VideoHelp Forum
+ Reply to Thread
Results 1 to 14 of 14
Thread
  1. Member ahhaa's Avatar
    Join Date
    Feb 2005
    Location
    Michigan USA
    Search Comp PM
    I tried out several distros on an old Gateway ME machine which was working fine. When rebooted into ME, everything was at a crawl & SysInfo reported RAM at 32 megs. Any clues?
    Quote Quote  
  2. Member
    Join Date
    Feb 2004
    Location
    Australia
    Search Comp PM
    The distros will not cause this issue ...

    Turn pc off at power point , remove case cover from pc , remove ram chips , and reinsert firmly back into their respective positions , and reboot the system ... This may be done several time's to get clean , stable contact .

    Gateway and dell systems tend to suffer inconsistencies as they get older ... its happen'd many time's .

    Best to get some pure alcohol on one of those ear bud cleaners and swab the memory slots , and use the same swab to rub down the copper contacts on the memory chips ... leave it to thoughly dry , put back together , and they should stay stable .

    Older pc's tend to suffer "dry rot symtoms" caused by oxidization of the contacts between component's .

    Then , in some case's ... you may have suffered your first memory card failure ... which is rare .
    Quote Quote  
  3. Member ahhaa's Avatar
    Join Date
    Feb 2005
    Location
    Michigan USA
    Search Comp PM
    Thanks BJ- I didn't think an OS could do that, but this was for sure using the RAM to the max, and I'd seen some forum comments about problems with power management, etc.

    Will give it a try, but I think this machine is just accursed!:]
    Quote Quote  
  4. Member tekkieman's Avatar
    Join Date
    Mar 2004
    Location
    Over the hill
    Search Comp PM
    Originally Posted by ahhaa
    but this was for sure using the RAM to the max, and I'd seen some forum comments about problems with power management, etc.

    Don't believe everything you read on a forum.

    Even this if you so choose...

    The reason a LiveCD uses so much ram is that it decompresses the OS and applications from the CD into ram to run. You've probably just used ram that hadn't seen a bit in it in who knows how long.

    As to management, if you really do mean power management, then yes, it is true. Power management in laptops with the current linux offerings can be somewhat tricky and even a little irritating. If you mean memory management, then you were mislead by someone who repeats things they hear without having the first clue.

    If you're really interested in it, Google "linux memory management".
    Quote Quote  
  5. Member ahhaa's Avatar
    Join Date
    Feb 2005
    Location
    Michigan USA
    Search Comp PM
    Hi Tekkieman-

    MEPIS (3.4) was one of the two distros that got as far as showing a desktop, the other was Ubuntu. Knoppix & Puppy both ran afoul of the Intel graphics system (think its 810) & failed to load. I didn't have Kubuntu to try.

    The machine is a donated Gateway FLEXATXSTC BRO ESSENTIAL 800C; it has a lot of annoying quirks: no PS2, the mouse plugs into the keyboard via USB, the PS fan is ducted over the CPU, so the rest of the case has no ventilation, and it has an on-mobo Dialup Modem. The case has 2 tabs you press in to open- it can literally guillotine your fingertips if not held right.

    That said, it is small, quiet, & has been running ME just fine at 1024x768, 24 bit. 3 PCI slots half height, max RAM is 512.

    With the withdrawal of support for pre-XP OSs by TinyLimp & the major suppliers of IS suites, I thought it was time for linux on this hardly used machine... SeaMonkey & OO would make it very useful as a little workhorse.
    I'd purely forgotten how little RAM was in machines back in 2001- it came with 64 megs of 133/100/66-MHz 64-Bit 4-Clock SDRAM DIMM (Gateway spec). Somebody added a 2nd 32 meg stick- that's all thats working now.
    Gateway wants $75 for a stick of 128, the machine isn't worth that investment. Kingston wants $86 for a 256- significantly more than I paid for the 512 I've got in my Epia.

    Put all the above here just in case somebody else happens to try to work on this model.

    ***

    Assuming I can scrounge some used memory, the next hurdle will be the dreaded dialup modem install. On the MEPIS forum, I did find several users who said the inexpensive Stratitec IC56a modem truly Plugs&Plays with 2.4 or later kernels- especially MEPIS.
    http://www.stratitec.com/support/docs/ic56a/cbic56a_linux_installation.html

    Once I get everything working again, how much RAM would you recommend for HD-installed MEPIS?
    Quote Quote  
  6. Member ahhaa's Avatar
    Join Date
    Feb 2005
    Location
    Michigan USA
    Search Comp PM
    BJ- thanks! I tried your cleaning routine, and now its back up to a whopping 95 megabytes!:]
    Quote Quote  
  7. Member tekkieman's Avatar
    Join Date
    Mar 2004
    Location
    Over the hill
    Search Comp PM
    Originally Posted by ahhaa

    Once I get everything working again, how much RAM would you recommend for HD-installed MEPIS?

    For any distro that uses the KDE or GNOME desktops, I'd suggest at least 256M, preferably 512. Now that doesn't mean that MEPIS (or any other distro) is out of the question for this machine. I would just suggest changing the WM/DE to something lighter weight (flux, xfce, etc.)

    F.Y.I. - there is work getting started on a community "Mepis-Lite" that should bring new hope to underpowered machines. There's Puppy (although to me, the desktop looks a little....preschool), and of course, Damn Small

    Also, my old Dell has run Mepis 3.4, and 6.0 and uses the integrated Intel i810 graphics. I've had no problem with graphics on that chipset. I've also not had any trouble with the i810 using Kanotix.
    Quote Quote  
  8. Member
    Join Date
    Oct 2006
    Location
    United States
    Search Comp PM
    The indicated machine, with 256MB of RAM and a 633MHz uP clock, runs MEPIS 6.0-Final just fine.
    See for yourself: http://www.gabston-howell.org/tech/gateway.bro.shtml

    It's no speed demon, by any stretch of the imagination, but my kids use MEPIS 6.0-F (along with some other distros) on a variety of even slower machines (as do I) with no complaints whatsoever. Of course, Dad does get the computer with glass packs and headers on it...but we won't dwell too much on that persnickety detail.

    Just beware of the e-caps by the DIMM sockets. They will eventually leak and have to be replaced.
    Quote Quote  
  9. Member ahhaa's Avatar
    Join Date
    Feb 2005
    Location
    Michigan USA
    Search Comp PM
    Thanks Allan- I chortled my way thru your article; better than most on Cnet, etc...

    My machine is an 800c, it seems very little used; the caps look OK so far. Previous owners did same thing with the HD; but it came with the Restore Disks, so I just did an fdisk/clean re-install of ME, got the last updates, and have added AVG & Kerio.

    Seems a little different than your machine- has a duct from the PS to the CPU fins (no case circulation!); and an on-mobo modem.

    My RAM problem was dirty contacts, but I went out bull-headed one day to get at least a stick of 128. Rural saga there; 3 towns and most of a day later, I got one (that works- two didn't) for $20. ouch! but cheaper than the $75 Gateway wants.

    Everything seems to work fine & very snappy in ME with a huge 195 megs. But I don't want ME!


    Was wondering if you did anything else in the BIOS?
    I have now tried several distros on it:
    Puppy tries to go for a 480x600 16 color screen;
    DSL loads to a 16 color pointillistic desktop;
    Ubuntu Live CD easily loaded to a full 1024x768 in Full Color, but it doesn't include any modem handling packages, you have to d/l'em from another working Ubuntu machine...
    Knoppix says " Passed unknown Display Mode' and then says stuff about not loading GLcore files, and bails with a Fatal Error.
    Both MEPIS 3.4 (Standard &VESA mode) & 6 seem to load fine but with a similar 'Unknown Display Mode' message & I'm left with a text prompt that doesn't seem to want to open anything graphical.
    Mandriva One stalled out during the installer- no messages, but I can take a hint...

    I'd prefer MEPIS because of the known-working Stratitec IC56A modem- its card is lo-profile enough to fit in the case (with a lil of your metal craft!:]) But- that's another $30 or more- I don't think this machine is worth more than $75 fully loaded.

    One other possibly related thing- this is one of the infamous machines with the Spider Solitare curse; if Win is reloaded, SS deals at a crawl- I check a number of forums and nobody had an answer; & boy, hard to believe how mad they were!:]
    Quote Quote  
  10. Member
    Join Date
    Oct 2006
    Location
    United States
    Search Comp PM
    The only thing I did, in BIOS, was to flip the boot device order to CD ROM drive first. Everything else was left the way it was when I hefted the machine up off the grass.

    Right now, that machine is holding-up several stacks of paper on my daughter's desk; but, I need to drag it out to do a reinstall and DMZ'ed, pseudo-honeypot test of this latest SM against the wilds of the Internet. When I do get it fired-up again, I'll go through the BIOS configs and get them to you, so you can see if there's anything different from your settings. Might be something as simple as the firmware rev.

    In my 'recipe' for installing SM6.0, where I indicated that I went and got a cup of coffee, I literally went and got a cup of coffee as the machine was booting from the CD. I got no undefined mode errors at all, and everything came-up GUI-based for login. (I'm not one to babysit the scrolling text on a $10.00 computer.) I do believe that there was a single instance of a hard drive boot that necessitated a Ctrl + Alt +F7 or Ctrl + Alt +F8 to get the KDM login screen, but that was a one-off. It has never repeated itself since. Same thing happened on a few Dell GX1/GXa machines that I installed 6.0 on, too.

    Before it disappeared under a mountain of paper, it was running at the 1024x768 that it defaulted to, when I ran the Live CD; and I don't think that integrated video will be able to pony-up the bytes to drive enought pixels to give me 1280x1024--not without resorting to 8 bit color depth, at any rate--so, that's probably where it's going to stay.

    The onboard modem is irritatingly vestigial and I'm betting this one is dead, seeing as the thing came with a PCI modem bojacked into the chassis. I'd delve further into it if I was using it as an alarm system or data acquisition box; otherwise, it's just not worth the time.

    Hard to answer the issue regarding the Win SS, since the only times I work with windoze is in virus/trojan/spyware clean-up or when I'm ditching windoze altogether and installing Linux. Thankfully, there's more of the latter, nowdays; although I'm still running a clean-up to migration ratio of about 5:1.

    FWIW, PySol does a rapid deal on this little box so, if you can swing the SM6.0 in there, you can have your pick of almost any card game out there (Pyramid remains my all-time favorite)....then there's the arcade games...LOL

    If you want to try another shot at installing that 6.0, swing by the '.org' forums, and we'll put our heads together to figure out what's gumming-up the works.
    Quote Quote  
  11. Member tekkieman's Avatar
    Join Date
    Mar 2004
    Location
    Over the hill
    Search Comp PM
    Originally Posted by Allan Gabston_Howell

    If you want to try another shot at installing that 6.0, swing by the '.org' forums, and we'll put our heads together to figure out what's gumming-up the works.

    I agree! Other than the modem, this should be an easy fix. Since this is pretty SM 6.0 specific, mepis.org might be the better place to find the fix. I actually still get the undefined mode message at boot, but by hitting space, or letting it time out, it will always still boot to the login screen.

    Somewhere on the official forum is the answer of passing a value like 778 (F3 at the grub screen), or setting vga=normal)

    Also, at the "black screen", have you tried typing "kdm"?
    Quote Quote  
  12. Member ahhaa's Avatar
    Join Date
    Feb 2005
    Location
    Michigan USA
    Search Comp PM
    Allan- thanks for the getback!

    If I'm reading right, you went ahead with a HD install without any LiveCD trial? Could that be more forgiving?

    I have posted about this at Mepislovers.org:
    http://www.mepislovers.com/forums/index.php?topic=2415.15

    I did some advised grepping and the results are there, but here's an excerpt for the curious (if any ):

    Ctrl-alt F7 just gives me a flashing cursor.
    Trying the VESA mode didn't work by itself; using startx I got:
    Using config file:"/etc/X11/xorg.con"
    Skipping "/usr/X11R6/lib/modules/extensions/11bGLcore.a:m_dbug_clip.0" NO SYMBOLS FOUND
    Skipping "/usr/X11R6/ ... debug.norm.0" NO SYMBOLS FOUND
    Skipping "/usr/X11R6/ ... debug.xform.0" NO SYMBOLS FOUND
    EE VESA (0) No matching modes
    EE Screens found, but none have usable config
    Fatal Server Error
    No Screens found
    XIO fatal IO error 104 (connection reset by peer) on Xserver ":0.0" after 0 requests (0 knwn processed with 0 events remaining.


    Could there be something in the monitor itself causing the unknown display mode?


    Hi Tekkieman! "I" 'm not passing any value manually, it's something happening in the automated setup script. I don't ever get a graphical screen- it just goes to the text prompt & sits there. KDM & the C/Alt key methods just get a blank black screen with a pulsating dot.

    Like Allan, I don't want to put an excess penny into this machine, so my modus operandi was to get a distro working before adding a 256 stick of RAM and/or the modem card. I do have an old CD burner I'd stick in, if that dang PS weren't so wimpy...
    Quote Quote  
  13. Member tekkieman's Avatar
    Join Date
    Mar 2004
    Location
    Over the hill
    Search Comp PM
    Originally Posted by ahhaa
    "I" 'm not passing any value manually, it's something happening in the automated setup script. I don't ever get a graphical screen- it just goes to the text prompt & sits there. KDM & the C/Alt key methods just get a blank black screen with a pulsating dot.
    Sorry, it was my intention to get you to pass the parameter. When the LiveCD starts to boot, you should see the grub screen. You'll also see the blue countdown bar in the lower left of the screen. At that point, by selecting F3, it will allow you to specifically pass the video mode information to the boot process. trying several of the available video options may allow you to fully boot to the desktop.

    One other thing to try is to verify the md5sum of your ISO. A bad burn could prevent you from booting! If you still have the downloaded ISO, verify the md5sum, then reburn at a slow speed (>=8X).

    I'll check out your post at mepislovers, but I'm not registered there, only at the official forum.

    EDIT: After reading your post at mepislovers, I agree with everything that has been suggested. Trying to run KDE (default for Mepis 3.4 and 6.0) with less than 256M is going to be painful (if even possible). You will probably have better luck with DSL or Puppy. You might also want to check with the people as ML. Pastor Ron is using fluxbox, and someone has remastered an "ultra-light" version that gives you all the Mepis goodness in a lightweight install.

    Beyond this, I don't know how much further you'll get. Especially running off the LiveCD. Remember, the LiveCD decompresses as much of the OS as it can into RAM. Since that's your biggest limitation on this machine, by the time you get to the DE, you've used it all (and then some).
    Quote Quote  
  14. Member
    Join Date
    Oct 2006
    Location
    United States
    Search Comp PM
    You're fairly-well on target, ahhaa. I just boot the CD to get the MEPIS on the hard drive, and shake-down the hardware issues from that point.

    The only machine I've had problems with was an HP notebook with a seriously twisted manner of talking to the HD and CDR drives. Since its LCD was dead, it wound-up as a headless RH7.3 print server in the girls' bedroom...at least until what's left of the carcass decides to die on me.

    I'd wager that, between the machine wanting 256MB and, possibly, an uncooperative monitor; you probably are looking at using something like DSL or Puppy. I'm not entirely certain that SLAX will fly at this point.

    If you were able to push a couple of 128MB DIMMs in there, I'm fairly certain that almost any 1024x768-capable monitor can be worked around--given the ability to snoop-up some horizontal and vertical freq specs on it.

    As far as mode-passing goes, you can pick the "vga=" value that you want to use from the chart, below:

    Code:
    # Color depth      | 640x480  800x600  1024x768 1280x1024
    # -----------------+-------------------------------------
    # 256        (8bit)|  769      771       773      775
    # 32000     (15bit)|  784      787       790      793
    # 65000     (16bit)|  785      788       791      794
    # 16.7 Mill.(24bit)|  786      789       792      795
    # 
    # The vga= setting only effects the frame buffer, not X (unless you're using the fbdev driver in X). 
    # This'll mean that your console will display at this resolution.
    Quote Quote  



Similar Threads

Visit our sponsor! Try DVDFab and backup Blu-rays!