HI,
I tried that new SUSE 10.2 and love it, I did have trouble with my ATI settings it was my hardware was not compatible as NVieda style Video the forum helped me fix it , I did get it to work and the the 3-D works too,
Most problems are hard ware related, many winwoes software issues are work arounds by ms that force you to use the default driver that maynot utilize your hardwares full potential, I realize this now after seeing suse with 3D. Each time I try a distro I seem to learn alittle more, I love that Mepis for its partition manager and will format a drive quickly for another distro while booted from DVD, My computer had fried the mother board and the video card was overheating. WIndows was dead on the hard drive, But I did boot up on dvd and do my banking and checked e-mail of the live DVD. And Mepis told me what was wrong with the PC during the boot.
Many PC repairmen use live DVD's and Live CD's to trouble shoot DOA PC problems most limux will show the error as it loads and tell you wants wrong.
I feel linux is a tool to learn how to fix work around problems in your computer and consider it a oppertunity to learn something about you PC except that point and click thingy..
Doug

I know that we all need to learn more about the nuts & bolts of our computers, but I am really shocked at how "primitive" Linux still is.

I still want to use Linux (and continue to hunt and experiment as we speak) mostly because I like the idea of open-source software and a non-Microsoft OS.

I tried BOTH SuSE 10.1 DVDs -- i386 and x86_64 -- and all I get is a blank screen! I get the "welcome" in 15 languages screen, then my monitor acts like it isn't getting a signal that it can display. It's a 19" LCD (Acer). The power light stays green, suggesting there IS a signal -- it doesn't go amber like when it's in power saving mode, or when there's no signal.

Anyhow, that seems like a pretty brazen glitch for a mainstream distro. And I have a VERY mainstream video card. I'm not stupid enough to buy the cheapest no-name video card there is -- I ALWAYS get a mainstream brand name. This time I have an ATI Radeon X300 with 128 RAM (PCI-X). There have to be hundreds of thousands of people with that card, no? It's a pretty inexpensive card, too.

Then I tried Fedora 5 and 6 DVDs -- and when it's time to "check dependencies" before the software gets copied to the hard drive, I get a run-time error! Seriously, the program said "this is probably a bug. Please report this..." etc. and then the install program exited. This happened multiple times with Fedora!

SuSE and Fedora are two of the biggest (and top ranking) distros. I don't have THAT weird of a PC. I have an AMD64 3500+ with 1 GB high-quality RAM, a DVD/CD burner combo, a USB mouse, 19" LCD monitor. My motherboard is MSI K8N Neo4-F Socket 939 NVIDIA nForce4 ATX.

I wonder why I'm having so many problems just trying to install Linux...

Matthew

i did n't get any problem on my desktop everything works smoothly
anyways please do post your pc config we ll try to find a solution
from my experience windows can and will install on a pc that have some minor hardware problems that is it you have a defective IDE cable or power problems on the drive
this does not seem to be the case with linux.
Fedora and SUSE are top ranking distro but you can't assume that they will work ok for you.
also try to boot knoppix to see if the non functioning hardware shows signs of life, and if it does, you re sure that few tweaking here and there can do the trick

anyway once you get the thing running you ll forget about XP or any other Ms stuff Believe me!!!!

Linux is not "primitive." I can prove it to you.

To my way of thinking, Windows is "primitive" because:

1. There are still no virtual desktops built in. The downloadable "powertoy" which provides them is a dirty hack.

2. It still uses the very crappy (originally 16 bit, but recently extended to 32 bit) NTFS.

3. You still can't move, delete or rename an open file.

4. They still don't provide a decent defragmenting tool for their crappy FS which really needs one.

5. All your personal settings are still stored in a binary "registry". One little mistake while editing the registry can render your entire installation useless.

By comparison, with Linux:

1. You can have as many virtual desktops as you please - under any of the DEs available.

2. It gives you the choice between several different 64-bit journalling filesystems.

3. You can do any of these operations and more.

4. It doesn't need a defragmenter because it's advanced filesystems don't fragment themselves in the first place.

5. All settings are stored in seperate and easily editable text files should you need to change something manually.

These are just some examples off the top of my head. There are many more ways in which Linux is more advanced than Windows.
There must be a problem with your DVDs. Did you check the md5 hash on the iso files? Or did you just burn them and hope for the best?
Linux will work with this hardware combo.
Linux isn't for everyone. Perhaps it isn't for you.

Do check the checksum before burning DVD as the man recommended!

This is on the download site!

This is easy even if you downloaded the DVD image under Windows.

Let us see a list of your hardware!

I've had FC6 installed for months and after an experiment, had to reinstall!

I got conflict errors until I unchecked the extras box during install!

There are some bugs no matter what the hardware.

My "yum update" that worked for months started getting errors!

I never had a problem with FC4 and FC5

I had to reinstall FC6 and I selected everything (to be installed)

except languages. Installation is a snap provided one doesn't have "file conflicts".

Swahili will have to take care of itself.

These guys want to immigrate here better learn english, not some dying language.

At the end of the install I was dead stopped by "file conflicts" during ruby!

I started over and removed ruby.

Next pass I almost got to the end and during zisofs-tools-1.0.6 got "file conflicts".

I just got through the install after deleting more and more stuff, and I find kde missing.

Gnome is useless and I do not understand why it is the default desktop.

I had to search to find a logout method and gave up.

I don't want to be a Linux hacker (no %age in this)...I want to write programs!

Newbies: If you get installed, switchdesk to kde and make your lives easier.

I am beginning to suspect an implicit(unintentional but existing) conspiracy!

I have learned in my 66.56983 years that people always ALWAYS build a high niche for

themselves so they look super! Absolute power corrupts absolutely!

I'd advise newbies NOT to try FC6. Maybe FC7 will be better.

once upon a time one needed only to

switchdesk kde ( I have the link or search under fedora)

and reboot (to be sure)

now one must find switchdesk rpm and install it

and

yum groupinstall "KDE Software Development" (137 megabytes!)

BTW I selected kde everything during install and still had to do this.

If I were to give my window's loving neighbours a distro to try, it would be PCLOS first, Mepis second, and Elive third.

Sure, they are easy to install and everything works outofthebox. What better introduction to linux could you hope for?

My neighbours are not interested in linux though. It must be some kind of black magic or geek thing.

lets us help the Linux newbies and other topics

Linux is very big

when it comes to yum, I am a newbie

let us not build an ever higher tower and moat for people to cross to come to Linux

I agree that perhaps Windows power-users tend to have more trouble with moving to linux than people who know nothing. Just remember that you came to linux because you heard about how much better it will be. How can linux be better than windows, and be exactly the same? It can't. Linux is different than windows. I think reading this article:
"Linux is not Windows"
http://linux.oneandoneis2.org/LNW.htm

might help clear a few things up for you. If you enjoy learning about your operating system, tweaking it so that you can make it do exactly what you want it to do, the way you want it to do it, then you'll stick with it and probably learn to enjoy it. I did. But if you don't, then try something else. Try installing good antivirus software, using hacks that inevitably will come out to disable DRM in Vista, and keeping up with the latest Windows updates, or, switch to Mac.

Also, if you do plan to keep on trying with Linux (I hope you do), don't forget the documentation! Read the documentation! Even if you don't understand it all, read it. That's how I got my way along. Cause at first you won't understand the stuff in the manuals, and then later you'll learn about a component, and you'll think "oh ya, I remember something like that in the foo manual". Go to tldp.org for lots of good documentation. that's "The Linux Documentation Project, tldp." Also for any command you can type man [command] and get the manual for it. If you don't know what command you're looking for, do this:
su
[root password]
makewhatis
exit
apropos [keyword]

After you do the makewhatis thing, you'll have a database of commands, and you can type apropos and a word that has to do with what you want to do, and it will list commands that have that word in their short description. (the first few lines in the manual)

I hope you have good luck with linux. If you decide that linux is not for you, I hope you have good luck with whatever operating system you choose.

Its weird I had no problems with Kubuntu on my last system (except that I thought it was a bit sluggish compared to Windows which I'm sure was configuration but I only had it about 2 months before I built my new computer) - and i can't install it on my new computer so I'm working on that right now. But I see what your saying about the integration issue.

If you look at it from most integrated to least it would be Consoles (I modded my xbox, thats basically just a pc in a box), Macs, Windows Machines, Open source. Consoles/macs are stable because the hardware and OS are all controlled by one set of engineers. Windows works because it is the status quo and everyone designs their hardware to work with windows. Linux works because the community works so damn hard - but no one designs their hardware with that in mind just yet. I also agree with you on the complexity of Linux - I feel like there needs to be a map somewhere to explain all the damn parts of it graphically, I can't wrap my head around it but I want at least an idea of it. However I don't think starting from scratch is the right approach, there is a lot of development time invested in it already and the problems don't seem to be in the linux kernel so much as in the sporadic standards on top of it. I think when things get a bit more standardized it will make it a bit easier to get things to work because the community won't be so splintered.

I started with SuSE and had similar experiences, but I learnt what was going on. Then I switched to Gentoo.

Building a Gentoo box from scratch is fine as long as you really read the docs and know what is going on. You end up with a transparent, tailored, reliable system. You understand it because you built it.

I contrived two sayings that came directly from my experience of using the Mac OS (legacy and OS X).

When something wouldn't work, or wasn't as easy to do as it might have been in Windows or Linux, I'd say
"That's the price of elegance."

When something worked flawlessly, could be done in one application or utility, or just looked excellent in its final form, then I'd say
"That's the elegance of price."

And as for whether to "go with" Windows, Mac or Linux/Unix, I summed it up nine years ago with this phrase:
"They all have about the same number of headaches -- just different flavors."

BZT

15 years a Mac home user (5 in OS X)
Missed my AASP certificate by 30 points (Displays & USB)

windows 7 is prob a retread of Vista

"fools rush in.."

I'll never pay another CENT $.01 for any microsoft software

the monopoly and its royal subjects