April 2006 - main

ThinkPad & Wireless
by Simon Royal 28 Apr '06

28 Apr '06

Hi I have decided to buy a cheap PC laptop and run Linux on it. I was going to buy a Mac laptop - being a Mac fan, but I can get a second hand PC laptop with higher specs cheaper than a Mac one. And as it is going to run Linux it doesn't matter. I have been told IBM Thinkpads are good for Linux can anyone recommend anything in particular? Also I want to buy a wireless PCMCIA card that will work on a laptop and under Linux, any suggestions? Kind Regards Simon Royal ---- www.simonroyal.co.uk The box said requires Windows 2000 or better, so I bought an Apple Mac

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Mysterious ethernet problem
by Peter 28 Apr '06

28 Apr '06

Has anyone heard of anything like this, and if so what did you do? The machine is a Compaq deskpro SFF, PIII. It is running Mandriva. The IP address is manually assigned, and its not connected to the Net, this is just for internal printing. You plug the machine in, boot up, and everything is fine. You can reach other addresses, print on a network printer, log into the network printers admin over the web browser (the printer itself, not CUPS on localhost). You can do file transfers from other machines. You then turn off using the gnome power control. System goes down, screen goes blank. Little light on back of network card goes out. Reboot, and network is unavailable. Do ifup eth0, comes up, however ping doesn't work in either direction and the other machines are not there. Connection refused is the message. The little light is still off. After much headscratching, shut down, turn off at mains, wait 20 secs, turn back on at mains. Little light comes back on, boot up, everything works.... What obvious thing am I missing? I would expect that it should go off at shutdown, and go on at bootup. The only other oddity is that Mandriva seems to think there are two network interfaces, one the card which really is in it, and another interface called sit0 or something like this. You can delete this without it affecting the eth0. I don't understand where this is coming from, if it matters, or what to do about it. Any suggestions gratefully received. Peter

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Guinea Pigs required for Linux VPS trial..
by Martyn Drake 28 Apr '06

28 Apr '06

Hello, Long time no post :) Time for another crazy idea of mine. In an effort to help part-fund my shiny new dual core dedicated server (some of it's already funded by a web site I run), I'm contemplating using VMWare Server to "partition" the machine up into several segments and rent out a Linux virtual server for those wishing to experiment, host their own sites, or whatever. Suggested charging for 128Mb VM would be around the £25 per month mark. However, before I do ANY of that, I want to try different distributions with different applications and thus if anybody is interesting in testing such a beastie, I would be very grateful. Initally I'm looking to offer Debian and CentOS (4.x). Each VM would be equal share CPU. If anybody is interested, please can you drop me an email off-list. Regards, Martyn

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[ALUG Announce] Reminder: Syleham Kit Meet Sun 30 Apr 2006 2pm-
by MJ Ray 27 Apr '06

27 Apr '06

ALUG Announce Please send announcements to Announce(a)lists.alug.org.uk Unsub, change settings via http://lists.alug.org.uk/mailman/listinfo/announce ----- Just a quick reminder for announce readers that there is a meeting on Sunday. See http://www.alug.org.uk/meetings/2006/04-30Sun.html or http://lists.alug.org.uk/main/2006-March/024264.html Also, I offer some transport to Syleham from places on the A134 Lynn-Thetford or A1066 Thetford-Diss: email me off-list. The next Norwich meeting will be Thu 11 May. See http://www.alug.org.uk/meetings/2006/all-NorThu.html If you'd like a meeting in King's Lynn, email me. While I'm writing, www.5quidhost.co.uk have offered any LUG member 3 months free on 6 months, or 6 months free on 12 months. Mention Anglian LUG when ordering. Thanks for reading! ----- Send discussion replies to main(a)lists.alug.org.uk (Reply-To set) Unsub, change settings via http://lists.alug.org.uk/mailman/listinfo/announce

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ThinkPad Mania
by Simon Royal 27 Apr '06

27 Apr '06

After weeks of trying to find a ThinkPad to use for Linux and having no joy I have won five in the last week - a 770, 755CX, 380ED, 380ED & 760XL. I have decided to keep the two 380EDs and resell the rest. One of them is for my wife so she can wirelessly surf while watching TV, but she is not interested in Linux and will be running Windows 98SE or 2000. Bearing in mind the age of the machine, what's the best distro to use for a Linux newbie? I don't want to dual boot or to run anything too heavy on it. I want it for wireless surfing, emails, light word processing and expanding my knowledge of Linux. I know it is old, but I would like it to run pretty smoothly. I am fairly new to Linux and would prefer a distro with a GUI, but know that Gnome or KDE are resource hungry. I have been running Vector Linux SOHO live on my wifes PC and it seems pretty easy on resources and uses Xfce desktop manager, it also has special ThinkPad tailored settings. I have also dabbled in DSL, Knoppix and Ubuntu - the last requiring a better machine than the 380ED. I have an 802.11b wireless PCMCIA card which apparently works in Linux according to the box. So the ultimate question is, which distro will run relatively smooth, work on a 380ED, work with my wireless PCMCIA card and is pretty user friendly and configurable via GUI and not too much Linux knowledge initially. One final question, does anyone know the max hard drive and RAM you can put into a 380ED. Kind Regards Simon Royal ---- www.simonroyal.co.uk The box said requires Windows 2000 or better, so I bought an Apple Mac

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ThinkPad & DSL Help
by Simon Royal 27 Apr '06

27 Apr '06

Hi After weeks of searching I have a ThinkPad 380ED with Damn Small Linux installed. For a Pentium 166 machine with only 32MB RAM it is damn (no pun intended) fast. The 380ED has a built in CDROM drive which is bootable and built in floppy, unfortunately it's PCMCIA slots are 16 bit and not cardbus compliant, so my cardbus wireless card won't work on it. Firstly, Can anyone recommend a 16-bit wireless card that works well under Linux. It can be with a 802.11b or 11g card don't mind. I have heard that the Belkin FSD6020 v2 works straight out of the box in Linux and the LinkSys WCP11 v3 works with a bit of tweaking, but neither of these manufacturers websites mention anything about Linux. Secondly, I have bought a number of RAM chips for the 380ED. After searching Google for the exact spec, I realised it has 16MB on board non-removeable and a 16MB stick removeable, upgradeable to 64MB. The machine has an 80MB maximum support. None of the sticks I have bought work. Although DSL runs fine with 32MB it will run even better with 80MB so would like to upgrade. I noticed the sticks I bought where a lot taller than the one I removed and this is the only difference I can see. Any help here would be appreciated. The sound don't work at the moment but I have found a modprobe work around so will try that later. Any further advice or experience anyone has had with one of these or general ThinkPad problems, all info would be great. Kind Regards Simon Royal ---- www.simonroyal.co.uk The box said requires Windows 2000 or better, so I bought an Apple Mac

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USB Wireless
by Peter Hunter 26 Apr '06

26 Apr '06

Hi everyone. I have been away from Linux for far too long. I was having withdrawals when a friend gave me a full unregistered copy of Linspire 5.0. I hastily installed this onto my laptop (which is running a 1.2GHz VIA C3 processor). It installed in super quick time, and everything was recognised and working OK, even my USB card reader. The Ethernet connection was setup without any help from me, and setting up the email account was simple. The one thing I haven't been able to get working yet though is my Belkin USB WiFi stick. I have a Belkin WiFi /Cable router in the ´work room´. The WiFi worked ok when I had winxp on it, so I know it´s all ok. Any ideas as to how to get it working would help please. Many thanks Peter

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Newsforge: Why LUGs matter
by Keith Watson 26 Apr '06

26 Apr '06

Haven't read the entire thing but it looks interesting; <http://www.newsforge.com/article.pl?sid=06/03/03/1813216> Regards, Keith ____________ The little things in life are as interesting as the big ones. - Henry David Thoreau

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Sunday 30th April Kit meet reminder
by John Woodard 25 Apr '06

25 Apr '06

Bring your box kit meet. Sun 30th April 2:00pm onwards at Syleham Village Hall. Meeting info: http://www.alug.org.uk/meetings/2006/04-30Sun.html Venue info: http://www.alug.org.uk/venues/syleham.html Cheers, BJ -- No virus found in this outgoing message. Checked by AVG Free Edition. Version: 7.1.385 / Virus Database: 268.4.6/323 - Release Date: 24/04/2006

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Any kit meets planned ?
by Peter Onion 25 Apr '06

25 Apr '06

Are there any plans for any "kit meets" this year ? Peter

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