[TriLUG] A Newbie's question about changing hardware on my Linux machine.

[Sinner from the Prairy]

On Wednesday 11 December 2002 12:21 pm, al johson wrote:
> O.K. after the last installfest at NCSU the Trilug helpers got just about
> all of my hardware to finally work on Mandrake. Unfortunately, I'm going to
> swap out my CD-RW drive (which is presently 4x) for one of the newer models
> which is around 40x. (and there probably won't be another Installfest any
> time soon, esp. with everyone recovering from the storm) So I'm wondering
> before I do this (and might live to regret it!)  how do I tell Mandrake 8.1
> that there is a faster, newer CD-RW in the box?? Intrex is going to install
> the new CD-RW, but they "don't do Linux" (at least the guy I talked to at
> the Cary store doesn't--they used to have a guy who did).

Tell Intrex to install it the same way as the old one. That is, using the same 
IDE channel, using the same slave/master configuration.

Then, on your cd burning software, as needed: 
- select the newer speed, 
- check the scsi configuration, 
- select the newer cdrdao driver
- select buffer size

Linux will find it and configure it noprob, as long as you enable the service 
"kudzu" on start (see MDK control center). But my guess is, Mandrake will 
configura nothing, as an IDE CD-RW is just an IDE CD-RW. And the devfs will 
take care of creating devices entries.

> I have two hard drives in drawers which allow me to put them in and take
> them out of  the box because there are lockable cases for them to reside
> in. This allows me to experiment with Linux at will without disturbing
> anything in the surly MS 98 OS. 

beware! Please handle carefuly the hard drives. They are delicate. Do you know 
that you can have 2 disks on the system, one OS on each disk?

> I'm looking forward to the day when I can
> finally tell MS to kiss my @#$#!! Unfortunately there are some amateur
> radio programs from Japanese companies (they manufacture just about all the
> ham radio gear at present) which are probably going to always require MS to
> work. 

Don't worry too much. Use the best OS for each task.

> I realize that it takes a while for Linux to obtain drivers for new
> hardware. So if I could just be reassured that the newer CD-RW will
> probably continue to work anyway (albeit at a lower speed), it would be
> good news indeed. But the CD-RW is such an important piece of hardware
> because it's just about the only way now to save a large quantity of data.

It should work effortlessly. I changed mine from CDRW 4x2x1 to 32x16x4 no 
prob. And with MDK as well.

> As you can tell I'm still a rank newbie with LINUX. 

We all have been newbies. I see no problem on being a newbie.

> If you prefer to
> discuss this subject off the list my email address is
> alfjon at mindspring.com. Happy Holidays Everyone.----Al Johnson.

Maybe better on-list, in case it helps somebody else.

I'll attend to the next TriLUG meeting. Look for me ans tell me there if you 
find any trouble.

> Al Johnson.



Salut,
Sinner
-- 
http://www.ibiblio.org/sinner/     Linux User # 89976
Running on Red Hat Linux 7.3 - Kernel  2.4.18smp  Linux Machine # 38068