Im trying out a live CD of both ubuntu and Backtrack, backtrack is a version of slackware. anyway i know that both CD's work because i booted them on my computer at home


these are the specs of my laptop.

Graphics card:128MB ATI Radeon® Xpress X200M
Prosessor: Intel® Celeron®M 440(Yonah single core) Mobile Core™ Duo Technology ready 1.8Ghz, 1MB L2 Cache
RAM: 1024MB DDRII 533MHz Memory
80GB 5400rpm Hard Drive
15.4"WXGA(1280x800)"X-Glass"WideScreen

I load up the disks it boots from them going into the screen which lets you select how to boot IE safe mode etc no matter which on i select the scren flickers for a moment then goes grey with like a dos "_" flashing and nothing happens no matter how long i wait

Ok i probably wasnt that specific but it manages to load the Linux Kernel before going to the blank screen with "_" flashing.

My laptop is an Asus A6RP if that helps.

I don't know about Backtrack, on the Ubuntu CD at least I know you can hit the function keys to specify additional options at bootup, there should be directions for what switches to use, such as noacpi or whatever it suggests for laptops.

There are extra boot peramiters with the Ubuntu CD. (apparantly Backtrack does allow you to use extra boot commands but when I try to type them in it says command or file not found so I'm not sure)

However, no matter what I select I don't seem to be able to get a response.

I did find that apparently the A6RP is terrible to try and get linux installed on the Linux for laptops website.

They seem to think that it is due to the fact that Asus dont support linux.
does this mean that most versions of linux wont run on my computer?

They said on the Linux for laptops site that they got to run Fedora Core 5 on it. If it can run Fedora 5 can it run 6?

I think I will test it for myself and find out. I will keep all those interested updated

I don't know much about those versions but try typing startx at the command prompt "_" and hitting enter ususaly that starts the GUI if it don't start its self.

-Steve

hmm i seem to be gettinng no output from my keyboard no matter what i type nothing appears onscreen

Although the motherboard certainly can spoil the linux experience, it is not true all asus motherboards would. I have an older system which had an asus motherboard and it ran SuSE and FC4 fine. I think I even tried slackware on that one. Check your fstab, see what it says about the keyboard. I read something once about keyboards, laptops and linux. If that doesn't work, post your output here. We'll see what we can come up with.

A helpful hint would be to try other live cd's.

I managed after a long wait of try and fail, to run "Mandriva One" on a 400MHz old PC. Of course, I didn't keep it, It's much better for the two faster computers.

Try these:
- Xandros
- Mandriva One
- SuSe

You could also try "Xubuntu" which is just a less "Power-Hungry" version on Ubuntu.

Good luck on the above and here.