Gift computer hardware

[Timothy L. Miller]

Ok, I'm building a computer for my father out of some spare parts that I had lying around. The basic specs are:
Celeron 300 oc'd to 450
256 MB SDRAM
13.6 GB ATA33 hard drive
LG DVD/CD-RW combo drive
Onboard soundcard
Riva TNT2 M64 32MB AGP
Zoom ISA internal 56K V.90(model 2919)

To start out with, all my hardware has been tested, and it works. The dvd/cdrw drive works in linux(I have it on another computer of mine also). If linux doesn't recognize onboard sound, no biggie, I have a SB Live! lying around, but it's a Micro ATX board, so expansion room is a premium, and I'd rather use the onboard. I'm not sure who made the board, I know it's a VIA chipset though.
Now, my question: Does anyone know if the modem can be made to work? I looked at Mandrakes HCL, and they listed it as non-compatible. I looked for Debian or Slacks HCL, but couldn't find them. But I also read a page that had several postings saying that it was working quite easily...Can anyone direct me to where I can find information on gettting it to work, or know of another distro that it works with? I'm not sure what I'm going to put on this computer. Mandrake possible since I can get that to work, but I'm considering Debain "woody" if I can get X to work in it(never been successful on mine...), or Slackware 8.1 if I can get LILO to install(again, having that problem on mine(I like having a TRIOS :D )) (I'm a newbie, and I know it, but I still like to try to install these much more difficult distros, since if I don't, I figure I'll never learn, and mandrakes "every program is dependent upon every other program" gets on my nerves!!) Thanks for any assistance. And before anyone asks, NO, IT DOES NOT HAVE A FLOPPY DRIVE. THE DAYS OF FLOPPY ARE PAST!! I will not be adding one, if need be, I will live with mandrake and just get a modem that works in it before I ever put a floppy in another computer.
Anyway, my fathers never used a computer before, so I figure if I set up a system with Galeon, Evolution, KDE &/or GNOME, Open Office, and convince him to get an account with the local library, then he should be good to go with linux! :rolleyes:

[mdwatts]

The ISA PnP Modem NHF (http://www.linuxnewbie.org/nhf/intel/modems/isapnp.html).

[Timothy L. Miller]

Ok, tried out Alt Linux 2.0 (based on Mandrake, but more up-to-date) and Libranet 2.0. Alt works perfectly except modem, but since I have no account to test it with, I'm not really concerned with that right now. Libranet recognized the soundcard as an ESS Maestro, but it didn't work...how can I test it to see what's wrong? Also, anyone know where I can find out what module Alt is using for the sound card to see if Libranet recognized it correctly? I looked in the KDE control center, but no help there... Thanks. I'd much rather use Libranet, since I'm getting tired of Mandrakes dependency problems, but since this comes with KDE3, Mozilla 1, Galeon 1.2.5, I'll probably use it if I can't get sound working in Libranet.

[mdwatts]

Does your ISA have jumpers or is it a PnP ISA modem?

Those modems usually come with a dos configuration utility you can use to change the resources on the card to whatever is free on your system.

Try searching Google for Linux for the ESS Maestro as you should be able to find out what module it uses.

Does lsmod show any sound modules as being loaded?

[mdwatts]

If you have the kernel source installed, you will find a couple of text files (maestro & maestro3) in /usr/src/linux/Documentation/sound that should help.

Seek and ye shall find.;)

[Timothy L. Miller]

It's a pnp isa modem. I'm going to try the tips on the page you posted previously, and I also found drivers that are suposed to be compatible with this modem. It's just that since I don't have anywhere to dial, it's not much of a point right now.
If I remember reading it correctly, the module (in libranet) is simply called maestro. I'm just wondering if it's detecting the card proplerly. Since it works in alt/drake, if I can find out for sure that it is the maestro module, then at least I'll know that's no thte problem. I'm assuming I can use lsmod to find out...I'll reply once I get the chnace to work on it again...I've been installing all types of different distros trying to find one I liked for it, since it's for my dad, who's never used a computer in his life. I wish I had the know-how to do slack, but I've had nothing but headaches with slack 8.1 (haven't even successfully gotten LILO installedf!!).
Thanks.

[mdwatts]

Can you disable PnP on the ISA card?

You should be able to if you have the configuration utility.

[irlandes]

The wonderful thing about linux is the choices individuals can make. If you choose to never again use a floppy, that is certainly your business. However, to simply announce that the days of the floppy are past is extremely offensive. They supply a service for some people some of the time, and that precludes their days being past.

[Timothy L. Miller]

Ok, reinstalled Libranet, manually set up sound using Maestro module, worked PERFECTLY!! WOO-HOO!! SuWEEETTTT!! Now, one question regarding modem: what configuration utility? I have PNP OS turned off in BIOS. I don't know of any configuration utility for the modem (it's a zoom 56k 2919, using lucent chip).

Irlandes-If you don't believe me, look at apples. You CANNOT get a floppy drive on a new mac...period(Yes, you can add an external one...). I still use on one of my comptuers, but only to transfer data from my camera with a flashpath adapter so I don't have to plug the camera in. If you need removable storage that's quick to write to, zips have killed off floppies, fully bootable in modern computers too. For normal removable storage, CDRW's are cheap. And with bootable cd's being easily enough to create (I even made a dos boot cd for my windows computer to do such things that require pure dos, such as fdisk and such...). If you disagree, that's every right of yours, but current trends tend to support my statement.

[mdwatts]

Most ISA cards include a dos configuration utility on the driver diskette or downloadable from the manufacturers website that you can use to change the PnP settings or the resources it uses.

[irlandes]

>>If you disagree, that's every right of
yours, but current trends tend to support my statement.

If you say that use of floppies is slowly dropping overall, that is, there is a TREND to less floppy use, I would agree with you. If you are saying that it is POSSIBLE to do the same thing with CD's, I would agree with you. I am saying there is still a lot of floppy use in the world, thus the days of floppies are NOT gone, and that it is really easy to judge the world by personal circumstances.

I even know of a office building of a large, well-known international corporation which uses floppies a lot. They have all the networks, etc., but there is so much e-mail coming in, that it gets little attention. So, if someone has an important file to transfer, it is saved to a floppy and gets handed personally to the recipient, or sent in an internal mail envelope with the cover letter.

I retired from that company, five years ago. Even then, the amount of information on their computers was very large, yet most of management could not answer simple questions about schedules, etc., because they were swamped with a large volume of data that they could not comprehend.

So, I was not especially surprised to hear that the floppy is being used to transfer information, because of e-mail swamp.

[irlandes]

How could I forget? This is a linux forum, right?

Well, most distros of linux are set up to produce boot disks. Floppy boot disks. I suppose you can do it with a CD if you wish, but I bet there are a zillion floppies used in the linux world for boot disks.

Also, there are a number of small linux distros which fit on one or two floppies.

But, then, of course, linux is still a small percentage of all computers.