Okay, I am a newbie, let'd just get that out of the way. I have a laptop of no particular brand (from a somewhat shady outfit called MDG Computers here in Toronto, Canada....kind of looks like an Acer). Its an Intel Centrino, 1.3 GhZ or something and I got a copy of RedHat Linux a while back (I think it is version 8) from freepctech.com.

Anyway, I am installing it as a dual boot system and I installed pretty well all the packages as I have a fair amount of room. I used automatic partitioning and GRUB allows Windows to still run (whew! Don't want to entirely migrate...yet). So, here is the problem.

When I choose Linux from the GRUB menu, it starts to run, but then it hiccups. It says something like: PCI_IDE: BUS00 Decvice f9 VID=8086 DID=24ca and ends with Could not enable device. Then it just sits there. Nothing happens. What is going on?

You need to get rid of that ancient copy of Linux, and download or buy a copy of Fedora Core 3. The ancestry is RH8 -> RH9 -> FC1 -> FC2 -> FC3 -> FC4 (next week), so the version you are trying to install is roughly equivalent to Windows 3.1. In particular, hardware support has changed dramatically since then. In terms of support, you will have as much success as if you were reporting a Win3.1 problem today (close to zero).

Thanks. That makes sense. I am in the middle of downloading Fedora as I write this.

Thanks again

Rob