I apologize for the topic title, however I figure that one topic can be effectively used to answer all of myquestions and cries for help.

I am a Windows user (grew up with it) and am sick of Winblows. I wish to convert entirely to Linux (my favorite distro so far is Mandrake 10.0). Unfortunately, the majority of the games I like playing have a DirectX requirement. I have been able to get some Windows programs and games to load using WINE, but as I mentioned, the games require DirectX so they don't work well. This issue my be caused in part due to the fact that I haven't yet upgradedmy video card drivers (using the ones that came with Mandrake). I have an nVIDIA GeForce 4 MX 440 SE with 128 megs of RAM and am looking for the best driver for it (more importantly, one that will give as close to the full use of the 3d rendering capabilities as possible).

Also, I am currently running a web server (Apache 2 w/PHP and MySQL) as well as an IRC server (Unreal with services provided by Anope). I have installed Apache, PHP, and MySQL as provided on the Mandrake 10.0 disks and am unsure how to proceed in setting up Apache and PHP. The Apache documentation isn't very specific in this situation.

Any assistance with these issues would be appreciated.

If you installed PHP, mandrake sets it up for you automatically. Run a PHP test (<?php echo phpinfo(); ?>) to make sure it works.

I thank you for your reply and I will be sure to do that...as soon as I get Apache listening on port 81...my ISP blocks port 80.

As for playing Windows games my advice is to stick to Windows for that. You can easily dual boot
by installing Windows first, leave enough room for MDK and install that afterwards. Install the boot loader
to MBR and you get a nice bootmenu that lets you select between Win and MDK at boot.

If you have installed Apache, PHP and MySQL, the only thing (with a few caveats) is to start the services.
Run 'service httpd start' and 'service mysql start' in a terminal and you shoud have a nice start.
Remember to set a root password in mysql: mysqladmin -u root password 'new-password'

- Peder

I actually already have a dual boot Mandrake 10.0 and XP Home.
As to the services, they were (according to the services tool so kindly provided in KDE) already running. And yet, not even so much as a php or myssql error (something I'd expect from my site when it can't find the mysql databases it uses).

What happens when you surf to your site then? Does it work?
php might be configured to be silent about errors. Check your /etc/php.ini.

- Peder

After a bit of fiddling, I am happy to report that my site is up and running as it is supposed to be (so far...).
I've had to create a seperate mysql database for it to run under Linux (I expected this) and as I switch from Linux to Windows and back it's gonna be a slight pain to export pertinent sections of the databases and then import them where they need to go. I hope at some point to somehow automate this proccess, having it automatically export the data I need as part of the shut down sequence (for Linux at least...doubt I could get Windows to do anything of that sort...).

Also, I've had to create a second spoof config.php for the main section of the site as the one for Windows didn't work in Linux...something about the way Windows and Linux sort the files/directories (I also expected something like this to come up). The two files are called config.php.win and config.php.linux and I rename the one I need for the OS I'm using. I've created a copy of the real config.php and placed it on the Linux system away from prying eyes (security) as I had done in Windows.

I've noticed a slight problem for awhile now. Under Linux as I'm doing things in the GUI (KDE if you must know...) the machine will occasionally freeze up and sit there, doing nothing. To clear this I have to hit the reset button on my tower. I attribute this little problem to not having the correct drivers for some of my hardware. I am wondering if there could also be a different explaination.

And they keep piling on...
I have 5.1 surround sound capability with my onboard sound (nForce 2) and it requires that the line in and mic ports be rerouted to the rear out and cent/sub out respectively. I do have 5.1 speakers that work with this setup, however, I can't seem to get anything in Linux to use 5.1 surround sound, just stereo. I have installed the driver provided by nVIDIA instead of the one that came with Mandrake 10.0 and still no joy. Any ideas?

Perhaps this needs bumped as it might have been overlooked...

When it freezes, check if you can press <Crtl><Alt><F2> to get a console login prompt.
If so it's only the GUI that's frozen. But it might be hardware related as you think.

As for sound, see if this helps: http://www.wlug.org.nz/NForce2Notes

- Peder

Most of the time, it freezes when I'm down on the CUI prompt (reachable by <Crtl><Alt><F2>), though occasionally a signle proccess in the GUI will freeze (and can be killed) As to the sound, I'll check it out.