Trying to put Debian on my HP DV2845SE laptop.
Has anyone done this before that could give me a run through of how it went?
I just tried with the Debian 4.0 net-install via ethernet cable. The install says that it detected a Firewire port that could be used as my ethernet port but unlikely. I said no and it gave me a list of drivers to use. I don't know what to select there.
The light for the port on my router is lit up and the lights where the cable plugs into the laptop are lit up. Any ideas? I don't remember it doing this the first time I tried.

What ethernet card does it have?

My guess would be to use the forcedeth module as it's common for many of the HP laptop ethernet cards.

can you post the output of lspci | grep -i eth

then we can see what Ethernet chip is in your system so we can recommend a driver.

Alternately if you are adventuresome. you could install Debian testing using the latest Daily netinstall iso. This worked on some new hardware for me recently that the regular netinstall failed on.

http://cdimage.debian.org/cdimage/da...t/i386/iso-cd/

Testing is due to become Stable in the next couple months (or however soon it's done) it's working great on several machines I have with no issues. It's worth taking a look and everything will be more up to date than Debian Stable.

I'll give the testing dist. a try tomorrow. Thanks for the input.

With most built in Ethernet cards the module is loaded automatically for the Ethernet port, it may just be asking you if you also want to load the firewire port for networking as well. Check to make sure you are not all ready loading the module without knowing it.