Success! I've done it.

[jayeola]

Uh, hey chaps. Someone's poked me about 100% free Gnu/Linux didtributions and one of them is BLAG! Following text lifted from the website.

"Bring your boxes, laptops and ethernet cables to 365 Brixton Road. London. Install and configure GNU/BLAG Linux with help from some friendly geeks. Dual booting? No problem? Having some trouble with wireless cards? We'll look into it.

Every Thurdsay 7pm "
If you ever use irc come and "meet the chaps for support and real time help if you ever need it.

channel= #blag
server = irc.indymedia.org

 

[teqniq]

Do you do kebabs? I'll blag one of those for my mate.

 

[breathbona]

Try this ubuntu newbies
http://www.linuxtopia.org/online_bo...ks/unofficial_ubuntu_starter_guide/index.html

 

[lozenge]

BMD (and others that are keen to learn)...
Since you like to tinker with things and have been given the all powerful 'sudo su' in-a-terminal incantation to elevate you to root (be careful) ... I reckon you could do with a bit better grounding in Linuxy things in general, so I'm suggesting these links with that in mind... none of them are Ubuntu specific, but hopefully they'll help you understand a bit more about how things work without having to search a forum for the answer to every problem....
1) http://rute.2038bug.com/index.html.gz -- geared towards redhat, but a good comprehensive overview if a little old now.
2) http://howtos.linux.com/guides/Intro-Linux/ -- lots of other docs on this site too

good luck & best wishes

 

[bmd]

I took it off in the end.

I can put up with a lot of things but no music isn't one of them. I'll probably get a simple box and put it on there or wait until Ubuntu catches up with the spec of my pc.

 

[Jonti]

Or just put in a sound card for Linux. You won't be using it for music as such, so a cheap one will do. And nvidia will be responsive to an email about driving your huge screen. They are into linux and like to shift hardware, so I seriously reckon it's just a matter of time.

 

[bmd]

Or just put in a sound card for Linux. You won't be using it for music as such, so a cheap one will do. And nvidia will be responsive to an email about driving your huge screen. They are into linux and like to shift hardware, so I seriously reckon it's just a matter of time.

I can't be arsed taking one card out and putting another in whenever I feel like a bit of Ubuntu action and it's not a huge screen it's a 19" widescreen, hardly cutting edge.

Anyway, thanks for your help, I've learnt quite a lot and, like everybody else, I come across old computers all the time so next time I do I'll probably use one as a Ubuntu box.

 

[Jonti]

You shouldn't need to take out your existing sound card. If you have a spare PCI slot (or even ISA ) you can just add another card which does play nice with Linux. The machine will just use whichever card that it is configured to use (under Windows, as well, presumably). As for the graphics; I'd have thought 1280x1024 would be quite tolerable on 19", for a while anyway. Dunno what your main uses are, but I find I rarely open windows to use the full screen even on 17" jobbies. And if you want to change the sixe of text, font type and size is generally easy to adjust (depending on the application, granted).

But yeah, slap it onto a street box sounds smart. You'll probably feel a lot happier getting radical messing with a spare box, and there's no doubt one learns fast by pushing things just a little *too* hard

Incidently, if you're unlucky enough to find a box with sound hardware that doesn't support linux, I've found that a "Mercury Multi-Channel Sound Card" from Maplin will sort things, for something well under a tenner.

 

[jæd]

Or just put in a sound card for Linux. You won't be using it for music as such, so a cheap one will do. And nvidia will be responsive to an email about driving your huge screen. They are into linux and like to shift hardware, so I seriously reckon it's just a matter of time.

Well... If were you I would check the compatibility list before ordering... https://wiki.ubuntu.com/HardwareSupport ... It will save lots of faffing around. I'd also reccommend you take people's advice & read docs. It will save you a lot of time in rebuliding your system...!

 

[bmd]

Well... If were you I would check the compatibility list before ordering... https://wiki.ubuntu.com/HardwareSupport ... It will save lots of faffing around. I'd also reccommend you take people's advice & read docs. It will save you a lot of time in rebuliding your system...!

Jonti, I like being able to have two windows open side by side without squinting at them, it's just the way I've got used to working and I don't want to use Ubuntu enough to warrant changing that.

Good advice about checking Linux compatibility before ordering hardware, that was the first piece of advice that stuck in my mind when I was looking for drivers for the Xfi. Loads of people had bought one and then found that there were no Linux drivers for it.

I may have a look on ALSA and then source a cheap soundcard for Linux but as I said I'll probably just leave it until someone throws out an old pc and I can resurrect it using Ubuntu.

Thanks for the help jaed.

 

[jæd]

Jonti, I like being able to have two windows open side by side without squinting at them, it's just the way I've got used to working and I don't want to use Ubuntu enough to warrant changing that.

Well... I'm using 19" montior and 1280 x 1024 appears fine... Have you tried changing the Font preferences...? If its a widescreen you may want to look at changing the resolutions available for it... Have you tried looking in ubuntuforums for people who have the same monitor as yours...?

 

[bmd]

Well... I'm using 19" montior and 1280 x 1024 appears fine... Have you tried changing the Font preferences...? If its a widescreen you may want to look at changing the resolutions available for it... Have you tried looking in ubuntuforums for people who have the same monitor as yours...?

Tbf it may have been the default font, it looked quite odd but as I was having trouble doing the most basic stuff I was leaving that until I was a bit more familiar with it all.

I presumed that to change the resolution available for it I'd need to change the graphics drivers.

 

[jæd]

Tbf it may have been the default font, it looked quite odd but as I was having trouble doing the most basic stuff I was leaving that until I was a bit more familiar with it all.

I presumed that to change the resolution available for it I'd need to change the graphics drivers.

Well... Did you try searching for help on ubuntuforums...? A quck search on "widescrren monitor resolution" gives this thread. And if you type carefully and use "widescreen monitor resolution" you get umpteen other threads...

And then we find this page that has a howto install nvidia drivers

and this page has a pointer to this guide on adding your own, custom screen resolutions.

I know I've banged on it before, but if you don't ask questions or search the available documentation then you aren't going to get very far with Ubuntu...

 

[Chairman Meow]

I think you need to change the title of this thread.

 

[bmd]

I think you need to change the title of this thread.

Yeah, to "Success! Oh hang on...no wait...I've fucked it right off!"

 

[Jonti]

If its a widescreen you may want to look at changing the resolutions available for it...

Ah, yes. Penny drops.

We know the kit can deliver, and the nvidia drivers are loaded and working without problems, so a tweak to the /etc/X11/xorg.conf file should be all that's needed.