From owner-freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG Mon Sep 18 09:22:12 2006 Return-Path: X-Original-To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Delivered-To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.FreeBSD.org (mx1.freebsd.org [216.136.204.125]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 5067116A403 for ; Mon, 18 Sep 2006 09:22:12 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from keramida@ceid.upatras.gr) Received: from igloo.linux.gr (igloo.linux.gr [62.1.205.36]) by mx1.FreeBSD.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 88B7343D45 for ; Mon, 18 Sep 2006 09:22:11 +0000 (GMT) (envelope-from keramida@ceid.upatras.gr) Received: from gothmog.pc (patr530b-0037.otenet.gr [62.103.226.37]) (authenticated bits=128) by igloo.linux.gr (8.13.8/8.13.8/Debian-2) with ESMTP id k8I9LgJl017903 (version=TLSv1/SSLv3 cipher=DHE-RSA-AES256-SHA bits=256 verify=NOT); Mon, 18 Sep 2006 12:21:46 +0300 Received: from gothmog.pc (gothmog [127.0.0.1]) by gothmog.pc (8.13.7/8.13.7) with ESMTP id k8I8VYgR001510; Mon, 18 Sep 2006 11:31:49 +0300 (EEST) (envelope-from keramida@ceid.upatras.gr) Received: (from giorgos@localhost) by gothmog.pc (8.13.7/8.13.7/Submit) id k8I0KrEQ003437; Mon, 18 Sep 2006 03:20:53 +0300 (EEST) (envelope-from keramida@ceid.upatras.gr) Date: Mon, 18 Sep 2006 03:20:53 +0300 From: Giorgos Keramidas To: Joel Adamson Message-ID: <20060918002053.GB3169@gothmog.pc> References: <20060917192245.94856.qmail@web50413.mail.yahoo.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Disposition: inline In-Reply-To: <20060917192245.94856.qmail@web50413.mail.yahoo.com> X-Hellug-MailScanner: Found to be clean X-Hellug-MailScanner-SpamCheck: not spam, SpamAssassin (score=-2.413, required 5, AWL -0.52, BAYES_00 -2.60, DATE_IN_PAST_06_12 0.50, DNS_FROM_RFC_ABUSE 0.20, UNPARSEABLE_RELAY 0.00) X-Hellug-MailScanner-From: keramida@ceid.upatras.gr X-Spam-Status: No Cc: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Subject: Re: Newbie Experience (As promised) X-BeenThere: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.5 Precedence: list List-Id: User questions List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Mon, 18 Sep 2006 09:22:12 -0000 On 2006-09-17 12:22, Joel Adamson wrote: > Dear Very Helpful and Informative FreeBSD List, > > I installed FreeBSD on Friday Night and tried very hard to get > it all working. My initial X problem actually fixed itself > (you can imagine my surprise), however, even with that, our > computer is useless as a desktop (or anything else) without an > internet connection. Well, maybe not completely useless. You can still grab packages from the network, using another system, transfer them to the target installation with a CD-ROM disk or other medium and install without a network connection. In general, though, a FreeBSD system without any sort of network connection is (IMHO) something like a 'crippled' computer. In fact, these days, *any* desktop system without some sort of access to a network is crippled in one or more ways. > My hardware is unsupported and despite my best efforts, I > decided it would be better to expedite the process and I > installed Mepis Linux. What hardware are you talking about? Maybe it *is* supported, but it was not very obvious how to configure or set it all up. If you still want to give FreeBSD a try, please try to install it, then run the following commands, saving their output to a file and find a way to post these files to us (i.e. use a floppy disk or something else, like a USB stick): # dmesg # pciconf -lv > I would hardly describe it the way another newbie did one week > ago. It was a good challenge. I'll wait until I'm a better > administrator and there's more support for hardware I might > have. > > The only really annoying thing was that I perpetually had > trouble mounting my usb flash drive. I think this was a > filesystem problem. Mounting filesystems is probably not as intuitive or automatic as it could have been. If you give FreeBSD another try, as I said above, then you can try showing us the output of: # usbdevs -v Run this command when logged in as `root', save its output to a file and post this file to us as a text attachment. We'll help you with the rest of the things needed to discover more about your USB flash disk and how to mount it. > Thanks for any help you've offered, > Joel You're most welcome. You know how to find us if you need more help with FreeBSD either some time soon now, or later :-) Regards, Giorgos