Please help with installation. I'm new.

[RandomJustice]

Hello all.

Let me first start by saying that although I'm new to Linux, I'm by no means computer illiterate. I have installed a debian distribution before along with xWindows, I believe... but that was quite a few years ago. I recently decided that I'm bored with WinXP and want to tinker around with Linux.

I'm not sure what information you guys need, or how I can get further information if there are any log files, but let me start from the beginning:

I downloaded SUSE 10.0 OSS i386 and burned the ISO's onto 5 CD-R's. I believe it's the 32 bit version, as I am running a Pentium 4. The machine I'm using is on dialup, but I have another machine at another location running broadband that is downloading the DVD Evaluation version (32 bit) to see if that will help solve my problems. I checked the MD5 checksums and everything was good. All of the burns were successful. I was able to install, but I did have a LOT of packages that failed to install. Retry didn't help, so I kept clicking ignore. Only 2 packages failed on the first disc, but probably like 50 packages failed on the second disc. Among some I noticed were files that were probably crucial to the GNOME GUI interface. Anyway I continued with the installation and got through to the hardware setup. I booted up the OS and got a login prompt, logged in but all I have is a console. I don't know how to get the GUI started or if it's even viable.

This is on a WinXP machine, with a small HDD (120GB) that is pretty full. I was able to allocate 14 GB to the Linux Ext2 partition that I created. There is a 1 GB swap file. The only wierd thing is when I installed and made sure that it wouldn't over-write my XP partition, it wanted to mount the root directory I believe to "windows/c". I'm not sure if that's correct? During boot up I get a few "failed" lines among those I believe is something to do with not recognizing an NTFS partition, which I know is my XP.

Anyway I also get a bunch of fatal errors due to packages not loading I believe. If there is any other information I need to give, let me know what and how to get that information, because I don't know of any logfile I can refer to... I'm also unfamiliar with console commands in Linux.

Anyone know if there maybe was a problem with the download, or what? The files all checked out ok and burned ok, so I'm not sure where to go with this. Any help is appreciated, thanks.

[AlexK]

Welcome to the forums RandomJustice,

If you are sure that the md5's checked out fine, try burning the iso's at a slower speed e.g. 8x instead of 30 - 50x.

Also, you can try get into a gui with startx.

Now you say you are downloading the DVD edition, again burn it slowly and try using that.

Also did windows run chkdsk when you resized the NTFS partition?

[RandomJustice]

I believe I burned at 24x on all the CD's. Will burning at a slower speed help even if I had the installation utility check the CD's before installing? The CD's checked out.

I'll try reinstalling with the DVD edition if it's done downloading. All I know is that a lot of packages failed to install with my initial install. Some of them I know were part of the GNOME environment. Maybe this has something to do with it?

Also what root should I have mounted? It defaulted to windows/c when I installed.

I used Partition Magic 7.01 to resize and make the Linux partition before the install. I don't know if Windows did a chkdsk.

[RandomJustice]

I'm scrapping the project, thanks for the help.

startx did nothing but load up a blank screen with an X for a mouse pointer.

Too many failed packages and I don't feel like going through the install again. I guess I'm not THAT interested in mucking around with Linux again.

[oldcpu]

Will burning at a slower speed help even if I had the installation utility check the CD's before installing? The CD's checked out.

Yes it DEFINITELY will help. Burn at the slowest speed your burner/media allows, with the highest quality media you can lay your hands on. This makes all the difference in the world.

I found this out by backing up my SuSE CDs and DVDs, and I went through a LOT of coasters, before I realized a slow speed and high quality media made the difference between it working and not working.

I'm scrapping the project, thanks for the help.

No worries. Linux and indeed SuSE linux are not for everyone.