[Cumbria] Mandrake 9.1

[Ian Linwood]

Hello Schwuk,

Friday, April 11, 2003, 10:44:33 AM, you wrote:

> Well, I've been using Mandrake 9.1 in anger for a couple of days now, so I
> thought I'd post my opinions...
Oh my god, a post to the list!

I can see the review now - reluctant to commit itself to install, but
once the difficulties are resolved it wants to run the show!
<allo_allo_style_french_accent>
We needz to give the hardware detectors
more time!
</allo_allo_style_french_accent>



> Install: Very straightforward. Detected and configured all relevant
> hardware without any prompting from me (including USB MS Explorer mouse,
> nVidia Ti4600 graphics card and correct make and model of monitor). Very
> impressive. The only problem I've found is that although it found my
> soundcard (SB Live Value), it tried to use the Audigy driver. This is
> switchable in Mandrakes configuration tools, and doesn't require a reboot
> - in fact, I haven't rebooted since I installed... I was also particularly
> impressed that NTFS support is included, and both my NTFS and FAT32
> partitions are mounted at boot - I know LUG members have had problems with
> this in the past (Yes, I mean you Mat).

Flash git! My current Linux tub ;

ian@gateway:~$ dmesg
Linux version 2.4.20 (ian@gateway) (gcc version 2.95.3 20010315 (release)) #1 Sat Feb 15 16:42:14 GMT 2003
BIOS-provided physical RAM map:
 BIOS-88: 0000000000000000 - 000000000009f000 (usable)
 BIOS-88: 0000000000100000 - 0000000004000000 (usable)
64MB LOWMEM available.
On node 0 totalpages: 16384
zone(0): 4096 pages.
zone(1): 12288 pages.
zone(2): 0 pages.
Kernel command line: auto BOOT_IMAGE=gateway ro root=301
Initializing CPU#0
Console: colour VGA+ 80x25
Calibrating delay loop... 49.66 BogoMIPS
Memory: 62248k/65536k available (1293k kernel code, 2900k reserved, 363k data, 248k init, 0k highmem)
Checking if this processor honours the WP bit even in supervisor mode... Ok.
Dentry cache hash table entries: 8192 (order: 4, 65536 bytes)
Inode cache hash table entries: 4096 (order: 3, 32768 bytes)
Mount-cache hash table entries: 1024 (order: 1, 8192 bytes)
Buffer-cache hash table entries: 4096 (order: 2, 16384 bytes)
Page-cache hash table entries: 16384 (order: 4, 65536 bytes)
CPU:     After generic, caps: 00000003 00000000 00000000 00000000
CPU:             Common caps: 00000003 00000000 00000000 00000000
CPU: Intel 486 DX/4 stepping 00
Checking 'hlt' instruction... OK.
Checking for popad bug... OK.
POSIX conformance testing by UNIFIX
PCI: PCI BIOS revision 2.00 entry at 0xfd650, last bus=0
PCI: Using configuration type 1
PCI: Probing PCI hardware
isapnp: Scanning for PnP cards...
isapnp: Card 'Adaptec AHA-1520B'
isapnp: 1 Plug & Play card detected total
Linux NET4.0 for Linux 2.4
Based upon Swansea University Computer Society NET3.039
Initializing RT netlink socket
Starting kswapd
pty: 256 Unix98 ptys configured
Serial driver version 5.05c (2001-07-08) with MANY_PORTS SHARE_IRQ SERIAL_PCI ISAPNP enabled
ttyS00 at 0x03f8 (irq = 4) is a 16550A
ttyS01 at 0x02f8 (irq = 3) is a 16550A
keyboard: Timeout - AT keyboard not present?(ed)
keyboard: Timeout - AT keyboard not present?(f4)
Uniform Multi-Platform E-IDE driver Revision: 6.31
ide: Assuming 33MHz system bus speed for PIO modes; override with idebus=xx
hda: ST32122A, ATA DISK drive
ide0 at 0x1f0-0x1f7,0x3f6 on irq 14
hda: 4124736 sectors (2112 MB) w/128KiB Cache, CHS=1023/64/63
Partition check:
 hda: hda1 hda2 hda3 hda4 < hda5 hda6 hda7 hda8 >
Floppy drive(s): fd0 is 1.44M
FDC 0 is a post-1991 82077
SLIP: version 0.8.4-NET3.019-NEWTTY (dynamic channels, max=256).
CSLIP: code copyright 1989 Regents of the University of California.
SLIP linefill/keepalive option.
pcnet32.c:v1.27b 01.10.2002 tsbogend@alpha.franken.de
PCI: Setting latency timer of device 00:17.0 to 64
pcnet32: PCnet/PCI 79C970 at 0xfce0, 08 00 09 e8 cc 91 assigned IRQ 15.
eth0: registered as PCnet/PCI 79C970
pcnet32: 1 cards_found.
PPP generic driver version 2.4.2
PPP Deflate Compression module registered
PPP BSD Compression module registered
SCSI subsystem driver Revision: 1.00
aha152x: BIOS test: passed, auto configuration: ok, detected 1 controller(s)
aha152x: resetting bus...
aha152x0: vital data: rev=3, io=0x340 (0x340/0x340), irq=10, scsiid=7, reconnect=enabled, parity=enabled, synchronous=enabled, delay=1000, extended translation=disabled
aha152x0: trying software interrupt, ok.
scsi0 : Adaptec 152x SCSI driver; $Revision: 2.5 $
NET4: Linux TCP/IP 1.0 for NET4.0
IP Protocols: ICMP, UDP, TCP, IGMP
IP: routing cache hash table of 512 buckets, 4Kbytes
TCP: Hash tables configured (established 4096 bind 4096)
NET4: Unix domain sockets 1.0/SMP for Linux NET4.0.
[snip volume info]
ReiserFS version 3.6.25
hamcore module init
ham: loading 536EP Release 4.51 INT (kern:2.4.20) - Feb 15 2003
ham: IRQ: 9, DSP-Base: 0xff800000 (phys) 0xc4cd7000 (virt) (range: 4096k), DSP-Port: 0x0 (range: 0b)
ip_tables: (C) 2000-2002 Netfilter core team
ip_conntrack version 2.1 (512 buckets, 4096 max) - 292 bytes per conntrack

> DrakFont will also pull fonts from your Windows
> installation (if you have one).

Mmm. Is this *legal* in MS eyes?

> Software: Mandrake is one of the 'everything-to-everyone' distro's that I
> have commented on in the past - it installs far too many packages, and
> makes no attempt to make choices easier for users. If you didn't know
> which programs to use, there are too many choices for beginners... The
> Mandrake configuration tools are very impressive, but also a bit
> 'dumbed-down'. I need more control (yes, I know I'm not a 'normal' user).

I'm a committed Slacker. So don't suffer from problems like this  :-)

> Performance: Performance is very good. I've installed Quake III Arena and
> Neverwinter Nights (I never thought I'd see the day when it was as easy to
> install a gmae on Linux as it is on Windows), and both outperform their
> Windows cousins. NWN in particular was impressive, running windowed whilst
> still browsing the web/IMing etc...

YOU have time for games!

> Oddities: Both Nautilus and Konquerer had problems browsing an SMB share.

In what way - slow response? Access denied? What did the
log.'hostname' say?


> Mozilla (1.3 is included) works fine, but Mozilla Mail crashes. I'm sure
> I'll find others...

It's known to do that - 1.3.1 is much improved stability wise.

> Overall: Very impressive distro. Once I got over the "it's not Red Hat"
> thing, I've grown to like it more and more. It's very much a desktop
> distro though, so I'm not planning on unleashing it on my servers... I'm
> planning on trying RHL 9 as soon as I get my disks (ahem, Mat...), and
> I'll post my opinions on that, and my final choice as and when... I will
> be recommending this distro to people though (esp. newbies).

I'm waiting for Slackware 9 iso's to be *ready*. The is will hopefully
let me play with the 2.5/2.6 kernels a little easier. Updating a Slack
8.1 system to be ready for the 2.5 kernels is just too much hassle IMO.

I'll report back to the list when I get Slack9 going...

In the meantime, I'm off to u/g the disks in two of my Solaris
systems...

-- 
Best regards,
 Ian                            mailto:ian@darksideofthemoon.org.uk