Gentoo linux

[Hooper]

Similar with any linux distro in terms of the kernel however. For example when installing slackware you will notice that the kernel is loaded to the gills for a default install. Modules are out the wazoo for all hardware under the sun.
As with Gentoo or any other distro, you will need be informed of your hardware configuration. While you may get by with at generic kernel, most linux users first step after installation would be to recompile the kernel for specific hardware. This just goes with the territory. Most installers as mentioned above are very "generic" in form. Yes it will detect a majority if not all of your available hardware, but it will also load a default kernel to achieve this. I just cannot picture running a bloated kernel and having a boat load of unneeded modules setting around. You will find this the case with a majority of the distro's out there. Whether you are installing a beginners linux such as mandrake, or a more advanced distrobution such as Gentoo or Slackware, you will need know your hardware and be prepared to recompile your kernel a few times until you get the swing of it. After that, it's just a walk in the park.

Added:

I wanted to clarify. I am not saying in anyway that Gentoo and Slackware are a more advanced Linux over other distro's such as mandrake/Redhat. What I should have said was that mandrake/RedHat and other disto's are more user friendly for generic installations. Gentoo, Slackware, Debian, BSD's, require a bit more intervention at times than do other distrobutions. No matter what I've installed, I tweak for better performance/specific hardware. All require a kernel recompile.

[Wayne Luke]

What about your applications? They do not get updated by Windows update.

That is how it should be in my opinion. I don't want my OS updated all my applications for me. Sometimes I will not need to upgrade to the newest version.

That is okay, this thread has made me change my mind about trying Gentoo in the future. It is about choice and I would rather have a system that works off the disk instead of worrying about hours of configuration and such.

[Jerry]

Yea, I was build a machine specifically for importer development, i.e. LAMP and networking and that is about it, oh nano and some logging.

So I took HAM radio support out


Ok, it was a joke, I know it's out by default in gentoo but there are some intresting things left in, and I think the last RH box I built had it left in.

[bahbah]

Installed Gentoo on a new Dell 5150 laptop. From stage 3 it took 3hrs to install but this was my first gentoo install. Another few hours for xfree and KDE to compile too.

It's taken me another 2 days to get all the other functions of my laptop working tho lol - GF5200FX - touchpad - wireless NIC - sound

But having always used RH for servers, I've found I've had to learn some new linux stuff, and also recall a lot of stuff which I'd almost forgot about. So the whole experience has been a lot of fun - but then I'm a geek so go figure

Specs of laptop:

2.4Ghz P4
1Gb RAM
GF5200FX
40Gb HDD

and getting 35-40fps on the ut2004 demo

Gentoo itself is blisteringly fast, and its probably now my favourite distro.

btw the install & infact all docs on the gentoo site are great

[Surrix]

What wirless nic are you using and what driver did you use?

[bahbah]

Dell truemobile 1300 which is a Broadcom bcm94306

I used ndiswrapper and the XP drivers. I own a licence for linuxant but had issues with that on Gentoo even though I've had it working on RH before.

ndiswrapper is free and open source so alls good

[Jerry]

btw the install & infact all docs on the gentoo site are great

Hear hear, its nice to see a distro make an effort like they have.

[LeeCHeSSS]

So, would I be able to try out Gentoo through Microsoft Virtual PC ?

[Raz Meister]

So, would I be able to try out Gentoo through Microsoft Virtual PC ?

There's no harm in trying, although I doubt you'll notice speed improvements if its running under VM.

[LeeCHeSSS]

I'm not wanting to gain speed improvements when trying it under MS VPC, but rather get a hang of the installation process, so that I can then install it with *less* fear on our server.

[Martz]

I'm not wanting to gain speed improvements when trying it under MS VPC, but rather get a hang of the installation process, so that I can then install it with *less* fear on our server.

I'd recommend you use VMWare Workstation 4 (For windows) to run a Virtual Server in.. I don't know if the MS Virtual PC equivilent is anygood. You also get a 30 trial with the software, so you can evaluate VMWare and Gentoo for 30 days without any hassles

[LeeCHeSSS]

I already have MS Virtual PC installed and working. I see no need to use another VM.

[WildEye]

Ok... tried to install Gentoo three times now, every single time i do something wrong. Last time i selected ext3 as file system for /boot and /root and while booting the kernel after compiling there are a whole lot of error messages about not being able to read the file system. I carefully selected ext3 support in the make menuconfig configuration of the kernel.

I'm starting to think this is a little over my head. Even with the excellent how-to doc...

Started with a netinstall stage 2, first time my network wouldn't work after making kernel, 2nd time i forgot to copy the kernel etc, so it wouldn't boot... Luckily i've only "wasted" 4 days now. Well yesterday it was a little more cos somehow it compiled xfree windowmanager (took a while) and i dont need it for my server...

Will try it one more time with ext2 file systems, then the bootcd goes in the trash if i'm unsuccessful... *frustrated*

Could anyone with more experience guide me to what i need to select in /etc/make.conf and Kernel config for this setup:

Dell motherboard with onboard 10/100/1000 ethernet
Dual Xeon 2.4GHz (HT)
1.5Gb ram
80gb ide disk
cd-rom
onboard 8mb gfx

disksetup: 100mb /boot
1536mb /swap
rest /root

thanks!

[Hooper]

Ok... tried to install Gentoo three times now, every single time i do something wrong. Last time i selected ext3 as file system for /boot and /root and while booting the kernel after compiling there are a whole lot of error messages about not being able to read the file system. I carefully selected ext3 support in the make menuconfig configuration of the kernel.

Could anyone with more experience guide me to what i need to select in /etc/make.conf and Kernel config for this setup:

Dell motherboard with onboard 10/100/1000 ethernet
Dual Xeon 2.4GHz (HT)
1.5Gb ram
80gb ide disk
cd-rom
onboard 8mb gfx

disksetup: 100mb /boot
1536mb /swap
rest /root

thanks!

Here is my kernel config for the filesystem. I like ext3 as well.
Remember that M is module and * means that it is configured within
the kernel. If you decide to load certain items/drivers via a module, you
may have to edit your modules.conf to ensure the device loads.

Linux machine 2.6.4 #1 SMP Sat Mar 13 18:40:29 EST 2004 i686 unknown unknown GNU/Linux

<*> Second extended fs support ? ?
? ? [ ] Ext2 extended attributes ? ?
? ? <*> Ext3 journalling file system support ? ?
? ?[*] Ext3 extended attributes ? ?
? ? [ ] Ext3 POSIX Access Control Lists ? ?
? ? [ ] Ext3 Security Labels ? ?
? ? [ ] JBD (ext3) debugging support ? ?
? ? < > Reiserfs support ? ?
? ? < > JFS filesystem support ? ?
? ? < > XFS filesystem support ? ?
? ? < > Minix fs support ? ?
? ? < > ROM file system support ? ?
? ? [ ] Quota support ? ?
? ? < > Kernel automounter support ? ?
? ? <*> Kernel automounter version 4 support (also supports v3) ? ?
? ? CD-ROM/DVD Filesystems ---> ? ?
? ? DOS/FAT/NT Filesystems ---> ? ?
? ? Pseudo filesystems --->


disksetup: 100mb /boot
1536mb /swap
rest /root

On the partitioning scheme, and although there are differences in opinion in that area, you might try fdisk or cfdisk to set up /usr /var /home /boot /swap /root.
I usually keep the above as seperate partitions.

On the HT/highmem you may need to compile the support into the kernel as well.


Subarchitecture Type (PC-compatible) ---> ? ?
? ? Processor family (Pentium-4/Celeron(P4-based)/Pentium-4 M/Xeon) ---> ? ?
? ? [ ] Generic x86 support ? ?
? ?[*] HPET Timer Support ? ?
? ?[*] Symmetric multi-processing support ? ?
? ? (2) Maximum number of CPUs (2-255) ? ?
? ?[*] Preemptible Kernel ? ?
? ?[*] Machine Check Exception ? ?
? ?[*] Check for non-fatal errors on AMD Athlon/Duron / Intel Pentium 4 ? ?
? ?[*] check for P4 thermal throttling interrupt. ? ?
? ? < > Toshiba Laptop support ? ?
? ? < > Dell laptop support ? ?
? ? < > /dev/cpu/microcode - Intel IA32 CPU microcode support ? ?
? ? < > /dev/cpu/*/msr - Model-specific register support ? ?
? ? < > /dev/cpu/*/cpuid - CPU information support ? ?
? ? <M> BIOS Enhanced Disk Drive calls determine boot disk (EXPERIMENTAL) ? ?
? ? High Memory Support (4GB) ---> ? ?
? ?[*] Allocate 3rd-level pagetables from highmem ? ?
? ? [ ] Math emulation ? ?
? ?[*] MTRR (Memory Type Range Register) support ? ?
? ? [ ] Boot from EFI support (EXPERIMENTAL) ? ?
? ?[*] Enable kernel irq balancing ? ?
? ? [ ] Use register arguments (EXPERIMENTAL)


Been a while since I messed with Gentoo, did you have any of the filesystem errors prior to recompile? Might want to dmesg. You might want to save your kernel config prior to making any changes. You can always reuse your old config file if need be.

====

Dell motherboard with onboard 10/100/1000 ethernet

Usually you will want to know the board, chipset, video, ethernet make and model so you can verify that you have the correct kernel selections.

Dual Xeon 2.4GHz (HT) - Just select as show above for Xeon/p4 /SMP/number of cpu's (2)
1.5Gb ram - High memory support settings. I have 2gigs and have it set to 4.
80gb ide disk - Disk settings ATA/IDE etc....
cd-rom - generic cdrom selections IDE and you may want to select SCSI emulation as well.
onboard 8mb gfx - Make and model (chip)? You may need a third party graphics driver in addition. If server no need as long as the screen glows.

====

Ideas anyhow. Once you have everything working on this particular hardware, you might backup your kernel config and burn it to rom. I wouldn't expect everything to be perfect the first time you rebuild the kernel. Takes a bit, so save your configs.

[RandomLove]

Intersting article:

http://lxer.com/module/newswire/view/8009/index.html