seeking resolution to Network Device difficulties

[Petrus de Calguarium]

Tim wrote:

>> I use firefox. That should be the best for javascript support, non?
> 
> You'd think so, but I've one modem/router that only displays its pages
> well in MSIE.
I never even thought of MSIE... shows you how many years it's been :-)

Unfortunately, I cannot boot WinXP since I exchanged the motherboard 3 days 
ago.

I only keep Windows around for flashing the BIOS and for the DRM-protected 
audio-/e-books from the public library that I am addicted to, but the latter 
I access from within qemu-kvm (it's the only useful function for KVM I have 
so far encountered, but it is cool to run Windows in a window on my Fedora 
box -- I have no use of running Linux in a window on Fedora, since I'm 
already running Fedora), and with the new Intel motherboard I can now 
download the biosflash.iso, so I don't even need a Windows partition at all 
anymore.

I really like Intel more and more all the time and I have likely finally 
given up on ASUS motherboards for good, just too many problems and horrible 
translations so that you never really know whether you are supposed to 
en-/disable to get the desired function in the BIOS. Intel's BIOS is just so 
professional, not this horrible Chinese translated junk that is barely 
comprehensible and oftentimes frustratingly ambiguous.

Fedora 13 booted just fine with the new motherboard, but WindowsXP refuses to 
boot altogether (I wanted to load the driver CD for the new motherboard), but 
I just get a blue screen that flashes so briefly that all I can see is a lot 
of zeros and ampersands and then it auto-reboots. I have tried safe mode, 
last known good configuration and command line, too, all to no avail. 
However, my other installation of WinXP in a KVM virtual machine boots just 
fine. Maybe I'll try configuring the router from within KVM, just to see if 
there is a difference, as you suggest.

> I've never cared for Konqueror, either.  It just seems to be lacking, or
> broken, with various ordinary parts of HTML and CSS.
I do like konqueror in principle and I like it more and more with every new 
release of KDE, but it is just not ready for general use (perhaps html5 and 
webkit-qt might help change that). There are isolated sites that one can use 
it on, but it is not practical to alternate browsers when surfing the web: it 
makes bookmarking commodious and nearly impossible.
 
> I have bitten the bullet and installed Opera to try out some things with
> an alternate browser.  At least that one's relatively easy to install
> without mangling things.  Opera has a RPM that just works.
I tried Opera a couple of years ago (on Fedora, of course) and I didn't like 
it's way of doing things at all. I cannot recall exactly, but I do recall 
there being a lot of different panels and stuff that did not appeal to me one 
bit. Perhaps it renders html well, I could not say.

>> I will have a look at the pdf manual sometime
> 
> It's worth it.  You may find there's useful things hidden in strange
> places.
I guess. I find it frustrating spending hours and hours poring over manuals 
scanning for some elusive tidbit of information that might or equally might 
not be there. A forum like this is better, as you can *sometimes* get someone 
to tell you straight how to do it. This piece of hardware is a special case, 
of course, as few likely have it, excepting all the subscribers of this 
particular internet provider (they actually mirror ubuntu, centos and gnu and 
used to unofficially mirror fedora a few years back, despite not supporting 
linux *at all!*, when it comes to telephone support).