Darrington, John [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: > > OK, so after 5 years of playing with slackware and Red Hat, I decide that my > next OS will be Debian --- I've seen the web page, and like the philosophy > and want to get started. The usenet reports that Debian is so difficult to > install can't all be true can they? Unfortunately I've found they are.
Good. You made the right move. I switched from redhat two years ago, and never regret. > Not knowing much about Debian I look on the web site for advice. I find > this: > `It is recommended that first time installers buy the CD set as the > installation is more straightforward. Many of the vendors sell the > distribution for less than US$5 plus shipping (check their web page to see > if they ship internationally). ' > Fine I think US$5 == AUD8 plus let's say $10 for postage, I should be able > to get going for $18. Well I don't want to wait weeks for a shipment from > the US, so I phone my local software shop and ask them if they stock Debian > 2.1 . Yes, they have a 2 CD set for $25. Great says I . I don't really > mind paying an extra $7. The shop's got to make an honest profit, and I Hmm, that is a bit expensive. I spent $11.00 to get my first Debian Hamm 2.0 CD from LSL, but that was including the postage fee. Now in sydney, there is a shop called everythingLinux(www.everythinglinux.com.au), and I think you can get it for about $5.00. > "Choose Debian archive path. Please choose the path inside the CD-ROM where > the Debian archive resides" > and the default appears to be /debian. I choose the default, not having any > other information. Then comes: > "Pleae select the directory containing the file resc1440tecra.bin" I agree this is something that debian should be improved. It is a bit confusing. But from memory, press ENTER should just do it. > This stumps me. How the hell should I know where that is? Being a > resourcefull character I back out of the menu wait until the CD is > unmounted, and place it in another machine and search for this file. It's > located at /debian/boot So back into the install procedure I go, enter > /debian/boot at the appropriate place. It seems to be denying the > existence of this file. --- but wait it's actually wanting the location of a > file with a similar name "drv1440tecra.bin". > I don't know where that is? I see there is an option `list' which > automatically detects it so I try that. Apparently it's not there. Back to > my other machine, and do a "find" . Sure enough it's not there. What do I > do now? I press <F1> like the start up screen told me. nothing happens. I > turn to the book. No hints. I spend the next 2 hours rebooting and trying > every possible path though the menu. including mounting the CD manually and > pointing the install process to the archives. It still wants this > non-existent file. Once again, you should be able to just press ENTER. > It's time to conclude that perhaps my hardware has some funny configuration > which this CD doesn't support. So, I borrow a machine and try again. Exactly > the same symptoms. Well, I don't think it is the hardware problem. Even if you have passed the above two steps, you will still have to face dselect, which a lot of people had trouble with it. > So after 2 days and $65 I have not managed to get even a login prompt. For > that price I could have got RedHat 6.1. > It's quite a demoralising experience. Are these problems common in Debian > installation or is it just me ?? Keep trying! You will eventually get there. Once you get your box up and running, you will never have to go thru this process again, the powerfull apt-get will fix up everything for you in the future. -- ____________________________________________________________________________ Shao Zhang - Running Debian 2.1 ___ _ _____ Department of Communications / __| |_ __ _ ___ |_ / |_ __ _ _ _ __ _ University of New South Wales \__ \ ' \/ _` / _ \ / /| ' \/ _` | ' \/ _` | Sydney, Australia |___/_||_\__,_\___/ /___|_||_\__,_|_||_\__, | Email: [EMAIL PROTECTED] |___/ _____________________________________________________________________________
