NotebookForums.com › Forums › General Notebook Discussions › Linux & Other OS's › Any success stories for the NP5660??
New Posts  All Forums:Forum Nav:

Any success stories for the NP5660??

post #1 of 12
1/7/03 at 7:37pm
Thread Starter 
Hi everyone.

Linux user here curious if anyone has had a success story installing Linux onto the NP5660, and particularly the model with the Radeon 9000?

Info on particular distributions would be more than welcome.
Reply
Reply
post #2 of 12
1/7/03 at 8:27pm
www.powernotebooks.com/forum

Is a great link regarding the whole M9 compatibility. I think a lot of people have had problems because of lack of drivers or something. I plan to dual-boot my future Sager, so this is kinda sad news, considering that even since the m9 came out this problem has not been resolved.
Reply
Reply
post #3 of 12
1/16/03 at 4:46pm
What're you going to dual with? I'm going to do Windows XP Professional and the latest SuSE pro.
Reply
Reply
post #4 of 12
1/16/03 at 5:18pm

Got...

I got win2k advanced server, and mandrake. Everything works great.
Reply
Reply
post #5 of 12
1/16/03 at 5:23pm
I plan to use 98 se and mandrake 9, if debian 3.0 doesn't work. I tried to install Debian and it only confused me, since I'm not too clear on the whole internal workings of a computer; just the basics.

98 SE is still a great OS, and I've been using it for much too long to switch to any of the new windows OSes. Linux takes some getting used to; mandrake lags a bit on this 500 mhz, but the Sager wont have that problem.
Reply
Reply
post #6 of 12
1/16/03 at 8:47pm

mandrake

mandrake is very easy to install. I personally think *nix systems are more...heh...useful...but because windows are soo much more seemingly widely supported, i too use it. Now, if youre lookin at a similar win nine eight box, 2000 is very similar. im eventually gonna run a quadrouple boot..hahaha. Ill tell yall if i actually pull it off.

(Yes, i AM going to try it)
Reply
Reply
post #7 of 12
1/16/03 at 8:51pm
is there WINE for mandrake? I can't seem to get it working, with the CVS thing. i know there is for debian, so maybe I won't even have to use win98 at all.
Reply
Reply
post #8 of 12
1/17/03 at 8:41am
Thread Starter 
I use Wine (infrequently) on my desktop. It has difficulty loading many recent programs, so a good way to test if it works is to try loading the Windows Solitaire program (sol.exe?).
Reply
Reply
post #9 of 12
1/17/03 at 10:44am
Hey Ice, you shouldn't have too much of a problem with a quad-boot, considering there was a guy who pulled off 58 Os's on a systems (+- 30, can't really remember the figure right now)
Reply
Reply
post #10 of 12
1/17/03 at 3:09pm

man

DAAAANG!!! 58????
Reply
Reply
post #11 of 12
1/17/03 at 4:05pm
I am dualing WinXP Pro and SuSE 8.1 Pro and had no problem doing so, even as I am using NTLDR instead of LILO/GRUB.

My only grip is that I am stuck at 800x600 resolutiong, which isn't a problem until I start opening up web pages, then I can't see the entire window. I tried many various settings through SaX2 to try to get my resolution to the other native resoulution of 1600x1200, of which was the resoulution that WinXP defulted to before I installed the Radeon drivers. I believe my tinkering hosed my install somehow cause it would not boot the kernal afterwards.
After a reinstall she is back up and running great again.

I have used SuSE 7.3, 8.0, and now 8.1 and this is the best yet. I have shopped around all the Linux flavors and I keep going back to SuSE.

If anyone else can find a configuration of monitor and graphics card that I can get to 1600x1200 let me know, I would really like 1024x768 but without Radeon Drivers, I don't believe this is going to happen.

Seibol
Reply
Reply
post #12 of 12
1/18/03 at 12:23am

Screen Resolution 1600x1200

To run the screen larger than 800x600, you have to switch off Framebuffer, and onto Vesa.

To do this you edit your /etc/X11/XF86Config file.

This worked successfully with Suse 8.1.

You can also run XF86Config, if you have it, and make sure to select Generic Vesa, as your display.

But if you are going to edit your file manually, here is a cut out of mine, you can copy as you will:


Section "Screen" #controls general res
DefaultDepth 16 #and colors
SubSection "Display"
Depth 16
Modes "1600x1200"
EndSubSection
Device "Device[0]"
Identifier "Screen[0]"
Monitor "Monitor[0]"
EndSection


Section "Device" #specifies your device
BoardName "unknown"
BusID "1:0:0"
Driver "vesa" #this is changed from
Identifier "Device[0]" #original
Screen 0
VendorName "unknown"
EndSection



Hope this helps, if you need more help. Just email me at ottbr@neandertech.com

One final comment: Suse 8.1 configured and installed all my devices except for the modem, and the screen. However, it is recommended you disable sound in the initial setup, and reenable it later since it tends to crash on first boot up after the install.

Brian.
Reply
Reply
New Posts  All Forums:Forum Nav:
  Return Home
  Back to Forum: Linux & Other OS's
NotebookForums.com › Forums › General Notebook Discussions › Linux & Other OS's › Any success stories for the NP5660??