I'm a total newbie to Linux. I've been a hardcore Windows/Dos user since the beginning basically, but thought I'd learn Linux for fun. I bought Mandrake 7.2 and am using the KDE interface.

The problem I'm having is that it keeps telling me that I don't have access rights to my cdrom drive, or my floppy drive for that matter. I'm logging in as the user I created upon install. I tried logging in as root (I'm assuming that's the equiv. of administrator) but when I'm logged in that way, there isn't even a cdrom icon on the desktop. And being a tolal beginner, I haven't a clue where to find it.

So could somebody help me out? If I could access my cdrom and floppy, that would be fantastic. Preferably logged in as my plain user and not root.

I'm actually typing this for the second time and my comp. locked up last time I got about this far :D. Typical Windows. You learn to love it.

One more thing that might be helpful. I logged in as root and I went to /mnt/cdrom and notice that the icon has a lock on it. The floppy drive too. It's telling me that both drives are locked. So how do I unlock them?

After reading some 'stuff' on Linux I believe you can access your cdrom and floppy by doing the following. You may want to do it using root as your login, or you can login as yourself then use superuser in a knosole window to get to root:

#:su root
(then password)

This is how you access either floppy or cdrom using the mount command. In the konsole type:

mount /dev/fd0 /mnt/floppy
mount /dev/cdrom /mnt/cdrom


Now you can access the cdrom and floppy from the folder /mnt/floppy and /mnt/cdrom

You may also have a folder called /cdrom or /floppy without the /mnt infront. If you have then simply leave out the /mnt bit. If you get stuck as again.

Also if you plan to really learn Linux (why not! :-) ) Then I recommend a book called Running Linux by Matt Welsh. It is an excellant begginers guide and essential if you are to understand what Linux is about.