I have a Dell Latitude LS400 laptop (400Mhz, 128Mb RAM, 6GB HD, Slackware 10.0 w/ 2.4.26 kernel, Intel 440BX mobo) and I am having an annoying problem...

Everytime the machine starts, when the hotplug daemon is initialised, the computer hangs, and the only way around it (to get it to boot) is to start the kernel with a "nohotplug" option. I was hoping to run hotplug, because I have a flash drive and other usb devices (wireless mouse) which I want to use. Is there any way to configure hotplug on boot to only run for USB?

I am a newbie to slackware, but I am learning quick, please help me learn quicker!

Look in /etc/hotplug, there are various scripts that are run when hotplug initiates. You can set which scripts run or don't run by making them executable or not.

You need to track down what is hanging the system and either disable it as described above or add it to /etc/hotplug/blacklist if it is a problematic module

You might try running Pat's 2.6 kernel (just install the packages from /testing). My computer was hanging on hotplug with 2.4 and upgrading worked great. That might be an easier way if you don't mind the change of version.

I've got Slack 10 up and running on my laptop (Sony Vaio PCG-FXA49 - Athlon4 1.3ghz, 512mb ram, Rage Mobility M1 8mb), however I'm having the same problem, to a T. The hotplug daemon freezes up on initialization from a hard boot. For whatever FUBAR reason, though, I've discovered that booting off the install CD into the setup kernel, then doing a softboot (with the reboot cmd) will load everything up just fine, which is what leads me to believe it's not a specific device thats hanging it (there are no usb devices attached to my system, btw).

I've used a few different linux installs in the past, and can navigate my way around, but I'm *very* far from being a power user.

Anyone have any suggestions about what would be causing this, and maybe a fix?

Cheers,
-- John-Luke