Well I have made some progress. I found the driver that my network card needed. I just had it set under another name which didn't help too much. So I have my network card working so I can access the net. Still have no sound though. I tried to configure the sound card but it keeps saying that an error has occurred and I should check to see if Alsa is properly installed. So I installed a whole swack of soudn stuff including alsa but it didn't seem to help the problem. What can I do to fix this. Another question I have is I figured out how to send email but how the heck do I receive messages. And how do I subscribe to and read newsgroups? I was also wondering if there is a good icq port for linux. I love this OS a lot and am really glad that I spent the ccash to buy it. I am trying to rig it so all the stuff I do under windows is available under linux. This way I don't have to use windows except in rare cases where things don't work under linux yet. I like linux because I can work more quickly and the system never crashes so I don't have to reboot all the time which I find very annoying with windows. I figure once I get everything set up it will be very good. Oh, and another thing I just thought of. How do I make blinux show the braille cursor as just dots 7 and 8 blinking instead of a full braille cell? Thanks a lot for your support and patience and understanding and thanks for taking the time to help a poor newbie out. I have learned quite a bit in the short time that I have been using linux and I will keep finding things to read and play with it a bit more. At least my internet access works under linux now so I can look up info a little easier. A very happy linux newbie, Dave Csercsics