Linux Ubuntu, Can anyone help?

[TEP]

Really cheesed with Microsoft so decided to give Linux a try. Installed Ubuntu on a old computer I have upstairs so I could give it a serious looking at, and everything is working great.

What has me confused is that I have not had to install any drivers, mainboard, graphics card, and all other bits are working OK, and with all their facilities. Is this normal? When you install a windows operating system you have to install all sorts of drivers to get the mainboard, USB, sound, and all your other bits working properly.

I know Linux comes with quite a lot of drivers within, but would be grateful if someone can tell me if this is normal. Not having to put any extra drivers on.

 

[Jon]

Ubuntu should load all the drivers it needs except that it will not load a commercial graphics driver for your graphics card. You might have only 2-d or simple 3-d graphics available, but, if that is not a problem for you, enjoy Linux.

 

[TEP]

Thanks Jon, guessed that was it, but being totally green where Linux is concerned I just wanted it confirmed.

PS: Welcome to the mad house. 8)

 

[seanybaby]

Good luck with linux Tam

http://www.psychocats.net/ubuntu/ Might be of use.

 

[BrianD]

You can improve your experience is you have an ATi or nVidia graphis card.

Just go to the System/Admin/Restricted Drivers Drivers and select the driver and then fire off System/Admin/update manager and away you go. It does make a difference!

Otherwise just enjoy Ubuntu as I am (I only use Linux nowadays and do not regret it). Stable and all the tools I need

 

[seanybaby]

Stable and all the tools I need

It's great When google makes a Sketchup version for linux, i will be completely Microshite free :lol:

 

[BrianD]

Actually I use Sketchup under wine.

works like magic - that way I am Micro.... free.

If need help to setup then let me know

 

[Gower]

Hello Tam,
Had the same experience as yourself. Just couldn't believe Ubuntu loaded with no fuss at all. When I set up the network, I was waiting for the usual wizards and endless questions and glanced at the top right corner that informed me that there were updates ready to download! Brilliant bit of kit and free!

Gower

 

[misterfish]

I must admit I've been pretty impressed with Ubuntu. The only problem I've had is getting my wireless network card working - I've tried everything I could find on the interweb but no success - I think I will have to end up replacing the card. On the other hand the wired network is no problem.

Despite this, I still also run XP with a dual boot option and most of the time use this rather than Ubuntu as I have been working with Windows from version 2 and am used to its foibles. I think the biggest problem with Ubuntu and other flavours of Linux is that you need to be a bit technically orientated to get things running as you want whereas Windows tends to be easier.

Misterfish

 

[seanybaby]

Actually I use Sketchup under wine.

Doh, i never even thought of running it through wine I have been using vmware and winblows. Is there many other programs you use through wine?

 

[mr]

Personally I found that Sketchup didnt run properly under wine. Not all menu items were available and it was prone to crashing. This was running on Ubunto rel 6 something iirc. I gave up with it in the end as I wasn't particularly interested in Sketchup in any case. It may be more stable on a more up to date release.

Cheers Mike

 

[TEP]

Many thanks guy's. I've yet to extend a phone line to the Linux computer, but will get that done in the next few days. Am very impressed with the system up until now, and will wait to see what is on-line once I get set up.

If I need any help will post again.


Thanks again.

 

[gasmansteve]

Anyone had success getting wifi to work?.
I tried Ubuntujust running off the disc and not installed to hard drive but no joy getting my wireless card to work (linksys) whether a hard drive install would be different.
Cheers
Steve

 

[misterfish]

Anyone had success getting wifi to work?.
I tried Ubuntujust running off the disc and not installed to hard drive but no joy getting my wireless card to work (linksys) whether a hard drive install would be different.
Cheers
Steve

My son and I have tried on two different computers with two different Netgear wireless adaptors with no success. We have tried everything we could think of as well as trying all the suggestions made by others on the various support forums. The annoying thing is that some others have managed to get these devices to work but in most cases people have failed. The only (definitely) successful method seems to be to change the adaptor to one that has Linux drivers available. To make matters worse it seems that apparently identical wireless adaptors can use different chipsets depending on when they were made and that older models may work whereas the newer ones don't. Others have widely commented that the difficulty of getting wireless networking working easily is the biggest problem of the software.

We set up virtual PCs on both our computers to be able to do a proper Ubuntu install but no joy. We also partitioned the hard disks to install Windows and Ubuntu as separate operating systems with a boot menu option. In all cases no success.

On the other hand when wired to the network hub the networking springs to life without having to take any action.

This has been the only frustration with Linux, apart from the networking wea re all impressed with the system.

Misterfish

 

[titan]

This has been the only frustration with Linux, apart from the networking wea re all impressed with the system.

Misterfish

Unfortunately, apart from a few exceptions wi-fi hardware manufacturers will not disclose enough information for a driver to be built or release a driver with with a licence that will not allow re-distribution with the CD. The normal way to get wi-fi working in this case is to use ndiswrapper which uses the Windows driver. If you Google you should find all you need to get it working.

Ian

 

[gasmansteve]

I have burnt the midnight oil on more nights than I can remember trying out the various Linux distros and getting the hardware to work with various pc`s.
I used to use Linux all the time (Fedora, Xandros and others) but when I needed to use newer hardware found I had to resort back to windows and to be honest I`ve found XP very stable so have stuck with it. It was quite a learning curve but interesting at the same time and I did learn a lot about pc`s but the effort involved at the time getting everything to work right just wasn`t worth it maybe Linux will get there but I don`t think its there yet. I find windows applications just `work` out of the box which is all I need. If Linux did this I would be back using it like a shot. When I did get stuff configured ok under Linux it worked like a dream but it might have taken 3 or 4 nights at the pc getting there :? .
Steve

 

[misterfish]

This has been the only frustration with Linux, apart from the networking wea re all impressed with the system.

Misterfish

Unfortunately, apart from a few exceptions wi-fi hardware manufacturers will not disclose enough information for a driver to be built or release a driver with with a licence that will not allow re-distribution with the CD. The normal way to get wi-fi working in this case is to use ndiswrapper which uses the Windows driver. If you Google you should find all you need to get it working.

Ian

We've spent frustrating hours trying to get NDISWRAPPER to work - different versions, blacklisting other drivers in all sorts of variations. Usually the OS sees the adaptor but only as an unknown USB device which we can identify by its hex address. The annoyance is that once or twice it has actually identified it properly and once even picked up the SSID but it could do no more. We tried fixed IP addresses and DHCP but no joy. Then after a reboot it went back to being unable to identify the device.

Misterfish

 

[titan]

We've spent frustrating hours trying to get NDISWRAPPER to work - different versions, blacklisting other drivers in all sorts of variations. Usually the OS sees the adaptor but only as an unknown USB device which we can identify by its hex address. The annoyance is that once or twice it has actually identified it properly and once even picked up the SSID but it could do no more. We tried fixed IP addresses and DHCP but no joy. Then after a reboot it went back to being unable to identify the device.

Misterfish

Here is a good how-to, http://manual.sidux.com/en/internet-con ... pper-basic
you will need to change bits for Ubuntu. I don't know if Ubuntu has the required packages and kernel module, I would think so but if not look at the advanced bit.

Ian

 

[misterfish]

Here is a good how-to, http://manual.sidux.com/en/internet-con ... pper-basic
you will need to change bits for Ubuntu. I don't know if Ubuntu has the required packages and kernel module, I would think so but if not look at the advanced bit.

Yes - we've tried this but no joy. IWCONFIG cannot see the LAN device (except for once). I'm coming to think that it may be a usb problem as I quite often have to reboot into Linux as it can't see the external usb hard drive or ZIP drive.

For the desktop it's not a problem as I plug it into the network hub but it means I can't get it working on the old notebook.

Misterfish