My unhappy adventures with Linux installation


The last Debian update broken all the Python stuff for me... PlayOnLinux and all the programs were complaining about not finding a 2.8 reference...

"... version WXU_2.8 not defined in file libwx_gtk2u_core-2.8.so.0 ..."

Just solved getting back the previous version of the packets:

Code: 
sudo apt-get install libwxbase2.8-0=2.8.12.1-12
sudo apt-get install libwxgtk2.8-0=2.8.12.1-12
 
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I had an interesting experience 4 days ago, my old WinXP/Debian PC died... so, I found an OLDER one and I put there the hard disks in the same order of the other one.

Old PC was an Athlon 1Ghz - 512 MB RAM

Older PC is a P3 500 Mhz - 256 MB RAM

The cool thing is, Debian 8 started without issues !! I just had to delete xorg.conf because it was configured for the other graphic card and was preventing X to start.

The coolest (but also not so cool) thing is that Win XP doesn't start at all !! I just see a blinking cursor even in safe mode... so that's a plain and simple LINUX 1 - WINDOWS 0 !!

(By the way, I finally ordered a new PC... it's really time !! :D Even with Debian this thing is impossibly slow)
 
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A strange thing is happening with Debian... I have a ps2 keyboard, the same that I was using on the other PC, and while at the boot it is working fine (I can go to BIOS setup, I can select things on GRUB, etc...), after Debian starts the graphic session, at the login screen, the keyboard becomes dead (even the leds doesn't respond if I select/deselect caps lock or block num, etc...)... the only way to use it is to unplug/replug it !! o_O

This happens everytime and I have no clues at all about what is causing this...
 
GRUB is a completely different environment to linux - it's another OS, if you like.  Just because it works in that doesn't mean it'll work in the OS downstream, because the last thing it does is load a fresh kernel and jump to its start address.

I've no idea personally what's up with Debian though.  I use my Filco Majestouch on my Linux desktop, which is a USB keyboard.  You don't have any USB devices plugged in which could be misinterpreted as a keyboard though, do you (run 'lsusb -v|grep -i keyboard' is a quick way to check)?
 
I had some weird error with GRUB and now I have 30 gigs I can't seem to recover that partition programs seem to think is a completely separate removable drive
 
LOL :D

I have this new superpowerful pc here, with UEFI, win 8.1 and some HP UEFI BIOS support software... I want to add another hard disk where I'll install Debian.

Should I have to know something before trying the dualboot way ? Maybe I should do something with the BIOS before starting ? Maybe Windows will not start anymore or it will not find anymore it's activation key  (I still have to find out where it is kept) ?? 
 
As far as I know, you have to turn fast boot in Windows 8 off, before you attempt to dual boot any OS. Also, beware of UEFI bugs. I managed to brick my Lenovo Laptop by trying to install Fedora 22 (their Installer sucks anyway). Now it won't boot anything in UEFI mode anymore. Thankfully I can still boot in Legacy mode.
 
Björn said:
I managed to brick my Lenovo Laptop by trying to install Fedora 22 (their Installer sucks anyway). Now it won't boot anything in UEFI mode anymore. Thankfully I can still boot in Legacy mode.
Click to expand...

Yeah almost bricked my Asus Transformer tablet using Fedora 22 before I sold it... luckily the restore tools seemed to work.
 
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Cool... now I'm scared... 

as far as I read about the thing, the problems raises mainly if you install Linux on the same hard disk with Windows... so I should be relatively safe with another HD...

and also seems that Windows will keep changing the starting order of the OS at the boot
 
This thread's title and development is depressing.
 
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Klumpen said:
This thread's title and development is depressing.
Click to expand...

Why ?

Seems like that Red Hat Linux was put on the Azure cloud service by the Microsoft itself, and some sort of professional Windows/Linux compatibility will become somewhat real... so I find strange that Fedora, of all the other distributions, had those issues with UEFI ...

EDIT: by the way, I found out that with UEFI you can also install Debian BEFORE installing Windows, and the last one will not overwrite the OS selection menu !! :)
 

EDIT: This could be relevant for the issues that Bjorn and TrashyMG explained:

"Quite a number of early UEFI systems were shipped with a non-UEFI installation of Windows 7 pre-installed, and the firmware set up to attempt UEFI boot first and BIOS boot second. This worked fine for users, but the moment a new operating system was installed alongside that copy of Windows, it would be difficult/impossible to dual-boot it.

debian-installer will now warn the user if it is booted in UEFI mode but can find it only non-UEFI existing OS installations. It gives them the option to switch the installer to non-UEFI mode from this point forwards so they don't break potential dual-boot setup."
 
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I've been dual-booting off of two separate hard drives for 15 years.  It is far and away the easiest thing to do simply because Microsoft keeps futzing with their boot loader.  It also makes configuring grub a snap since you don't have to deal with partition mapping.  Windows on one drive, Linux and Grub on the other (primary), worst case scenario I just swap the boot order and Windows doesn't even know Linux exists.
 
EDIT: This could be relevant for the issues that Bjorn and TrashyMG explained:

"Quite a number of early UEFI systems were shipped with a non-UEFI installation of Windows 7 pre-installed, and the firmware set up to attempt UEFI boot first and BIOS boot second. This worked fine for users, but the moment a new operating system was installed alongside that copy of Windows, it would be difficult/impossible to dual-boot it.

debian-installer will now warn the user if it is booted in UEFI mode but can find it only non-UEFI existing OS installations. It gives them the option to switch the installer to non-UEFI mode from this point forwards so they don't break potential dual-boot setup."
Click to expand...

The problem was that my UEFI firmware became bricked and would refuse to boot anything on the internal hard drive, even Operating systems that had been newly installed. Also, my Laptop didn't came with Windows 7 pre-installed.

I think the problem wasn't so much the Fedora installer, but more the absolutely crap UEFI firmware on my laptop. Most of the UEFI Firmwares are very shoddy and riddled with bugs. This can cause a corruption in the UEFI variable store and make your system unbootable.
 
All I'm hearing about UEFI are problems and I've encountered one myself already too.

Why was it introduced in the first place?
 
It was introduced because the BIOS was starting to show it's age (especially on 64-Bit machines). That's what i've been told, but I never looked more into it. The problem is that they've really got carried away with what should be in a Firmware. So we ended up with the over-engineered, poorly designed UEFI. To be fair, the quality of the Firmware will get better over time, but that doesn't solve all the other problems UEFI has.
 
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They wanted a SMART-BIOS and that's what happened... I wonder how a firmware can corrupt itself... 

I'm reading about a lot of unhappy adventures with linux installation thanks to UEFI, and I'm loosing my will to even try the thing... :(
 
 
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