new rebuild

[chg]

Hello all!I am helping a friend rebuild a gateway performance 450.We are in the process of rounding up a hard drive and will try installing ubuntu.unfortunately gateway has told me they don't have drivers for this os and I would like to know how to obtain them when the process gets that far.will be new to linux and probably asking silly questions in the future please excuse my ignorance as I'm also on my first repair of this magnitude.

[misterbadnback]

I used Ubuntu for a while but I think most of the drivers are included in Ubuntu. Someone with more experience with it should be able to tell you more but I think I am correct in saying that Ubuntu comes with most of the drivers that you will need. Plus if you have it connected to the internet it will find the connection during setup and set up your connection so that all you have to do is once installed just connect to the internet through Firefox (included with Ubuntu) and start surfing.

[kage]

The only drive you -might- have problems with is the Video driver. It will work, but you might not have 3d acceleration. Everything else should be picked up and installed during the install. Unlike a Windows install, Ubuntu has the majority of hardware drivers built into the kernel, so when you first run it there is no dashing to find a driver cd.

[chg]

Thank you both!thats a big relief!We'll let you know how it goes when all hardware and system up and running I hope:D

[jmtjet]

I would like to add that it's a good idea to know your hardware before to start so you can search for a driver if you need one.

[chg]

Thats a good point!Is there a good diagnostic program like everest for linux systems you could suggest?:hmm:

[kage]

In linux, if you open a terminal window, and run "lspci -vv" as root (or in Ubuntu's case, "sudo lspci -vv") it will tell you all kinds of information about your hardware. :)

When I run it on my machine, the following is the output from my sound card, video card, and nic card:

00:1f.5 Multimedia audio controller: Intel Corporation 82801DB/DBL/DBM (ICH4/ICH4-L/ICH4-M) AC'97 Audio Controller (rev 02)
Subsystem: Giga-byte Technology Unknown device a005
Control: I/O+ Mem+ BusMaster+ SpecCycle- MemWINV- VGASnoop- ParErr- Stepping- SERR- FastB2B-
Status: Cap+ 66MHz- UDF- FastB2B+ ParErr- DEVSEL=medium >TAbort- <TAbort- <MAbort- >SERR- <PERR-
Latency: 0
Interrupt: pin B routed to IRQ 201
Region 0: I/O ports at e000 [size=256]
Region 1: I/O ports at e400 [size=64]
Region 2: Memory at e2101000 (32-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=512]
Region 3: Memory at e2102000 (32-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=256]
Capabilities: [50] Power Management version 2
Flags: PMEClk- DSI- D1- D2- AuxCurrent=375mA PME(D0+,D1-,D2-,D3hot+,D3cold+)
Status: D0 PME-Enable- DSel=0 DScale=0 PME-

01:00.0 VGA compatible controller: nVidia Corporation NV34 [GeForce FX 5200] (rev a1) (prog-if 00 [VGA])
Subsystem: nVidia Corporation Unknown device 01b9
Control: I/O- Mem+ BusMaster+ SpecCycle- MemWINV- VGASnoop- ParErr- Stepping- SERR- FastB2B-
Status: Cap+ 66MHz+ UDF- FastB2B+ ParErr- DEVSEL=medium >TAbort- <TAbort- <MAbort- >SERR- <PERR-
Latency: 248 (1250ns min, 250ns max)
Interrupt: pin A routed to IRQ 177
Region 0: Memory at e0000000 (32-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=16M]
Region 1: Memory at d8000000 (32-bit, prefetchable) [size=128M]
[virtual] Expansion ROM at e1000000 [disabled] [size=128K]
Capabilities: [60] Power Management version 2
Flags: PMEClk- DSI- D1- D2- AuxCurrent=0mA PME(D0-,D1-,D2-,D3hot-,D3cold-)
Status: D0 PME-Enable- DSel=0 DScale=0 PME-
Capabilities: [44] AGP version 3.0
Status: RQ=32 Iso- ArqSz=0 Cal=0 SBA+ ITACoh- GART64- HTrans- 64bit- FW+ AGP3- Rate=x1,x2,x4
Command: RQ=32 ArqSz=0 Cal=0 SBA- AGP+ GART64- 64bit- FW- Rate=x4

02:05.0 Ethernet controller: Realtek Semiconductor Co., Ltd. RTL-8139/8139C/8139C+ (rev 10)
Subsystem: Giga-byte Technology GA-7VM400M/7VT600 Motherboard
Control: I/O+ Mem+ BusMaster+ SpecCycle- MemWINV- VGASnoop- ParErr- Stepping- SERR- FastB2B-
Status: Cap+ 66MHz- UDF- FastB2B+ ParErr- DEVSEL=medium >TAbort- <TAbort- <MAbort- >SERR- <PERR-
Latency: 32 (8000ns min, 16000ns max)
Interrupt: pin A routed to IRQ 209
Region 0: I/O ports at c000 [size=256]
Region 1: Memory at e2000000 (32-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=256]
Capabilities: [50] Power Management version 2
Flags: PMEClk- DSI- D1+ D2+ AuxCurrent=375mA PME(D0-,D1+,D2+,D3hot+,D3cold+)
Status: D0 PME-Enable- DSel=0 DScale=0 PME-

[chg]

That sounds good!once we get it started.for now we'll just haffta eyeball it and gather what we can from that.Maybe we can gleen a little info off gateway sites and forums like yours if you don't mind a couple nuby's stumbin around underfoot:D

[jmtjet]

if you don't mind a couple nuby's stumbin around underfoot
Reply With Quote

We were all newbies once. :) So ask any questions you like. Remember, the only stupid question is the one unasked.

[Harrie]

Another cool one is this, because it puts it in html format and it's very readable, sort of in sections, and you can pull it up handily any time you need it - like when you're asked on a board about your hardware!

In terminal:

sudo lshw -html > myhardwarespecs.html (or name the file whatever you want).

Then search your system for it and drag to your Desktop if you like - now it's handy!

[chg]

sounds like I'll have a few things to do when all the pieces line up!thanks for the info!;)