Installing drivers & compiling...

Hi

Complete Linux novice here. Installed Suse a few days ago. Loving it but frustrated at my n00bness.

I've installed it on my laptop & supprised myself by getting it to duel boot with Windows (still need windows for my job) but i'm now trying to sort out missing drivers etc.

Problem is I have absolutely no idea how to go about doing this! I'm browsing various Linux Beginners sites but no luck so far (gonna be working on this for the next couple of hours if I don't get too pissed off!)

I'm mainly trying to get the wireless card working. To compound matters it seems there is no 'proper' Linux driver for my chipset (its a Compaq nx9105 laptop which seems to have a Broadcom BCM94306 chipset) so doing the research it looks like I have to install something called 'NDISWrapper' then use a windows driver that works. I've downloaded both of these to my /home/username/documents/ dir from the NDISWrapper site, but have no idea where to go from here.

The instructions say I have to compile it!!! Coming from Windows (where the hardest thing I have to do is unzip it) this all sounds vewy scaaawy!

Second thing i'm gonna have to do is try and sort the resolution. Its a widescreen laptop so currently Linux is in a box in the center of the screen. I think its running at 1025x768 when it needs to be like 1200x800 or something. But not too bothered about that yet.

Thanks in advance & sorry for long posts. I can't get the hang of not babbling on insessently!

S

P.S. Excuse any typos - the spellcheck doesn't seem to work under this Linux browser (Konqueror)

ok now I broke it

Tried taking matters into my own hands and playing with the resolution and now I can't get to the GUI. Best I can get is the command line and have absolutely no idea what to do with that!

Heeeeeeelp!

I *can* reinstall if it comes to it, but would rather figure out how to get round it (its the only way to learn) am busy reading up, but if anyone knows of a shortcut......!

S

Heh, calm down take a deep breath. Linux is not hard, you just don't know what to do yet. Ok lets get you back into a graphical screen. Now if you can get to prompt login as root and try typing in kdm. This should get you to a point where you can select users to login. If that does not work, Try putting in cd 1 and booting from it. Go to installation, and then to repair existing installation. It will run its checks and hopefully fix your situation. If not we can try a few more complex things. Just don't panic.

hi DuckIT
if you have the software or driver for your wireless lan card complie it and install. for compiling u have to unzip it if its in zip format. then go to terminal window and go to the directory where you unzipped your driver. then type 'make' in terminal. it will start compiling. if it have any error it will display there itselt. after compiling typr './configure' or './install'. that you will come to know which one yuou have to put by refering in the respective directory. it will install he driver by doing so.
regarding gui problem...... have you tried 'startx'..... if not do that first. it it says 'xserver cannot be initialized' or xserver crash or cannot find 'XF86Free' install the packages from ur cd.


regards

Oi. Reinstall? Ouch.

Do a search for XF86Config -- might either be in the /etc or /root dir -- or any number of other places including /usr/X11R6.

What you need to do is find the one you are trying to load. If you find a few, obviously pick the one with the most recent change date; that will be the one you altered.

vi the file and edit the resolution lines back to something functional. 1024x768, or whatever.

Save it, and start again, either with startx, or xinit .

As for the card, I will presume you acquired a tar file, or tar.gz file?

You have to ungzip and untar the file first. (I know this can be done in a single step, but I am trying to make it simple )
gunzip filename
tar -xvf filename
For the second you will note the gzip extension is gone.

Then you will have a directory, more than likely. Cd to it, then type ./configure.
When it's done, presuming it passes... type make then make install -- as root user.

It should be installed and ready to configure.

Cheers.

i have problem with my pc i cannot find a pci audio driver..... my M'Board is ASUS P4SP-MX also how can i find or identify the chipset of my M'Board?........

I realize this is 4 months old, but anyone looking for how to get this card working, check the hardware compatibility list at http://www.linuxquestions.org/hcl. Specifically:
http://www.linuxquestions.org/hcl/showp ... roduct=810

I think the file you need is /etc/X11/xorg.conf on Suse (but don't quote me on that as I have no use for Novell)

Coolzooks, you should start a new thread rather than tacking onto a completely different issue. The command you need is "lspci"

that is correct. in order to get back to the gui, all he had to do was login as root and enter the command: cp -f /etc/X11/xorg.conf~ /etc/X11/xorg.conf


cool, start a new thread and we'll be happy to assist you :]