Overnight, I downloaded the Mandrake Linux distribution. It was around 1gb!
Today, when I went to burn the three ISO files onto CD-R’s, I noticed two were bigger than the CD-R capacity of 700 mb. That couldn’t be? So, I burned away and made five coasters before realizing something was dreadfully wrong.
I posted on Usenet, looking for a solution, and was told I was doing something wrong. After resetting a number of the parameters I’ve never needed to touch in Nero (my CD burning software) and telling the program it was OK to overburn, or put more that the stated capacity on a disk, the ISO’s took.
Now, to install them on the laptop.
I booted from the CD, saw the first screens and then… failure. Mandrake’s installation program told me it wasn’t seeing my CDROM player. Of course it saw the player to get this far, otherwise it wouldn’t know to tell me it couldn’t see it now.
In a situation like this, you’re on your own. So, I went to the Mandrake site, and started searching for my model of laptop. Sure enough, there was a string of messages with the same exact problem and a fix!
Just add a switch with the boot that said ide=nodma (I believe this means the drives don’t use direct memory access, meaning they’re older/slower). But, how does one add a switch? I tried a few different tacts until it finally took.
As far as I can tell, Mandrake is installing. I know it was clueless to my Robanton wireless networking card. I sort of expected that. Supposedly, it will sense other cards as they’re plugged in and install them on the fly, automatically. Sure – whatever.
I am persevering because I’m pigheaded. What I’m experiencing is totally unacceptable if Linux is to become mainstream.