installed linux mint mate' (32bit) to an old dell inspiron 1100 laptop yesterday and have a double screen coming up in the login and desktop with 640 x 480 resolution. read somewhere to update bios to a32 and increased the video to 8 mg from 1 mg. also having trouble installing a pcmia netgear wireless card wg511 v2. I have mint cinnamon on newer asus (k52f) (64 bit) which works just fine. anyone having resolved these issues?

Ugh. The 1100 was rubbish when it was released - I used to use one as a challenge to see if I could get various distros to run. Tossed mine out a couple of years back when the lid broke off.

KMS would be an issue these days I would reckon - do you have i915 loaded in the initrd ?.
Maybe try adding "i915.modeset=1" to the boot parms. For testing perhaps set it to 0 (zero) to turn off KMS; not recommended, but might be worth a try.

Thanks for the speedy response! As a newbie to Linx I'm having trouble configuring the parts. Tried to access the X11 today and got nowhere. So could you give the precise keystrokes for the changes you suggested.Did have a surprise when i tried an alternate boot and everything worked like expected.
Thanks
Scott

Explain - in detail.

i was able to boot into a recovery mode by hitting esc key (i think) and then after a system check the screen was no longer split. when i rebooted normally the split screen was back. how do i configure the graphics driver to the i810 intel version. the vi command showed no data inside the etc/x11/xorg.conf file. does the package configuration program do that instead?
i downloaded the mint mate/cinnamon debian version but haven't installed it hoping i can adjust my current version instead to get it working properly.
Thanks
Scott

Might be worth seeing what options that selected. Run this from a terminal (will need sudo probably for Mint) and post the output

here is the code requested:

menuentry 'LinuxMint, with Linux 3.2.0-23-generic' --class linuxmint --class gnu-linux --class gnu --class os {
linux /boot/vmlinuz-3.2.0-23-generic root=UUID=5cce8091-3356-48e5-a955-ac31530504c6 ro quiet splash $vt_handoff
menuentry 'LinuxMint, with Linux 3.2.0-23-generic (recovery mode)' --class linuxmint --class gnu-linux --class gnu --class os {
linux /boot/vmlinuz-3.2.0-23-generic root=UUID=5cce8091-3356-48e5-a955-ac31530504c6 ro recovery nomodeset
menuentry "Memory test (memtest86+)" {
linux16 /boot/memtest86+.bin
menuentry "Memory test (memtest86+, serial console 115200)" {
linux16 /boot/memtest86+.bin console=ttyS0,115200n8

Had a problem with the previous install so had to reinstall and it's acting the same way with double partial screens and poor resolution.
Thanks

Not sure I can add much - just go with the recovery option perhaps ?. Wouldn't take much to make it the default I imagine.

The entry for recovery shows the parameter "nomodeset" whereas the main entry does not. If you modify the fist entry to include the nomodeset parameter that should work.

Ubuntu forum has a guide on how to update the menu entry located here. Remember to run update-grub in terminal if you do add the nomodeset parameter.

I have an Inspiron 1100 and it has indeed been a bear to work with. Ubuntu and Ubuntu based distros (like Mint) have been especially troublesome. The last time I installed ubuntu (10.10 I think) I had to tweak the xorg.conf settings to get the display to work correctly. There is lots of good documentation about this issue on the Ubuntu forums and wikis.

I am now running slackware -current on the Dell and it works fine. Crunchbang linux and Vector Linux have also worked well for me on this particular machine.

Good Luck!

That worked. Once I got help with the vi editor and correct commands, we removed the "quiet splash $vt_handoff" and replaced it with "nomodeset". Now to get the Netgear WG511v2 (Taiwan) to be recognized.
Thanks for the help.
Scott

I'm of a like mind to @ahzthecat - try something a bit (lot) lighter than anything too close to standard Ubuntu.
In addition to those listed, maybe look at Bohdi - I go that to run (fast) on a low-spec netbook.

Finally got the netgear wg511v2 pcmcia card to work using the marvell 8335 file and installing ndiswrapper (see below)!!!!
Scott

Old 01-05-2008, 01:36 PM #10
Syche
LQ Newbie

Registered: Jan 2006
Posts: 9

Rep: Reputation: 0

nope, you just have to use m-a... just install ndiswrapper-common module-assistant and the headers for your kernel. Then run m-a a-i ndiswrapper. That's it