Thanks, Dan. You might be right about my hardware. I had one indication of a problem right off the bat. Before attempting to install Linux, I used XP for a few days. When I attempted to install Adobe Acrobat Reader (on XP), it kept telling me I had no hard drive space available -- even though I had 50-odd GB free. Dell technical support was unable to resolve the problem over the phone. Then the problem seemed to disappear on its own. Meantime, I tried to return the PC to Dell, which (successfully) offered me a discount of $267, or 25% off, to keep it.
Pat On Sun, 2003-02-02 at 17:02, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: > > > ----- Original Message ----- > From: Pat Roche <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > Date: Sunday, February 2, 2003 4:42 pm > Subject: (clug-talk) (RH8-Dell D. 2350) crashes > > > I've been using Red Hat 8.0 on a Dell Dimension 2350 (2GH Celeron / > > 512MB RAM) since early January. Bottom-line impression: I love Linux. > > > > But there's one problem I'd love to resolve. Linux has crashed while > > surfing the Web, on average, at least every two hours (during at least > > 50 hours total browsing). > > > > Konqueror seems more stable than Galeon and Opera, and all seem > > somewhatmore stable than Mozilla. There's little consistency. > > Mozilla, for > > example, crashed on the third page I accessed today (Yahoo News); but > > when I rebooted I surfed that page and many others for more than > > an hour > > without hanging. > > > > Meanwhile, I've worked more than 40 hours in OpenOffice Writer and can > > only recall it hanging once. Evolution rarely hangs and the CD player > > (kscd) hasn't crashed yet > > > > To compare OSes on the same machine, I've spent about 15 hours surfing > > in Windows 2000 (using Opera, Internet Explorer and Phoenix) and had > > only two crashes -- a much better average than Linux. In each OS, > > control-alt-delete won't force a reboot after a crash. > > > > I usually work in KDE, but didn't document any improvement during > > aboutfour hours in GNOME (on Mozilla, Opera, Galeon and Konqueror). > > > > Another quirk in Linux: the hard drive sometimes runs for three > > minutesfor no reason. > > > > Also, Evolution is very slow (maybe 10 seconds) opening HTML e- > > mails. Is > > this normal, or possibly related to my Web-browsing problem? > > > > BACKGROUND: Inside the Dell box, there are NO CARDS. Everything -- > > videocontroller, network controller, etc. -- is embedded in the > > motherboard.(Luckily there were three empty slots.) The video > > controller -- which > > wouldn't work with Linux -- could NEITHER BE REMOVED NOR DISABLED. > > > > As a non-technical person, I was in over my head long before this > > point.I'm much obliged to CLUG member Johnny Stork for coming up > > with the > > various workarounds that enabled me to use Linux my new computer. (I > > just wish I'd talked to him before buying the Dell.) > > > > The workaround Johnny came up for the video controller was to set > > up a > > dual-monitor system and to designate the new video card (HIS TNT2 M64 > > PCI) as primary and the built-in video controller as secondary. > > (So the > > original controller which couldn't be disabled is now outputting > > to a > > non-existent monitor.) > > > > Does anyone have any suggestions? Do I have any options beyond selling > > the new $800 Dell at a discount to my brother-in-law (who prefers XP) > > and starting from scratch on another new computer?? > > > > Any comments or anecdotes (e.g., your own experience with bundled, > > brand-name systems, both positive and negative) will be much > > appreciated. > > > > Thanks for reading. Sorry it's so long. > > > > Pat > > Hi Pat, > > I use a number of distributions on different hardware platforms and simply have zero >and I do mean "ZERO" crashes, glitches nada, from Netcrap, Moz or Konqueror. I can >only conclude that your PC has some serious hardware deficiency which is certainly >not of your fault. I your brother inlaw wants it let him have it.He'll never know the >diff anyway with XP anyway. Good luck.... > > All the best, Dan > >
