debian on an AMD Turion 64?

[jade]

My Vaio laptop (Intel chipset) was getting old, slow, etc, so I got a new Compaq (AMD turion 64 chipset); I was thinking about installing debian on it (instead of FC, which is what I put on my Sony).

Anyone have experience w/this specific pairing? Any issues/warnings to be aware of before going w/the install? I have a binary copy of the DVD for "Sarge" (since I do not trust Microsoft OS with the precious non-Microsoft binaries or downloads -- yes, a wee bit paranoid.)

The Compaq laptop has the wireless internal, and since wireless is the only way for me to get net access these days, I'm a wee bit concerned to be testing. The latest stable version of debian came out at the end of last year. Being that AMD is a newer type of chipset, and that I seem to remember reading that most Linux distros are the least stable on the newer systems, I was just wondering if anyone had any tips/pointers before I go ahead w/the install. Or would the FC (4 or 5?) be better (more tested/stable)? I have something like 70 Gigs of freespace, so that is not an issue, but that I cannot afford to pay money for partition magic is. . . .

Any tips/pointers will be appreciated. TY.

[michael_aust]

I would go with Debian testing so your hardware should be supported on the current kernel available (2.6.12-1) for that branch.

The wireless conenction will more then likely need ndiswrapper to work, unless its a chipset that has Linux drivers avalable in the repos or already in the kernel.

The amd64 port of debian is pretty stable. There are however some applications missing as native amd64 packages, for example win32 codecs, flash plugins and Openoffice.org. However there are some experimental amd64 builds for openoffice over at http://openoffice.debian.net/

[antidrugue]

See what others did on the same machine at www.tuxmobil.org.

Personally I have Debian Etch (testing) on my Asus Z63A with a custom 2.6.15.7 kernel, and everything works perfectly. Fedora Core 5 works nicely on the same machine, but I don't care much for it.

Which wireless card do you have?

[jade]

See what others did on the same machine at www.tuxmobil.org.

Neat link. The compaq presarios listed all seem to have the intel chipsets. hmm. . .

Personally I have Debian Etch (testing) on my Asus Z63A with a custom 2.6.15.7 kernel, and everything works perfectly. Fedora Core 5 works nicely on the same machine, but I don't care much for it.

Which wireless card do you have?

It's integrated, Broadcom 802.11.

The wireless conenction will more then likely need ndiswrapper to work, unless its a chipset that has Linux drivers avalable in the repos or already in the kernel.

Thanks for the heads up. I found this -- https://www.scientificlinux.org/docu...apper.broadcom which maybe will help.

[antidrugue]

Neat link. The compaq presarios listed all seem to have the intel chipsets. hmm. . .

Then look at:
http://tuxmobil.org/cpu_64bit.html

And:
https://alioth.debian.org/docman/vie...d64-howto.html

It's integrated, Broadcom 802.11.

I guess it would work nicely with NDISWRAPPER:
http://www.linuxforums.org/forum/lin...ork-linux.html
combined with the windows 64 bits wireless drivers:
http://www.broadcom.com/support/ethe...oaddrivers.php

[michael_aust]

take a look here this site also lists running linux on various laptops and problems encountered and possable work arounds

http://www.linux-laptop.net/

[jade]

This should be fun.

I'm a wee bit worried about the "erase entire disk (80GB)" stage of the disk partitioning; the machine is "creating ext3 file system for / in partition #1 of IDE1 master," as I type this. . .

[jade]

This should be fun.

I'm a wee bit worried about the "erase entire disk (80GB)" stage of the disk partitioning; the machine is "creating ext3 file system for / in partition #1 of IDE1 master," as I type this. . .

More updates (and maybe some questions) soon.