[opensuse] Install over Vista?
Thanks to all who replied to a previous problem report (Samsung monitor...). I purchased a new box, a Pavilion a6000n, and suffered from 10.1 not being able to see the dvd/cd rom drive to start the install. The splash would come up, but after selecting any of "Installation", "Installation ACPI off", etc. it would invariably say that it did not detect the optical drive. I took the machine back for an exchange (turns out windows would not come up on it either....) and they were nice enough to check the replacement that I could get farther in the process with the new box. Unfortunately, another of the same model got no further, with the same problem. The tech fellow suggested that it might likely be bios settings peculiar to boxes sold with Vista. He recited various stories about bios settings which prevented people from "regressing" machines puchased with Vista pre-installed to XP. As I've never had any prior difficulty installing SuSE over Win2000 nor over XP, and this was my first attempt to install over Vista, it seemed plausible. Unfortunately, I've not the expertise nor inclination to poke around speculatively in that direction. Has anyone else on the list had similar experiences, or applicable wisdom? Many thanks. Michael -- Michael Fischer Happiness is a config option. michael@visv.net Recompile and be happy. -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org
* Michael Fischer
Has anyone else on the list had similar experiences, or applicable wisdom?
Download a "live" dvd, openSUSE or knoppix and take it to the store where you are purchasing. Ask one of the tech/sales persons to run the dvd on your computer choice. This will give you a good indication of the compatibility of the hardware for linux installation. beware that this is just an "indication" as like models do not necessarily contain the same hardware, but similar hardware. -- Patrick Shanahan Plainfield, Indiana, USA HOG # US1244711 http://wahoo.no-ip.org Photo Album: http://wahoo.no-ip.org/gallery2 Registered Linux User #207535 @ http://counter.li.org -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org
I was out having lunch with a computer consultant
friend and he said that MS twisted the arms of
manufactures to put a bit in their bios so that only
VISTA would be recognized. He said on the net
you can find patches where you d/l the current bios
apply the patch which manipulates 1-bit in the bios
that then allows it to recognize and deal with Linux
installation. I have no further detail and leave it as
an exercise for you to do more sniffing.
Moral to the story for me is that I will not purchase a
name brand computer but instead build one from scratch.
Or possibly make the dealer give me a written guarantee
of a 100% refund if I can't load Linux.
Bob
On 6/16/07, Michael Fischer
Thanks to all who replied to a previous problem report (Samsung monitor...).
I purchased a new box, a Pavilion a6000n, and suffered from 10.1 not being able to see the dvd/cd rom drive to start the install. The splash would come up, but after selecting any of "Installation", "Installation ACPI off", etc. it would invariably say that it did not detect the optical drive.
I took the machine back for an exchange (turns out windows would not come up on it either....) and they were nice enough to check the replacement that I could get farther in the process with the new box. Unfortunately, another of the same model got no further, with the same problem.
The tech fellow suggested that it might likely be bios settings peculiar to boxes sold with Vista. He recited various stories about bios settings which prevented people from "regressing" machines puchased with Vista pre-installed to XP. As I've never had any prior difficulty installing SuSE over Win2000 nor over XP, and this was my first attempt to install over Vista, it seemed plausible. Unfortunately, I've not the expertise nor inclination to poke around speculatively in that direction.
Has anyone else on the list had similar experiences, or applicable wisdom?
Many thanks.
Michael -- Michael Fischer Happiness is a config option. michael@visv.net Recompile and be happy. -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org
-- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org
On Sat, Jun 16, Robert Lewis wrote:
I was out having lunch with a computer consultant friend and he said that MS twisted the arms of manufactures to put a bit in their bios so that only VISTA would be recognized. He said on the net you can find patches where you d/l the current bios apply the patch which manipulates 1-bit in the bios that then allows it to recognize and deal with Linux installation. I have no further detail and leave it as an exercise for you to do more sniffing.
Moral to the story for me is that I will not purchase a name brand computer but instead build one from scratch. Or possibly make the dealer give me a written guarantee of a 100% refund if I can't load Linux.
Yes, I'm going to go that route, probably with avadirect, who seem to be fairly linux-friendly. Thanks to all who replied with their excellent advice. Michael -- Michael Fischer Happiness is a config option. michael@visv.net Recompile and be happy. -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org
Robert Lewis wrote:
I was out having lunch with a computer consultant friend and he said that MS twisted the arms of manufactures to put a bit in their bios so that only VISTA would be recognized. He said on the net you can find patches where you d/l the current bios apply the patch which manipulates 1-bit in the bios that then allows it to recognize and deal with Linux installation. I have no further detail and leave it as an exercise for you to do more sniffing.
This sounds like so much hooey! I think he (and/or you) are getting confused with the bios hacks to work around VISTA activation. There is simply no way I can believe there is a BIOS that forces you to install VISTA. -- Jonathan Arnold (mailto:jdarnold@buddydog.org) Daemon Dancing in the Dark, an Open OS weblog: http://freebsd.amazingdev.com/blog/ UNIX is user-friendly. It's just a bit picky about who its friends are. -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org
participants (4)
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Jonathan Arnold -
Michael Fischer -
Patrick Shanahan -
Robert Lewis