Hp a220n not accepting linux

[SoulNothing 0]

alright i know ive posted about quite a fewquestions bout various distros but ive noticed none of them work on my hp, is my hp linux retarded or something because the only one that worked was evil e. I put on ark linux installs fine boot screen appears detects everything, then mid procedure while loading the screen goes black i left it on over night around 8 hours nothing when i wake up. But when i press the power button the screen appears and it boots to the gui, yet then it turns right off. This also happened with gentoo, debian, knoppix, morphix, featherlight,mepis, mandrake (yeah i finally got mandrake on it.), and red hat. Now i pushed it to ark last night and reset it to windows today. I looked at my hardrive it s now 111gb i know thats still rather large but before i went on trying to install linux it was at 120 gb thats a total of 9gb disappearing. What im trying to figure out is whether i should quit messing with my hp a220n (because it has a big fat sticker that says designed for win xp.), or try something i havent. Note i got all the listed distros to workj in some form on my old laptop so i know its not the distros. So is the problem the computer, or the user.

 

my issue is i dont want to eat much more of my hard drive.

[danleff 0]

The first question is, how many Linux partitions do you have on the system? Also remember that there is also probably a swap space or two as well.

 

Do you have PartitionMagic? If so, you can view how many Linux partitions are on the system an dif you choose, reclaim the space.

 

Don't forget that hidden partition that I spoke of. You DO NOT want to delete this.

 

If you choose to install Linux again, use one of the already existing Linux partiions for the install. Also, I found that Asus motherboards (which you have) have trouble with acpi being set.

 

From the following link;

 

http://www.mithunc.net/NVIDIA/#graphics

 

 

Quote:

Important:

 

A lot of people, especially those using Asus motherboards, have reported problems with Linux locking up randomly with nForce2 chipsets. If you're experiencing this problem, or just to be safe, add the following line to your lilo configuration file (/etc/lilo.conf on most systems):

 

append="noapic nolapic"

 

This will disable the APIC and local APIC function on your CPU. It looks like they are getting close to fixing this problem, but as of 2.6.0 I am still experiencing this problem when the local APIC is enabled. Asus users will also want to disable ACPI with

 

append="noapic nolapic acpi=off"

 

As it too has been causing the random lockups. Please correct me if the the ACPI problem has already been fixed.

[Mel 0]

Hello, SoulNothing

 

I found that later model HP hardware seems to be designed to run

a certain OS instead of tweaking the OS to the hardware.All is not lost

,though.

I found when sharing a drive with XPon HP,it helps to create a partition

set up as logical drive so it will have it's own drive designation.

That helped on my pav.551w because XP doesn't like sharing a drive

with another OS.However,XP did me a favor and overwrote it's "protected"

recovery partition so I just wiped the drive and gave it all to Ark.I don't

think ark will mind sharing a little space with other distros later on.

Ark has a default resolution of 1400x1050.If your monitor doesn't

support that high a resolution,it will come up,flash the screen and

go blank (black on mine).When Arks install starts hit f2 for install

options and set the resolution to one you know your monitor supports.

I set mine at 1024x768.(f1,f2,f3 and f4 give helpful info. You only

have a few seconds to hit fx or start typing linux but once done, install

won't start until you go back and type "linux (options)" or just linux if you just

want a default install.

If, like me,you happen to have an old hd laying around,you can set the

jumper to slave and install linux on that to avoid battling XP for

hd space.(Xp is very greedy.)

Also Ark creates 4 partitions on my 551..

1.A small boot partition. (Should be hidden, so you won't see it.)

2.A primary2 partition.

3 A primary3 partition.

4.A swap partition.

Since,on mine,it only seems to use primary3 ,I'm not sure why the

primary2.Probably for future storage and files that don't need primary3.

Or maybe just because it has 40gb to play with.

Hp seems to like the onboard sis video chips.If so,some versions of linux

seem to have a problem dectecting it.I'll leave that kind of help to someone

who knows what he's talking about.

Hope something in here helps.

[SoulNothing 0]

alright when i put on the partition i used either boot it ng

or cfdisk

i allocated 500 mb to the swap drive and the rest to linux

now i dont have any linux on it just xp

[SoulNothing 0]

alright got you on the resolution still lost on the issue as why 9GB! disapearred i have an old dell 15 inch hooked to a modern hp so um and im afraid if i try to put on linux again itll eat more of my hard + whenever i tried to choose the paralell option it wiped my hardrive clean bye bye and reset my bios and i had to go in and mess around with things

[Mel 0]

Winders sometimes does't recognize linux partitions and will show drive size

only for win partitions.The missing space is probably Linux partitions if I understand correctly, you're checking your drive with windows so if you have a live cd (linux) try starting up with that and check your hd with linux.Linux will recognize all partitions .

[danleff 0]

Mel is correct. Windows will not see the Linux partitions, so this space will not be reported. It sees only the vfat or NTFS partitions that you have.

 

I would be careful about using cfdisk. If you are trying to wipe the whole hard drive and mess with the hidden partition, then this is probably why the bios settings need to be reset.

 

I am not 100% sure about your particular system, but in some HP and Compaq systems, the hidden partition holds some bios settings.

 

I suggest using PartitionMagic to set your Linux partitions, or to delete them.

 

Or, Mandrake's partitoning tool is also OK for this.

[SoulNothing 0]

all right only one partition now its a ntfs can someone please give me a link to this partition magic realize broke cant pay for software but i only have one partition and no live cd i have will start i think i need to mess around with ark some more

[Mel 0]

If you have Mepis or you or a friend can DL Mepis iso and burn

it to a cd I think that would be the best way to go. (Mepis does require Pentium or AMD processor. I believe you have a pentium.)

Reasons;

1.Mepis is a live cd which can easily be installed on HD and Mepis

gives the clearist instructions of any distro I've seen.

2.Before Mepis does anything it gives instructions that are easily

understood even by us noobees.

3.Mepis installation requires very little input from user.

4.Mepis auto detects most hardware.

As soon as the first screen comes up,hit f2 (this is just to stop

the default startup).Then hit f1 and read everything then f2,read everything

,f3...f4.

Once you read that you will know how to start Mepis with the proper

resolution for your monitor.Log on as root.

As soon as Mepis is loaded click on Mepis Installation center.

Click on Install Mepis on Harddrive

!!!!Caution!!!! Look over everything at each step now because root

has very powerful privileges.

Click on QTParted

Click on your HD (something like "/dev/hda"

.

You should now have a window that gives all info about your HD.

Info will include drive make,model,size and all partition info.

Now you can close the two windows and click "Next" whereupon installation

will begin.You will be given choices including "Install in existing

Linux partitions" which will probably be the safest option.

(Make your own decisions here because the only way I could be sure

would be by sitting at your computer,which isn't likely to happen.)

Hope this helps.

[Mel 0]

BTW, I need to take a look at ARK discs because some of the info I gave you for

Ark may have actually been Mepis info. I've been experimenting with so many distros,I

may get a couple confused with each other.

.

.

(I know I'm not perfect.So close you can't tell the difference but not quite perfect.)

[SoulNothing 0]

im going to get mepis tonight

[SoulNothing 0]

got mepis any more advice before i try to install

 

oh yeah i dont like pentium me dislike pentium

 

me have amd 2600

[Mel 0]

My HP is running a pentium so I don't know how it will work with AMD in HP.

It ran really well on eMachine wit AMD Athlon.

Mepis is supposed to be optimized for AMD and pentium.

Make sure you read everything is the best advice I can give.

If you get Mepis installed OK, I think you will like it.

[danleff 0]

I run Athlons exclusively, no problem! The only issue should be legagcy hardware that may be in the system, such as a sound card. But nothing ventured...

 

If it runs from the cd, then it should be fine with a hard drive install.

[SoulNothing 0]

tried mepis left it on overnight nothing again ;(

 

so tonight i finally got cable isp

 

so im getting every distro i can find

 

tonight im trying redhat 9.0

 

backing up hard drive

partitioning does this seem right to do

in school now so i wont be trying it to later

heres my plan

 

pre installed xp first

 

going to partition

60gb to xp ntfs

50gb to linux

1gb to swap

 

losing x) so much sleep

 

im going nuts ive learned more in this short period about computers then i have in my entire 16 years of life

 

keep all hammers and guns away from me or ill kill my hp

[Mel 0]

XP is a HD hog,It wants the whole drive to itself. HP and XP ,in my little bit

of experience has been a tricky combo for dual boots on same drive.

I found that on mine ,it's better to install Mepis first to make sure have your

Linux partitions on drive.

Make sure when you install Linux,you install a boot loader.I use Lilo but that is a

matter of choice.

After Linux is installed then install XP and maybe it won't eat your linux partitions. After you install XP reboot from your Linux CD and install the boot loader again or all you will be able to load will be XP.

BTW , did you install the boot loader when you installed Linux? If not, the only thing

you will find on your drive will be XP. A Linux boot loader will find and give a choice of every OS on drive. XP loader will only recognize XP.

I think you should check with Danleff, Maillon or Dapper Dan for glitches and workarounds for your Athlon. I may be wrong but I believe Danleff ,especially, has a lot

of experience with Athlon processors.They're all good people and you can bank on any

advice they give you. But remember ,they have to rely on machine specific information you give them

.BIOS settings may also be causing a problem but I am hesitant to give advice on that subject.

[Mel 0]

If Mepis won't install , try Ark. It seems to work better, at least with Pentium on HP.

(Not sure about Athlon.)

I think RedHat 9.0 is a good choice but you won't have the XP controll panel clone.

I'm running it on eMachine with Athlon and love it.

[SoulNothing 0]

mepis nor ark work just going to try red hat

[Mel 0]

I hope Red Hat works for you.

Red installer (Anaconda) wouldn't run on my HP551 but I have a pentium in that machine.

Maybe it will work on yours,though.

[SoulNothing 0]

im going to try tommorow got state testing tommorow and just got back from court but if that dont work im trying fedora i got 7.3 for my laptop and that works real well.

 

btw mel i like your sig and thanks for all the help

[Mel 0]

May I suggest you go to ibiblio .org or linuxiso.org and go through thier list

of distros. Each distro listed will have a link to that distros home page.

Go to each home page and check thier compatiblility list for your computer. That

may save you a lot of frustration since distros that work on one machine may not

work on another. A little research may make the difference in finding a good OS

or just being frustrated with distros that won't work on your machine. Each distro has

its own installer and different distros have problems with different machines.

Good luck on your tests.

[SoulNothing 0]

im told im stubborn as a ox

and i figure that since im so young im getting a good learning through this but ill try that as well

[SoulNothing 0]

i got fedora on and its coexsisting with xp but i switched the resolution from 800*600 to 1024*768 or whatever the number is anywho i screwed the screen over anyway i can change that through text now i have another 25 gb for redhat noob is excited

[Mel 0]

I'm glad you got one running.

You're right ,at your age ,it's good to get the experience. You have the potential

to become a real guru if keep it up.

How is fedora ? I haven't tried it yet . I have Fedora core 1 but I haven't gotten it

to install . I'm going to try another DL since I had a bad connectioin when I got it and

may have some corruption.

[SoulNothing 0]

thanks for the guru comment i practically run my school network because of our network peoples incompetence

 

fedora is exactly like redhat cept you start in text i really havent noticed much difference other than that

 

heres how my hard drive looks now

 

60 GB Xp

25 GB Redhat 9

25 GB Fedora Core 1

1GB Linux swap

 

the only issue im having is setting up the network again i got the nvidia drivers for 9.0 and it aint working right i havent had to much time to play in the shell just with the sndconfig and graphics

 

but another issue is speed i heard that linux was supposed to be faster but its the other way around whats up im running a 2.8ghz amd

 

the thing about fedora i think is its meant for advanced users it didnt list my monitor or my graphic but hey its a great peace of work