0.8178-r2
>>> md5 files ;-) files/digest-nvidia-kernel-1.0.6629-r5
>>> md5 files ;-) files/digest-nvidia-kernel-1.0.8178-r1
>>> md5 files ;-) files/1.0.8174/NVIDIA_kernel-1.0-8174-1423627.diff
>>> md5 files ;-) files/1.0.7676/NVIDIA_kernel-1.0-7676-1321905.diff
>>> md5 files ;-) files/1.0.7676/NVIDIA_kernel-1.0-7676-1386866.diff
>>> md5 files ;-) files/1.0.7676/NVIDIA_kernel-1.0-7676-1392404.diff
>>> md5 files ;-) files/1.0.7676/NVIDIA_kernel-1.0-7676-1359015.diff
>>> md5 files ;-) files/1.0.7676/NVIDIA_kernel-1.0-7676-1361053.diff
>>> md5 files ;-) files/1.0.7167/NVIDIA_kernel-1.0-7167-1237815.patch
>>> md5 files ;-) files/1.0.7167/NVIDIA_kernel-1.0-7167-conftest-koutput-includes.patch
>>> md5 files ;-) files/1.0.7167/NVIDIA_kernel-1.0-7167-amd64-shutup-warnings.patch
>>> md5 files ;-) files/1.0.7167/NVIDIA_kernel-1.0-7167-x86-shutup-warnings.patch
>>> md5 files ;-) files/1.0.7167/NVIDIA_kernel-1.0-7167-disable-preempt-on-smp_processor_id.patch
>>> md5 files ;-) files/1.0.7167/NVIDIA_kernel-1.0-7167-1233959.patch
>>> md5 files ;-) files/1.0.7174/NVIDIA_kernel-1.0-7174-1258475.diff
>>> md5 files ;-) files/1.0.7174/NVIDIA_kernel-1.0-7174-1296092.diff
>>> md5 files ;-) files/1.0.7174/NVIDIA_kernel-1.0-7174-1321905.diff
>>> md5 files ;-) files/1.0.7174/NVIDIA_kernel-1.0-7174-1386866.diff
>>> md5 files ;-) files/1.0.7174/NVIDIA_kernel-1.0-7174-1361053.diff
>>> md5 files ;-) files/1.0.6629/nv-pgprot-speedup.patch
>>> md5 files ;-) files/1.0.6629/NVIDIA_kernel-1.0-6629-1175225.patch
>>> md5 files ;-) files/1.0.6629/NVIDIA_kernel-1.0-6629-1182399.patch
>>> md5 files ;-) files/1.0.6629/NVIDIA_kernel-1.0-6629-1201042.diff
>>> md5 files ;-) files/1.0.6629/nv-pgd_offset.patch
>>> md5 files ;-) files/1.0.6629/NVIDIA_kernel-1.0-7174-1296092.diff
>>> md5 files ;-) files/1.0.6629/conftest_koutput_includes.patch
>>> md5 files ;-) files/1.0.6629/NVIDIA_kernel-1.0-6629-1161283.patch
>>> md5 files ;-) files/1.0.6629/NVIDIA_kernel-1.0-6629-1165235.patch
>>> md5 files ;-) files/1.0.6629/nv-fix-memory-limit.patch
>>> md5 files ;-) files/1.0.6629/NVIDIA_kernel-1.0-6629-1162524.patch
>>> md5 files ;-) files/1.0.6629/NVIDIA_kernel-1.0-6629-1171869.patch
>>> md5 files ;-) files/1.0.6629/NVIDIA_kernel-1.0-6629-1155389.patch
>>> md5 files ;-) files/1.0.6629/nv-shutup-warnings.patch
>>> md5 files ;-) files/1.0.6629/nv-disable-preempt-on-smp_processor_id.patch
>>> md5 files ;-) files/1.0.6629/NVIDIA_kernel-1.0-6629-agp_bridge_data.patch
>>> md5 files ;-) files/1.0.6629/nv-amd64-shutup-warnings.patch
>>> md5 files ;-) files/1.0.6629/NVIDIA_kernel-1.0-6629-1189413.patch
>>> md5 files ;-) files/1.0.6629/nv-vm_flags-no-VM_LOCKED.patch
>>> md5 files ;-) files/1.0.7667/NVIDIA_kernel-1.0-7667-KERNEL_VERSION-moved.patch
>>> md5 files ;-) files/1.0.6111/nv-pci_find_class.patch
>>> md5 files ;-) files/1.0.6111/conftest_koutput_includes.patch
>>> md5 files ;-) files/1.0.6111/nv_enable_pci.patch
>>> md5 files ;-) files/1.0.6111/power-suspend-2.6.9-changes.patch
>>> md5 files ;-) files/1.0.6111/nv-remap-range.patch
>>> md5 files ;-) files/1.0.6111/vmalloc-reserve.patch
>>> md5 files ;-) files/1.0.8178/NVIDIA_kernel-1.0-8178-U122205.diff
>>> md5 files ;-) files/1.0.8178/NVIDIA_kernel-1.0-8178-U011106.diff
>>> md5 files ;-) files/1.0.8178/NVIDIA_kernel-1.0-8178-U012206.diff
>>> md5 src_uri ;-) NVIDIA-Linux-x86-1.0-6629-pkg1.run
* Determining the location of the kernel source code
* Found kernel source directory:
* /usr/src/linux
* Found sources for kernel version:
* 2.6.15-gentoo-r5
* getfilevar requires 2 variables, with the second a valid file.
* getfilevar <VARIABLE> <CONFIGFILE>
* Could not find a usable .config in the kernel source directory.
* Please ensure that /usr/src/linux points to a configured set of Linux sources.
* If you are using KBUILD_OUTPUT, please set the environment var so that
* it points to the necessary object directory so that it might find .config.
!!! ERROR: media-video/nvidia-kernel-1.0.6629-r5 failed.
!!! Function linux-info_pkg_setup, Line 534, Exitcode 1
!!! Unable to calculate Linux Kernel version
!!! If you need support, post the topmost build error, NOT this status message.
So I try to just install the drivers that come from nvidia.com, but even if I change my runlevel in inittab, it still comes straight into X. And as you know, you can't install the nVidia drivers if X is running.
I'm so confused... But I
REFUSE to give up on Gentoo because I've played around on a few systems that run it at LAN parties in the past and I love it, and everyone says that if you can make it through the headaches of installation that the end result is 100% worth it.
Can anyone here give me some help? I haven't felt lost on a Linux distro in a LONG time
