Re: Linux/EMC

Hi Steve,

I would suggest that your problems all stem from unsuitable hardware and
that this is probably the motherboard although the SCSI setup could be
suspect. The problems you are having seem very similar to the ones I had at
first and, whilst you are not specific, I seemed to get different problems
appearing each time I tried to load the system. My board was also a 100 Meg.
Pentium and the solution was to steal the board out of my daughter's
computer (I di do her a swap and set it up to work OK with Windows). This
instantly solved all problems and linux installed itself with no help for
me - detected and set up all the video, disk controllers, modem etc by
itself. The only thing I had to do - after everything else was set up and
working, was to install the soundcard support and re-compile the kernel as
Tim's script has no soundcard support built in. This shows another advantage
of linux - you can mess about with the kernel, adding and removing
components, re-compiling and testing, without risking upsetting your main
working program - just try changing the screen resolution in Windows to
something it doesn't like and you can get instant panic. You also don't
finish up with a machine full of redundant .dll's or massive swap files
which Windows has thoughtfully filled your disk with after previous crashes.
On the other hand, you do need to take a step back to work with linux and it
can seem like trying to remember how to use DOS/Win3.1/NT at times ( I'm
still trying to find my way around the file system and work out which files
I can delete from old apps and which I need to leave ). For any previously
Windows only user, I would certainly recommend installing KDE desktop
straight after the initial installation as it is the closest thing to a
Windows desktop I have seen. Having said this and as I use both systems
continuously, I do get a bit frustrated by the way KDE has transposed the
'minimise and shutdown' buttons on its windows so that I often find myself
shutting down a program when I just meant to minimise it.

Ian
--
Ian W. Wright
Sheffield UK

----- Original Message -----
From: Steve Carlisle <quatsein@...>
To: <CAD_CAM_EDM_DRO@onelist.com>
Sent: 12 October 1999 02:32
Subject: Re: [CAD_CAM_EDM_DRO]Linux/EMC


> From: "Steve Carlisle" <quatsein@...>
>
> Well, here's Steve's story on getting LINUX_RTLINUX_EMC
> up and running on a Pentium 100, 32 megs ram, 1 gig scsi
> hard drive, Cirrus Logic GD-5430 video, Motorola Lifestyle
> 28.8 modem, cdrom and floppy.
>
> About an hour to install RH 5.2, linux for dummies
> About 15 hours to configure video for Xfree
> about 15 hours to configure to recognize modem
> About 4 hours and counting on RTlinux install, 2
> times with Tims script, 2 times with Matt's instructions,
> and I am right now on the 3rd try with Tim's script.
>
> But hey, I will not give up! And those time estimates are
> very conservative. I have used MS/Windows machines
> only before this try with Linux.
>
> Any helpful idea's I may not have tried would surely
> be welcome.
>
> Steve Carlisle
>