[PLUG] newbie debian questions / philosophy

[Jeff Abrahamson <jeff@purple.com>]

I installed debian (2.2, potato) recently on a new machine. All went
well except for identifying the ethernet and video cards. Because it
was a new machine, I was able to look up the ethernet card (had the
box) and specify the driver. The video card was harder: it's an ATI
Xpert, which means Mach64 driver. But trying to config X just gives
me a low-res verticle striping, followed by low-res gray, which then
offsets to the right leaving a blank strip on the left. And there it
stays until I control-alt-bs out of it.

Any suggestions on getting X to work? I apt upgraded already.


I'm also trying to get debian up on an older machine. There the video
card is ok, but the ethernet card is problematic. It's an ethernet
card that Redhat 5.2 (!) recognized without incident.

Any suggestions how to proceed on that ethernet card?


More generally, I'm curious if anyone can help me empathize with the
debian installation process. The redhat installer is GPL as I
recall. Why don't they borrow some of the device detection stuff?
Debian's got an overly-hard install process, albeit with a nice carrot
at the end of the stick (apt). I'm not looking for fancy graphical
installers, but, sheesh, recognizing an ethernet card for which you
have the driver...and bringing up X on a relatively popular card, at
least in low res...

Thanks for any help understanding.

-- 
 Jeff

 Jeff Abrahamson  <http://www.purple.com/jeff/>



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