Suse 9.1, sound & ndiswrapper

I am thinking about purchasing Suse 9.2 for my eMachines m6805, but want to make sure that everything works before forking over the cash. Linux Format Sept 2004 DVD edition came with a full working (but cut down 32 bit) version 9.1. After installing that, everything worked except (you guessed it)the wireless card. So, I installed ndiswrapprer along with the Windows 32 bit driver. Now wireless kind of works although slowly. Also the sound card now stutters. (Maybe irq or i/o port conflict?) It is like both devices half-way work. Anyone have both devices working properly at the same time? If so what are your configs for both devices?

If I can get the 32 bit version of 9.1 to work, I will spring for the 9.2 full (64 bit ) version!!

TIA, theoak

I have also installed Fedora Core 3 (only tried 32 bit) and the ndiswrapper with the same Windows driver worked pretty good. Slightly slow, but nothing unacceptable. But the card readers were flakey. Would work one minute, and not the next. I have also tried to install Mandrake 10.1 official. (That is what I run on my desktop machine. Every single device works great on that machine, including my TV card, DVD burner, multi-memory card reader, firewire, dial-up modem, sound, etc. Most worked "out of the box". Firewire had to be set up.) The m6805 just is a hastle to install, even with new bios upgrade. (ACPI problems, PCMCIA don't work, memory card readers don't work.)

I really want to have Linux work as flawlessly on my laptop as it does on every other computer I have had in the last 6 years. Windows does not have anything 64 bit to offer except beta, (use at your own risk plus when (if) they release the official version, my beta expires) and Linux has not only 64 bit OS, but also 64 bit apps. So it would seem that the only way to get a real 64 bit experience is Linux.

Oh well, maybe I'm stuck in the 32 bit world for a while yet (sigh).

I gave up on Suse 9.1 or 9.2 for now.

I installed MS 64 bit XP, and was deeply disappointed. USB only installed as USB 1.0. Modem did not install at all (no big loss since I have DSL). ATI drivers had to be downloaded from someone besides MS or ATI, but worked OK. Broadcom wireless was supported "out of the box"! Even though I invested in a 5400 prm hard drive (faster than the 4200 rpm drive that came in my m6805) the speed of the 64 bit Windows XP was only marginally (almost un-noticeably) faster. Windows nags you to install antivirus software, but will not let me install AVG Antivirus. Prehaps if there were 64 bit apps to run, I would see the performance boost I was expecting.

So I re-installed Fedora Core 3 (32 bit). After using ndiswrapper with the Windows driver for the wireless card (Broadcom), I am typing this from Fedora. Wireless works great, and sound works great too. BUT, the ATI driver for the display does not seem to be able to handle the 1280 X 800 native resolution of the screen. (Or I have not figured out how to configure it.) So the wallpaper is distorted (fat). Memory card reader is still flakey. Works when you first hotplug it, but if you umount it or remove it, it will not re-mount right without rebooting. (If I try to mount /dev/sda1 /media/cfcard it says that there is no sda1 device. If I use MAKEDEV to create one, it says it is not a valid block device. If I reboot, it works again. I will investigate this further.)

Anyway, that is my 2 ¢ as far as installing 64 bit Windows, Suse, and Fedora.