3 Major Problems

Forum: Other Help Topics
Topic: 3 Major Problems
started by: srulop

Posted by srulop on Feb. 03 2006,14:42

Hi!
I started to use DSL yesterday, and it's really great! Except from 3 major problems that I encountered so far (and couldn't find answer to them in Help):
1. I run DSL from CD, but I can't see any of my hard drives! They are NTFS formatted. Can't DSL see NTFS partitions?
2. How the *^&*$ do I change screen resolution/refresh rate??? I tried everything but it always displays at 60Hz and it makes my eyes hurt.
3. Is there some kind of antivirus & firewall that can run on DSL?

Thanks in advance for your help!

Posted by mikshaw on Feb. 03 2006,15:45

You should do some reading about Linux in general if you are a new user...DSL does not supply general linux documentation, so that will be up to you to find. Also, two of your questions have been covered a number of times in these forums....a search would have given you some answers.

1. DSL can mount NTFS read-only. Look for documentation on "mount" and "fstab".
2. The xvesa server in DSL is fixed at 60hz. Install XFree86.dsl if you need a more flexible server.
3. Theoretically, anything can be installed in DSL. The question is how much effort are you willing to put into it. The easiest way to get antivirus and firewall into DSL might be to enable apt and install them from Debian packages, although you may first need to install some dependencies...DSL is stripped to accomodate only the applications within it.

Posted by lagerratrobe on Feb. 04 2006,01:36

mikshaw's right, you're going to go crazy trying to setup your system without a linux reference of some type. I have a very old copy of the O'Reilly 'Running Linux' book that is still a good reference for basic stuff. I would imagine that any used book on Linux will cover some of the basics you'll be interested in.

The nice thing about the live CD setup is that you don't have to worry too much about destroying your system. However once you make your NTFS disks writable in DSL, then you can do some damage to your other previously installed OS.

To answer some of your questions a bit more fully:

1. DSL probably found your NTFS partitions just fine. However it does not mount them automatically for you. Look in a file called /etc/fstab to see what... mountable partitions are present. (I never know what to call those suckers). Use the Beaver application to view the file, or point Firefox at the file, or use the unix utility "cat" in an Xshell. like this:

Code Sample

# cat /etc/fstab

Look for entries that have /dev/hd in them. Like this:

Code Sample

# partitions found by dsl
#/dev/hda1 /mnt/hda1 ntfs noauto,users,exec 0 0

All you have to do to make the partition accessible is to remove the # in front of the /dev/hda1, save the change, and type "sudo mount -a" in an Xshell. There's probably some other gui tool to do the mount command for you, but I've never looked it up.

Once you have done that, if you point the Emelfm file manager to /mnt/hda1, you should see the files on your hard disk. You can also edit and delete them. You've been warned.

2. Not gonna touch the refresh rate and X mode question. Brrrrr! Makes me cold just thinking about it.

3. I believe that the mydsl download site has a couple applications that you can use to setup a firewall on your system. "rcfirewall.dsl" in the Network section is one of them, and I believe the "iptables.dsl" in the System section is another. You'll have to look them up and see which you like best. Not really sure if any anti-virus software exists for Linux at this time. There probably is something, but I don't know of anyone who runs a Linux box with it.

Good luck.

Posted by cbagger01 on Feb. 04 2006,06:31

1.

If you have a newer computer that has a SATA hard drive, please get DSL version 2.1 or 2.1b

Then boot with this command:

dsl sata

And all of your hard drive partitions should be autodetected.

To mount them, open Emelfm and go to the /mnt folder

Then right-click on the partition name and choose "Mount" from the menu.

NTFS support is fine, but it is read-only.

You cannot write to an NTFS partition unless you somehow install a program called "Captive-NTFS" or "Captive" for short. It has been done before by someone here, but it takes some expertise to get it up and running.