Numenor

Sorry I've been out of the way for a few days... I found out last night that it does in fact detect my drives after all - not sure why it didn't seem to the first time - I'll put it down to my own ineptitude. And now that I have my new drive, I actually have some free space to install it to. Plenty of fun ahead... Thanks for your help.

Sorry, I really did provide the bare minimum of information didn't I? My Machine is an A64 3700 (San Diego core) running on an Abit AX8 motherboard with 1GB of PC3200 DDR RAM. Currently running Windows XP. The version of Ubuntu I downloaded was 6.10 (Edgy) and I used the 32-bit x86 version as I wasn't sure whether there would be any point using the 64-bit edition. (but I did actually download that as well so I have both CDs) I booted from the CD and allowed it to boot to the GUI. Had a play around with Open Office and the games and thought it would be good to install it on a spare drive. I didn't have a spare drive at that point in time, so I just tried to familiarise myself with the UI and find out whatever I could. To be honest it's been a couple of months since then, so I can't remember exactly what I did and where I looked - I can do it again later so I can give a precise run-though - but I got into something about disks and couldn't see any detected (despite there being two SATA disks on my onboard controller). So I booted back into Windows and set about searching for drivers. This was when I hit my stumbling block - I can't find any VIA VT8237 SATA Controller drivers that say they're compatible with Ubuntu. The closest I can find is at: http://www.viaarena.com/default.aspx?PageID=420&OSID=18&CatID=2100&SubCatID=143 which says it's compatible with RedHat 9.0, Fedora Core 1, SuSe 8.2, Mandrake 9.1, Mandrake 9.2 and RedFlag 4.0. So I suppose my question is, does this mean I can't run Ubuntu on my current setup? Do I need to buy a PCI SATA controller card or upgrade my motherboard? Or am I just useless at searching and there actually are suitable drivers out there? Oh, and is there a benefit to using the 64-bit version of Ubuntu, or should I stick with the 32-bit? Thanks for your help.

I've been wanting to install Ubuntu on my PC but when I boot from the CD and get through to the GUI I realise it doesn't detect my SATA hard drives. These are connected to the onboard controller. There's no info on the lists here about the AX8, and I can't find any drivers anywhere that say they're compatible with Ubuntu - am I shafted? I've been told (verbally, with no further details) that Fedora will work with it - can anyone help? Thanks...