FC 6 issues

[Usman S. Ansari]

Tried to install FC 6 on my dual CPU Pentium III machine.

1. First it failed to discover my Dell FP 2001 monitor and G 400 video card and assume head less install.

2. And may be due to above it install Linux under XEN ? anyway upon booting, last thing it said was diabling XEN buffers and after that my machine froos

There is only one kernel installed on the system. Last time, during FC 5 install, it failed to discover some of the hardware on my system. I ended up solving this issue using non-SMP and enabling firstboot.

Any pointers who I can recover from this situation.

Any help is appreciated.

Thanks

Usman

[Tony Nelson]

At 5:52 PM -0800 11/20/06, Usman S. Ansari wrote:
> Tried to install FC 6 on my dual CPU Pentium III machine.
> First it failed to discover my Dell FP 2001 monitor and G 400 video
>
> card and assume head less install.

Probably this can be worked around with some poking.  Possibly the
other-mode install than you used will help (Text vs. Graphics mode).
> And may be due to above it install Linux under XEN ? anyway upon
>
> booting, last thing it said was diabling XEN buffers and after that my
> machine froos

You probably clicked on the "Virtualization" button.  It should probably
have "Xen" in the name, and Anaconda should warn before installing that
additional work will be needed to boot the machine.
> There is only one kernel installed on the system. Last time, during FC 5
> install, it failed to discover some of the hardware on my system. I ended
> up solving this issue using non-SMP and enabling firstboot.
>
> Any pointers who I can recover from this situation.
>
> Any help is appreciated.

Do the install over again.

[Jim Cornette]

Usman S. Ansari wrote:
> Tried to install FC 6 on my dual CPU Pentium III machine.
> First it failed to discover my Dell FP 2001 monitor and G 400 video
>
> card and assume head less install.

There may be two different things that you can do. The first is to boot 
with 'linux xdriver=mga' if video detection is the only problem. I have 
a G200 and some with the G400 also had problems with installations prior 
to FC6 with out of range. As far as I know the problem was fixed for the 
G400 as it was for the G200. I don't recall. The second choice is to 
install with 'linux xdriver=vesa' though the entry will also be in the 
xorg.conf of the installed system. Before the fix, that is what we would 
have had to resort to using. After the install, you could take care of 
the issue.
Regarding the kernel, it comes in the smp version only now and is the 
kernel. It is supposed to fall back to uniprocessor mode for non-smp 
computers. I don't know of any options to the kernel to force it to 
behave in non-smp mode. There might be options out there somewhere.
> And may be due to above it install Linux under XEN ? anyway upon
>
> booting, last thing it said was diabling XEN buffers and after that my 
> machine froos

You might have to use rescue mode in order to install the kernel instead 
of the xen version of the kernel.
> There is only one kernel installed on the system. Last time, during FC 5 
> install, it failed to discover some of the hardware on my system. I 
> ended up solving this issue using non-SMP and enabling firstboot.

If you cannot find options to make the kernel non-smp you may have to 
find one compiled with that option off or use an FC5 kernel version from 
somewhere. do not take this as athoratative though, I just install the 
stuff. :-)
> Any pointers who I can recover from this situation.

I hope you get the system to install successfully.

Jim
> Any help is appreciated.
>
> Thanks
>
> Usman

[Usman S. Ansari]

Tony and Jim, thanks for your replies.

I will have to reinstall the FC 6 (since it exist no more on my hardisk).

Tony Nelson  wrote:
> > First it failed to discover my Dell FP 2001 monitor and G 400 video
> >
> > card and assume head less install.
> Probably this can be worked around with some poking.  Possibly the
> other-mode install than you used will help (Text vs. Graphics mode).

Tony, I don't understand what you mean.
> > ... last thing it said was diabling XEN buffers and after that my
> >
> > machine froos
> You probably clicked on the "Virtualization" button.  It should probably
> have "Xen" in the name, and Anaconda should warn before installing that
> additional work will be needed to boot the machine.

Since, FC 6 selected text install, there was no button to click. I do not remmeber checking box next to Xen.

Jim Cornette  wrote:
> > First it failed to discover my Dell FP 2001 monitor and G 400 video
> >
> > card and assume head less install.
> The second choice is to install with 'linux xdriver=vesa' though the entry will
> also be in the xorg.conf of the installed system. Before the fix, that is what we
> would have had to resort to using. After the install, you could take care of 
> the issue.

I guess, I can install, FC 6, boot my machine with FC 4 kernel or 2.6.14.2 which I have built and mount FC 6 / as root. Than copy xorg.conf file.

Do you think this will work ?

[Jim Cornette]

Usman S. Ansari wrote:
> Tony and Jim, thanks for your replies.
>
> I will have to reinstall the FC 6 (since it exist no more on my hardisk).
> > You probably clicked on the "Virtualization" button. It should probably
> > have "Xen" in the name, and Anaconda should warn before installing that
> > additional work will be needed to boot the machine.
>
> Since, FC 6 selected text install, there was no button to click. I do 
> not remmeber checking box next to Xen.

I did a text install during the testing phase of FC6. I agree that the 
information is a bit vague. When I installed in text mode, it took in a 
lot of packages. Maybe specifying the xdriver=mga will get you a working 
GUI installer mode.
> */Jim Cornette /* wrote:
> > > First it failed to discover my Dell FP 2001 monitor and G 400 video
> > >
> > > card and assume head less install.
> > The second choice is to install with 'linux xdriver=vesa' though
> > the entry will also be in the xorg.conf of the installed system.
> > Before the fix, that is what we would have had to resort to using.
> > After the install, you could take care of the issue.
>
> I guess, I can install, FC 6, boot my machine with FC 4 kernel or 
> 2.6.14.2 which I have built and mount FC 6 / as root. Than copy 
> xorg.conf file.
>
> Do you think this will work ?

Copying over the xorg.conf file might give you back a better xorg.conf 
file than default FC6 provides. I don't see why a more elaborate 
xorg.conf file would cause damage.

Regarding the kernel that is by default with smp enabled, if the kernel 
version does not work for you, you might use your customized kernel. I'd 
go with trying the FC6 provided kernel first before trying the custom 
kernel.
The issues that I used to have with the smp kernel related to 
cpufrequency and the AMD 32-bit processor. The problem was remedied and 
the default "kernel" with smp enabled worked for cpufrequency. If you 
still have errors with the FC6 kernel, you might search for similar bug 
reports and attach to the bug report or extract the bug report resolution.

Hopefully you can get the GUI installation with either vesa or mga as 
the specification to xdriver=<whatever-driver> command. I had to supply 
sis as the driver on one of the computers which I installed FC6 on. The 
installer would crash if the parameter was not supplied.
Admittadly, the crash was not as major as not even detecting a video card.

Good luck on your second attempt.

Jim
>

[Usman S. Ansari]

I think I know why it installed XEN on my system. I selected all the options (from text based install) to install on my system.

Well, if this is true, than what should I do to avoid XEN install. Should I take bare minimum and after system is up install rest of the packages or there is a sub option, which I can select to disable Visulization ?

Usman

Jim Cornette  wrote: Usman S. Ansari wrote:
> Tony and Jim, thanks for your replies.
>
> I will have to reinstall the FC 6 (since it exist no more on my hardisk).
> > You probably clicked on the "Virtualization" button. It should
> > probably have "Xen" in the name, and Anaconda should warn before
> > installing that additional work will be needed to boot the machine.
>
> Since, FC 6 selected text install, there was no button to click. I do 
> not remmeber checking box next to Xen.

I did a text install during the testing phase of FC6. I agree that the 
information is a bit vague. When I installed in text mode, it took in a 
lot of packages. Maybe specifying the xdriver=mga will get you a working GUI installer mode.
> */Jim Cornette /* wrote:
> > > First it failed to discover my Dell FP 2001 monitor and G 400
> > >
> > > video card and assume head less install.
> > The second choice is to install with 'linux xdriver=vesa' though
> > the entry will also be in the xorg.conf of the installed system.
> > Before the fix, that is what we would have had to resort to using.
> > After the install, you could take care of the issue.
>
> I guess, I can install, FC 6, boot my machine with FC 4 kernel or 
> 2.6.14.2 which I have built and mount FC 6 / as root. Than copy 
> xorg.conf file.
>
> Do you think this will work ?

Copying over the xorg.conf file might give you back a better xorg.conf 
file than default FC6 provides. I don't see why a more elaborate 
xorg.conf file would cause damage.

Regarding the kernel that is by default with smp enabled, if the kernel 
version does not work for you, you might use your customized kernel. I'd go with trying the FC6 provided kernel first before trying the custom 
kernel.

The issues that I used to have with the smp kernel related to 
cpufrequency and the AMD 32-bit processor. The problem was remedied and the default "kernel" with smp enabled worked for cpufrequency. If you still have errors with the FC6 kernel, you might search for similar bug reports and attach to the bug report or extract the bug report resolution.

Hopefully you can get the GUI installation with either vesa or mga as 
the specification to xdriver= command. I had to supply sis as the driver on one of the computers which I installed FC6 on. The installer would crash if the parameter was not supplied. Admittadly, the crash was not as major as not even detecting a video card.

Good luck on your second attempt.

Jim
 noapic
 linux xdriver=vesa
 linux xdriver=mga

[Tony Nelson]

At 10:16 AM -0800 11/22/06, Usman S. Ansari wrote:
> I think I know why it installed XEN on my system. I selected all the
> options (from text based install) to install on my system.
>
> Well, if this is true, than what should I do to avoid XEN install. Should
> I take bare minimum and after system is up install rest of the packages or
> there is a sub option, which I can select to disable Visulization ?

I think you can select all, and then enter into some of them and deselect
parts, as well as select things that weren't selected with all.  I haven't
tried this, and certainly not from a text install.

[Usman S. Ansari]

I was talking about un-selecting visualization (XEN).

Usman

Tony Nelson  wrote: At 10:16 AM -0800 11/22/06, Usman S. Ansari wrote:
> I think I know why it installed XEN on my system. I selected all the
> options (from text based install) to install on my system.
>
> Well, if this is true, than what should I do to avoid XEN install. Should
> I take bare minimum and after system is up install rest of the packages or
> there is a sub option, which I can select to disable Visulization ?

I think you can select all, and then enter into some of them and deselect
parts, as well as select things that weren't selected with all.  I haven't
tried this, and certainly not from a text install.

[Usman S. Ansari]

Thanks for all the help.

When installing, I passed noapic xdriver=mga to kernel.

Everything went well after that. Video card was detected correctly, install used X for collecting information and after booting all devices are working correctly.

Usman

"Usman S. Ansari"  wrote: I think I know why it installed XEN on my system. I selected all the options (from text based install) to install on my system.

Well, if this is true, than what should I do to avoid XEN install. Should I take bare minimum and after system is up install rest of the packages or there is a sub option, which I can select to disable Visulization ?

Usman

Jim Cornette  wrote: Usman S. Ansari wrote:
> Tony and Jim, thanks for your replies.
>
> I will have to reinstall the FC 6 (since it exist no more on my hardisk).
> > You probably clicked on the "Virtualization" button. It should
> > probably have "Xen" in the name, and Anaconda should warn before
> > installing that additional work will be needed to boot the machine.
>
> Since, FC  6 selected text install, there was no button to click. I do 
> not remmeber checking box next to Xen.

I did a text install during the testing phase of FC6. I agree that the 
information is a bit vague. When I installed in text mode, it took in a 
lot of packages. Maybe specifying the xdriver=mga will get you a working GUI installer mode.
> */Jim Cornette /* wrote:
> > > First it failed to discover my Dell FP 2001 monitor and G 400
> > >
> > > video card and assume head less install.
> > The second choice is to install with 'linux xdriver=vesa' though
> > the entry will also be in the xorg.conf of the installed system.
> > Before the fix, that is what we would have had to resort to using.
> > After the install, you could take care of the issue.
>
> I guess, I can install, FC 6, boot my machine with FC 4 kernel or 
> 2.6.14.2 which I  have built and mount FC 6 / as root. Than copy 
> xorg.conf file.
>
> Do you think this will work ?

Copying over the xorg.conf file might give you back a better xorg.conf 
file than default FC6 provides. I don't see why a more elaborate 
xorg.conf file would cause damage.

Regarding the kernel that is by default with smp enabled, if the kernel 
version does not work for you, you might use your customized kernel. I'd go with trying the FC6 provided kernel first before trying the custom 
kernel.

The issues that I used to have with the smp kernel related to 
cpufrequency and the AMD 32-bit processor. The problem was remedied and the default "kernel" with smp enabled worked for cpufrequency. If you still have errors with the FC6 kernel, you might search for similar bug reports and attach to the bug report or extract the bug report resolution.

Hopefully you can get the GUI installation with either vesa or mga as  
the specification to xdriver= command. I had to supply sis as the driver on one of the computers which I installed FC6 on. The installer would crash if the parameter was not supplied. Admittadly, the crash was not as major as not even detecting a video card.

Good luck on your second attempt.

Jim
 noapic
 linux xdriver=vesa
 linux xdriver=mga

[Jim Cornette]

Usman S. Ansari wrote:
> Thanks for all the help.
>
> When installing, I passed noapic xdriver=mga to kernel.
>
> Everything went well after that. Video card was detected correctly, 
> install used X for collecting information and after booting all devices 
> are working correctly.
>
> Usman

I'm glad that the install went well when installing with those options 
at install time. I guess for the lack of proper video detection, running 
/sbin/lspci -n and submitting a bug report with that information should 
que the developers onto your computer's pci ID numbers so FC7 and above 
should recognize your video card automagically..

I submitted a report as advised for the sis lack of detection problem. 
As an example, here is the vague report that I submitted.

https://bugzilla.redhat.com/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=213884

Jim
> */"Usman S. Ansari" /* wrote:
> I think I know why it installed XEN on my system. I selected all the
> options (from text based install) to install on my system.
>
> Well, if this is true, than what should I do to avoid XEN install.
> Should I take bare minimum and after system is up install rest of
> the packages or there is a sub option, which I can select to disable
> Visulization ?
>
> Usman
>     Hopefully you can get the GUI installation with either vesa or
>     mga as
>     the specification to xdriver= command. I had to supply sis as
>     the driver on one of the computers which I installed FC6 on. The
>     installer would crash if the parameter was not supplied.
>     Admittadly, the crash was not as major as not even detecting a
>     video card.
>
>     Good luck on your second attempt.
>
>     Jim
>
> noapic
> linux xdriver=vesa
> linux xdriver=mga
> -- 
> Usman S. Ansari
> ...
> Alif Laam Meem. This is the Book, in it is guidance sure, without doubt, 
> to those who fear Allah. Who believe in the Unseen, are steadfast in 
> prayer, and spend out of what We have provided for them (Quraan Chapter 
> 2, v 1-3)

[Usman S. Ansari]

Jim,

I think this is not needed, since now I realize the problem is not "not 
detection" but the problem was "no using noapic" flag.

I verified with FC4 install, if I have noapic taken out from grub 
command line, some of the device stop working, like ethernet  RTL-8139

I would like to sincerely thank Fedora Core team for coming up with 
excellent rreleases every six months.

Usman
> I'm glad that the install went well when installing with those options 
> at install time. I guess for the lack of proper video detection, 
> running /sbin/lspci -n and submitting a bug report with that 
> information should que the developers onto your computer's pci ID 
> numbers so FC7 and above should recognize your video card automagically..
>
> I submitted a report as advised for the sis lack of detection problem. 
> As an example, here is the vague report that I submitted.
>
> https://bugzilla.redhat.com/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=213884
>
> Jim

[Jim Cornette]

Usman S. Ansari wrote:
> Jim,
>
> I think this is not needed, since now I realize the problem is not "not 
> detection" but the problem was "no using noapic" flag.
>
> I verified with FC4 install, if I have noapic taken out from grub 
> command line, some of the device stop working, like ethernet  RTL-8139
>
> I would like to sincerely thank Fedora Core team for coming up with 
> excellent rreleases every six months.
>
> Usman

Thanks for relaying that fact regarding the noapic option.

I basically agree with the much improved release as time goes on, though 
php in yum is consuming 91% cpu and is not progressing. Overall, a great 
job with the release.

Jim

What works in list e-mail

[James Wilkinson]

Usman S. Ansari wrote (quoting from the raw message):

<snip>
> Message-ID: 
> X-RedHat-Spam-Score: 3.381 ***

<snip>
> ... anyway upon booting, last thing it said was diabling XEN buffers and
> after that my machine froos <img
> src="http://us.i1.yimg.com/us.yimg.com/i/mesg/tsmileys2/02.gif">

Hi Usman,

It looks like you're using Yahoo web mail, and using "picture" smileys
provided by yimg.com. (Possibly Yahoo makes it look like they're "a part
of Yahoo mail": I don't use it so I can't tell.)

May I recommend you *don't* do that, for three reasons?

Firstly, many Linux and Unix mail clients won't display the HTML version
of your e-mail at all. Their users won't see the smiley, or any
indication that you meant to put anything there.

Secondly, your e-mail was constructed in such a way that the smiley
wasn't distributed with your e-mail, but each client would have had to
have downloaded it from yimg.com. That means yimg.com would be able to
tell whenever anyone read your e-mail.

That's considered unfriendly -- almost like spying on us. Many bulk
e-mailers (including spammers) use specially-constructed filenames for
the downloaded pictures, so they can cross-refer which e-mail went to
which e-mail address, when it was read, how often and where.

So most mail clients on Linux and Unix (and an increasing amount on other
platforms) won't load these images. That means *those* users won't see
the smiley anyway.

Thirdly, many spam filters will spot these picture references, and score
up your e-mail accordingly. (Not only is it a way for spammers to check
which e-mail addresses are being read, spam messages encoded as pictures
are relatively difficult for spam filters to analyse. So all messages
with embedded pictures come under suspicion).

You can see that you got a relatively high score from Red Hat's spam
filter. That's not good -- if you happened to include a few other
"spam-like" phrases, your e-mail could have been blocked.

Finally, we prefer that you don't send HTML-formatted e-mail to the list
at all. The Mailing List Guidelines for Fedora mailing lists can be found
at
http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Communicate/MailingListGuidelines#postingguide...
along with a link to pages explaining how to turn it off.

Hope this helps,

James.

(For what it's worth, I only spotted this because your message scored
highly enough on my spam filters to go into the "unsure" box, and I
wanted to find out why.)