Re: [gentoo-user] Botched Gentoo Install

[Michael Crute <mcrute@gmail.com>]

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Colleen,
Glad to see another Fedora user see the light! Here's the scoop... you 
haven't botched anything you just need to configure your X server. In theory 
it is very easy to configure your X server all you need to do is run "Xorg 
--configure" as root then copy the xorg config file from /root/xorg.conf.new 
to /etc/X11/xorg.conf and startx again. In practice it usually takes a bit 
more tweaking. On my machine X wouldn't recognize my mouse at all till I 
told it where it was (/dev/input/mice) and even after that it took some 
tweaking to make all 5 buttons do what I wanted them to do. I also loaded 
the nvidia driver because otherwise the graphics suck. After that you're 
home free. Here's some links to some step by steps if you like. (Note that 
you don't need the manufactures graphics drivers if your on a server but on 
a desktop I wouldn't run without them.) Let me know if you have anymore 
troubles.

http://www.gentoo.org/doc/en/xorg-config.xml
http://www.gentoo.org/doc/en/nvidia-guide.xml
http://www.gentoo.org/doc/en/ati-faq.xml

-Mike

P.S. The first time your issue with eth0 could have been corrected by fixing 
a kernel parameter that you missed and recompiling just the kernel and 
modules :)

On 8/3/05, C.Beamer <cbeamer@interlynx.net> wrote:
> 
> Hello all,
> 
> This will be a bit lengthy and I apologize for that, but I don't know
> exactly where I went wrong, so am providing all details.
> 
> First, I am new to Gentoo, but not new to Linux. I have installed
> source tarballs on other distributions (mostly Redhat and Fedora), but
> have never configured Linux in the same manner as required for Gentoo.
> However, I am not stupid, although not a computer science grad, so all I
> really need is a push in the right direction with an explanation that
> doesn't required you to be a "geek" to understand (I'm a wanna be
> "geek", but nowhere near that elite status! :-) ).
> 
> Okay, short story first. This was my second attempt at installing
> Gentoo. The first time, I got to the point where I could boot from the
> hard drive, but when I tried to connect to the network (i.e. my isp via
> cable modem), I had no connection. I had missed a step somewhere.
> 
> Anyway, I went back to square one because I wasn't sure exactly where I
> had missed the step and even if I could have surmised it, I wasn't sure
> if I could recover from that point. This wasn't a problem and it was a
> good learning experience. Attempt 2 was successful in that I could boot
> my system and eth0 was recognized and functional.
> 
> From here, I did a quantum leap. I didn't know where to start so, I
> just typed 'emerge kde' 3 days later, kde was installed along with X,
> which of course I know kde is dependent on. At this point, I tried to
> startx to see what the system looked like and to try to determine
> exactly how much of kde had been installed - ie whether I had any
> further components to install. Well, that's where my problem starts.
> 
> After attempting to connect to the xserver, I got my shell prompt back
> again with the following printed on the screen:
> 
> New driver is "i810"
> (==)Using default built in configuration
> (EE) open /dev/fb0: No such device --> I have no idea what this means
> (EE) GARTinit: Unable to open /dev/agpgart (no such file or directory)
> (EE)I810(0) AGPGART support is not available. Make sure your kernel has
> agpgart support or that the agpgart kernel module is loaded
> (EE)Screens found, but non have useable configuration
> Fatal server error:
> no screens found
> 
> Now for the details:
> 
> When I initially booted from the Gentoo CD, at the boot prompt, I typed
> gentoo dopcmcia agpgart acpi=on
> 
> The reason that I did this was because when I had Fedora Core installed
> on that computer, I noticed references to those things during the boot -
> I ALWAYS boot into runlevel 3 rather that runlevel 5
> 
> I didn't install any extra kernel modules because when I got to the
> point in the Handbook that showed the command to list the available
> modules, on issuing the command, I didn't know what any of them were, so
> left well enough alone.
> 
> Probably not relevant to this issue, but in my make.conf file, I
> probably went overboard with the USE flags. I included everything that
> I recognized or that sounded interesting that wasn't in the
> make.defaults file.
> 
> In my grub.conf file, I *didn't* use the vga line that the Handbook said
> could be used because from what I read in the Handbook, I didn't think I
> needed to.
> 
> Graphics integrated into the system board into the system board: - an
> Intel i810 chip.
> Specifics:
> 
> Integrated Intel Direct AGP Graphics Accelerator with Dynamic Video Memory 
> (DVM) technology architecture.
> 
> Other details are as follows (I provide this in case it is thought that
> I should have installed an extra kernel module):
> 
> Graphics architecture: Intel Dynamic Video Memory (DVM) technology
> 
> Graphics accelerator: Intel Direct Accelerated Graphics Port (AGP)
> 2D and 3D graphics accelerator
> 
> Display cache: 4 MB, 100-MHz synchronous dynamic random-access memory 
> (SDRAM)
> 
> Graphics memory: Dynamically assigned from system memory
> 
> Video resolutions
> 
> 800 x 600 pixels; 85 hertz (Hz) refresh rate with 16.7 million colors
> 
> 1024 x 786 pixels; 85 Hz refresh rate with 64,000 colors
> 
> 1280 x 1024 pixels; 85 Hz refresh rate with 256 colors
> 
> 1600 x 1200 pixels 75 Hz refresh rate with 256 colors
> 
> The computer is a Dell Optiplex GX100 and the monitor is a Dell E551,
> which has always been recognized on other Linux installs (as far back as
> Redhat 9.0), so I don't think that it is special.
> 
> Any ideas where I went wrong? Is this recoverable without having to
> reinstall everything?
> 
> I don't mind reinstalling. I'm doing this on an old PC (600 MHz Celeron
> processor). The idea is to get Gentoo to the point where I have my
> Fedora Core system and if I can do that, I'm going to ditch FC4 in
> favour of Gentoo.
> 
> Oh another piece of info. This has to be something that I missed
> doing. The computer I'm using once had Fedora Core 3 on it, I have
> tried Ubuntu on it and I can run a Knoppix 3.9 live CD on it, so I know
> that I should be able to install Gentoo on it.
> 
> If the concensus is that I should again start from scratch, any ideas on
> what I should have done would be appreciated so that I don't repeat my
> mistakes.
> 
> Thanks for the patience in reading this.
> 
> Regards,
> 
> Colleen
> --
> gentoo-user@gentoo.org mailing list
> 
> 


-- 
________________________________
Michael E. Crute
Software Developer
SoftGroup Development Corporation

"In a world without walls and fences, who needs windows and gates?"

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