Linux - Ready for Prime Time?
02/10/03 17:51 Filed in: Computer
Tales
Since I've
started my Blog part way through some of my struggles
with Linux, I thought that I had better start with
today's tale of woe.
I did what I thought was a simple thing - I changed my monitor. I had had an Apple 1710 which is a 17" trinitron monitor, that I had always used with the Athlon SuSE Linux box. I had also via my iogear 4-port USB KVMP used the same monitor with my PowerBook. Well I got hold of an old - but newer than the Apple 1710 monitor - Compaq V75 17" monitor. The PowerBook and G3 server all recognised the new monitor OK, even the Athlon box when booting into WinXP Pro didn't bat an eyelid. However, the Athlon box when booting into SuSE linux started fine, then as it finishes the main start up and goes into KDE all went blank. And stayed blank. After much fussing, plugging the V75 directly into the athlon, changing the power settings in the BIOS, and struggling to get it recognise any USB devices - keyboard and mouse. Even starting up in Linux safe mode was fine - very console based though. All of these tweaks made no difference to the basic problem. So, I lugged the old Apple monitor back in, started up fine - no problems.
I then went in and changed the monitor selected in YaST and SAX. Now the Compaq V75 works fine. Good job the Apple monitor had not gone to meet its maker quite yet!
So is Linux ready for prime time? On this basis - NO. Unless I have missed something quite simple, I would expect the system to start at least in basic mode and then enable you to change the monitor.
I did what I thought was a simple thing - I changed my monitor. I had had an Apple 1710 which is a 17" trinitron monitor, that I had always used with the Athlon SuSE Linux box. I had also via my iogear 4-port USB KVMP used the same monitor with my PowerBook. Well I got hold of an old - but newer than the Apple 1710 monitor - Compaq V75 17" monitor. The PowerBook and G3 server all recognised the new monitor OK, even the Athlon box when booting into WinXP Pro didn't bat an eyelid. However, the Athlon box when booting into SuSE linux started fine, then as it finishes the main start up and goes into KDE all went blank. And stayed blank. After much fussing, plugging the V75 directly into the athlon, changing the power settings in the BIOS, and struggling to get it recognise any USB devices - keyboard and mouse. Even starting up in Linux safe mode was fine - very console based though. All of these tweaks made no difference to the basic problem. So, I lugged the old Apple monitor back in, started up fine - no problems.
I then went in and changed the monitor selected in YaST and SAX. Now the Compaq V75 works fine. Good job the Apple monitor had not gone to meet its maker quite yet!
So is Linux ready for prime time? On this basis - NO. Unless I have missed something quite simple, I would expect the system to start at least in basic mode and then enable you to change the monitor.
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