Build tips
Hard drives
GRUB GRUB GRUB GRUB
symptom: The system does not go into grub, but instead chants GRUB GRUB GRUB GRUB ad infinitum.
solution: Go into the BIOS, change the hard drive detection from auto to user, and change LBA to LARGE. Dave says this works 90% of the time, and the remaining 10% might be able to be fixed with a BIOS upgrade but - who's got the time for that? ditch the hdd. we have more. --User:ideath 13:06, 12 May 2005 (PDT)
Hard drive clicks
symptom: cool noises
solution: recycle that drive!
SMART warning
if the SMART utilities say the drive is gonna die, replace it. --User:ideath 13:06, 12 May 2005 (PDT)
bad cables
When trying to enter Bios, and you can't try swaping out the IDE cables.
Sound
not finding sound card
symptoms: message reading "/dev/dsp can't be found"; onboard sound; IRQ 5 has nothing on it; alsaconf doesn't detect a PCI or PNP soundcard. This happened on two Dell Optiplexes.
solution: Google says they use a Crystal ISA sound card, which was an option in alsaconf. You may be able to find information about the sound chip used for your onboard sound. --User:ideath 13:06, 12 May 2005 (PDT)
Video
X tries to start & fails
symptoms: you get the grey screen as if kdm were starting, but it eventually blinks out and drops you to the text login.keyboard and mouse are PS/2
solution: make sure the mouse is plugged in properly and in the correct port. X won't start if it doesn't think it has a mouse. --User:ideath 13:06, 12 May 2005 (PDT)
symptoms: you're returned to the console with the message "no screens found" and you're using certain kinds of ATI card (including the Riva128 card)
solution: Change the default color depth to 15, in /etc/X11/XF86Config-4 --User:Jeff
X won't start; video driver for onboard chip identified as "unknown"
Video problem with onboard video chip : VIA Technologies, Inc. VT8623 [Apollo CLE266] integrated CastleRock graphics (rev 03).
X overdrives monitor
symptoms:monitor presents high frequency scan lines and displays squished version of x solution:check for IRQ conflict and set IRQ 3 only to legacy. Magix identified the chip but chose "unknown" driver. X wouldn't start. When we substituted "via" for "unknown" in the XF86Config-4 file, x windows would start but the only resolution we could get was 600x480. A bunch of googling later we tried "vesa" for the driver and kdm worked fine. --Roy Marshall
Networking
Flaky ethernet card
Some ethernet cards will work to install the image, but not to connect from the OS. I generally end up swapping out the NIC and it will work fine. -- MW
Modems
Not detecting PCI modem (ttyS14)
symptoms: modem isn't found. or, modem shows up on the "serial" step in basiccheck (at ttyS14), but modem doesn't respond. and anyway, what the heck is ttyS14? or - if the modem isn't found in the serial step (you only have one serial port detected), you can check if this applies using dmesg. try
guest@freekbox:~$ grep dmesg ttyS | less
(this searches dmesg for lines that contain the string ttyS) and see if you have a line that refers to ttyS14. If you do, this is your issue.
solution: To talk to this modem, you gotta create ttyS14:
guest@freekbox:~$ su freekbox:/home/guest# cd /dev freekbox:/dev# MAKEDEV ttyS14 freekbox:/dev# ln -s ttyS14 modem
CD Burners
to configure a cd burner, i suggest the following.
set the regular cdrom to secondary master, the cd burner to secondary slave. i usually don't plug the cd burner into the sound card.
boot up. log in as guest. copy and paste the cdrom icon, renaming it 'cdrw'. edit the properties of the icon to have the URL point to 'file:///media/cdrw'.
open a terminal, 'su' to root, and edit the /etc/auto.removable file. down towards the bottom, you'll want to first remove the letters 'cd|' from the cdrom entry, then you'll want to copy all the lines that constitute that case entry (from 'cdrom)' to ';;'), and paste it in underneath. then you'll edit the new entry to say 'cdrw)' instead of 'cdrom)', and to say '/dev/hdd' instead of '/dev/cdrom'.
exit your editor and execute '/etc/init.d/autofs restart'. then double check to make sure the icon works on a data cd.
the previous instructions would be equally applicable for any second cd device.
for burning software, install k3b: 'apt-get install k3b'