1st time, video problems, newbe, please help

[jakwi]

Hi all,

I'm on my first linux install. and I'm struggling.
My wife is going to kill me if I don't get this figured out in relatively short order.

for background

I have a
mb: MSI KM4M-V
cpu: 2400
mem: 256 Mb ram
hd: 250 gb SATA drive
On board Video: Integrated S3 Graphics UniChrome™ 2D/3D Graphics with motion compensation (I got this from the msi website)

Installed Debian, Sarge, The latest stable release.

I was running win XP pro. I installed Debian, and used the Grub boot loader and it is working great. I really had no problems getting everything up and running until I tried to install KDE

When i did that nothing happened. So then I tried Gnome, same deal. I know I'm probably missing something obvious here, but it's all greek to me.

I then read in a forum about X-Windows, So I tried that. It seemed to be my best failure. I've tried reconfiguring it using every video choice. VESA is the only one that comes even close, When I choose Vesa and type xdm at the prompt, it comes up with come color at the top of the screen and what looks like some squashed text, but I'm not sure. It flashes that several times and then goes back to the prompt. I've tried every other module, but they just flash a black screen at me and then back to prompt. I've tried adj. the monitor settings. I even used Simple and 8 colors, but no go.

On this forum I've read something about a unichrome driver, and installing it, but I'm not sure how to install a driver.

I'm not really familiar with linux commands, so I'm struggling to get around in the text based enviro too.

I'd post the logs, but I haven't figured out how to look at them, or copy them yet. or even where they are for that matter.

Personal background: I'm not a computer guru by any means, but I did build my current box. I have installed windows etc for many years, I'm ok at DOS. I've always wanted to give linux a try, but after yesterday and today, I'm not so sure. I'm definately a little frustrated, but not throwing things yet!

Any suggestions would be greatly appreceated.

Jason

[techieMoe]

You say you're getting dumped back to your console after X Windows tries to start up. Usually it doesn't do this quietly. What error messages do you see on the console when you get dumped back?

[antidrugue]

Yop, as techmieMoe said, look for errors messages coming from the X server. If I remember correctly, the log file for Debian Sarge's X server (which uses XFree86) is

/var/log/XF86.0.log

The errors are normally at the end of the log file, so you can post here:

cat /var/log/XF86.0.log | tail

Normally just installing the base system, and the typing something like

apt-get install x-window-system-core gdm gnome-desktop-environment

would give you a working system in no time.

Try to reconfigure X with

dpkg-reconfigure xserver-xfree86

I say don't get discouraged, because configuring X if often the hardest part of the process. If you get pass that, then the fun will never end.

First experience with Linux? Maybe you would be better with a distro featuring a little more autodetection. Like Ubuntu/Kubuntu/Xubuntu (if you want Debian based), Suse, Mepis, etc.

[brokndodge]

Congratulations on your decision to try out GNU/Linux. Debian is a great distribution, but it is really intended more for experienced Linux users running servers, as it is perhaps the most stable distribution available. There are a number of flavors of Debian available that have been tweeked to make it more "Windows User Friendly". I think trying one of these to become more familiar with the OS will be more fruitful than simply diving straight into Debian Sarge itself.

Xandros based on Debian to be Windows User Friendly, they have a free edition that can be downloaded for free using bittorrent, or you can buy the download from their ftp servers for not much
Linspire is available for purchase only but it is cheap, you can even purchase a computer with Linspire preinstalled

[antidrugue]

I just found this:
http://www.debianhelp.org/module-pnF...4-start-0.html

So apparently

dpkg-reconfigure xserver-xfree86

and select the "via" driver, and go on with the rest of questions. You should be good to go then.

[jakwi]

I'm not sure about the errors, and I'm at work now, so I can't check at the moment. It seems to me that it said something about display and pointer errors, but I can't remember exactly. It does dump me back to a prompt, I've been logging in as root until I get this figured out. I tried both via and s3 but it just goes blank, I tried every single one, but VESA is the only one that gave me anything.

I decided to go with debian, as I had read good things about it, and I have a friend who is using it, He is helping me also, but I'm trying to figure somethings out, so as not to annoy the crap out of him.

he recommended that I unistall x-windows-system and

then install install xserver-xorg

I also found a driver for my video card, but I don't know how to install it. Does anyone know how? it is a .diff file

thanks for the help

[antidrugue]

he recommended that I unistall x-windows-system and

then install install xserver-xorg

There are 2 x-window-systems:
xfree86, which is the legacy one, no quite used anymore, but by Debian Stable
xorg, the new one, based on xfree86

Debian Stable use xfree86, that's pretty much all there is to it. Now if you want you can install xorg over it (it will replace it) but you'll have to use some unofficial packages (from http://www.backports.org/). Doing that you won't exactly be using Debian Stable anymore. So you might as well change distro, or try Debian Etch (testing flavor, which uses newer packages, like xorg).

I also found a driver for my video card, but I don't know how to install it. Does anyone know how? it is a .diff file

You really shouldn't have to do that. I strongly recommand you find a simpler solution.

Installing Linux is not supposed to be the hard part. Debian is great, but if you struggle, you may try something easier (Knoppix, Ubuntu, Mepis, etc.).

[brokndodge]

The last time I started messing around with unstable packages on sarge things went south real quick. Better to just start out with Debian Etch ( Debian testing distro). Etch uses xorg and a lot more of the modern packages. I would venture to say that your friend might be right about xorg. most things i've found that didn't work under xfree86 do work under xorg.

[jakwi]

The last time I started messing around with unstable packages on sarge things went south real quick. Better to just start out with Debian Etch ( Debian testing distro). Etch uses xorg and a lot more of the modern packages. I would venture to say that your friend might be right about xorg. most things i've found that didn't work under xfree86 do work under xorg.

do I have to reinstall debian to do this? or is there a way to upgrade it?

[antidrugue]

You can upgrade easily just by changing your /etc/apt/sources.list file with any text editor (nano, vim, pico, etc.). Just change every occurance of stable (or sarge) to testing (or etch),and save the file.

Then,

apt-get update

And finally

apt-get dist-upgrade