Has anyone successfully installed FC6 on a DELL XPS 410

[bseltzer]

I'm planning on doing just that as soon as the big brown truck show up. Problem is, this box uses a SATA drive, and although I've about googled myself silly, I have no idea what controller chipset is involved.

So I was just wondering if someone else has been down this path and what if any problems were encountered.

Thanks,
Bert

[bseltzer]

I realize I should have included more information regarding the system in question. So here's the spec's on the box;

Dell XPS 410
Intel DuoCore E6600 2.4 GHz
2 GB DDR2 SDRAM
1 320 GB Serial ATA HDD
1 CD/DVD drive
19" 1907FD Display
256MB nVidua 7900GS video card

My real concern with this install is the fact that the drive is a SATA drive, and I know there's been a number of issues reported with these. I will not be using any sort of RAID configuration.

Thanks,
Bert

[bseltzer]

OK, so let me make this a bit more generic...

What are the pitfalls of installing FC 6 on a system (any system) with a single, non-RAID'd SATA drive?

How can these issues be avoided/fixed?

Are the problems peculair to some specific group controller chip sets?

Thanks,
Bert

[mwette]

FC6 installed on my Dell C521 w/ SATA drive OK. I did have problems with
the BIOS and the video card. These are resolved now. You might want to
ask on the Dell forum http://www.dellcommunity.com/supportforums/?category.id=Tech_Talk

[bseltzer]

I searched the Dell forums before posing the question here. Only found 2 vaguely relavent posts, none more recent than Oct. 2006.

I have determined that the XPS 410 uses an Intel 965 series (the "G" variant, I think) mother board, and after searching this forum using "intel", "965", and "sata" as keys, I did turn up some information that I hope will be useful. Well... that's not entirely true. What I REALLY hope for is that FC6 will just plain work like literally every other redhat install I've done on various platforms over the past (you don't want to know how many) years, and the info I've gathered won't be needed. BUT... as we all know, reality bites so I'd rather be prepared for the worst. So I'm all ready to use "all-generic-ide", "irqpoll", and "pci=nommconf" and to set the BIOS to either IDE to AHCI if needed.

Either way, this is gonna be interesting...

Now the point is, if there're any other tips/tricks, I'd love to know about them too!

Thanks,
Bert

[mwette]

My motherboard is very different, but I'm currently using "acpi=noirq".
Also, once you boot check /var/log/dmesg. Sometimes the boot process
and drivers detect possible problems and give boot hints.

[bseltzer]

It turns out the "965G" indentifier isn't terribly specific. Seems Intel make about half a dozen or so MB's that fall under that general heading. So like I said, this is gonna be interesting. Big Brown is supposed to show up with the boxes this Wednesday, so we'll see.

At this point, I am hoping for the best. Given the lack of chatter on this particulat topic, I'm assuming either 1) no one's had enough in the way of serious issues with this hardware to make commenting worthwhile, or 2) everybody's had so much trouble with this hardware that it's not worth discussing anymore, or 3) the question itself is just too trivial. In any case, looks like I'll just have to try it and find out for myself. No biggee.... I mean, worst case scenario, the box does come with Vista installed (Arrrrrggh!!!)

Meantime, I'm thinking about downloading the x86_64 installation media as well as the proven 32-bit FC6 distro I have already just as a kind of fall back.

One way ot the other, I will report the outcome on the off chance it might benefit someone down the road.

Regards,
Bert

[bseltzer]

Which brinfs up another (possibly trivial) question.... Would it be better to install the x86_64 distro or the usual 32-bit distro on this box?

As stated earlier, it's got a DuoCore E6600 processor...

Regards,
Bert

[mwette]

I don't have experience to know. My feeling is that the x86-64 will be quicker, but
you need to weigh that against running apps that are built for i386, which will need
the 32-bit versions of libraries. I am playing it safe w/ i686/i386. If I would have
done this again I might have generated partitions to support both options.

[bseltzer]

In any case, thanks for the input.

I do have a number of 32 bit apps, like bibble pro, used for processing of RAW files from a Nikon DSLR, that I doubt are available in 64 bit versions. So I'm thinking the 32 bit distro whould be my first choice. But, if it comes down to having to use the x86_64 CD's in order to get a functional install, well, I'll just have to bit the bullet.

Again, that's for your advice and counsel. It is sincerely appreciated.

- Bert

[bseltzer]

OK, so the folks from UPS had a bit of trouble getting from Salt Lake City, UT to Sparks, NV. Nasty weather in the Sierras.... But my shiny new XPS410 did finally show up yesterday. Long story short, the installed Windo$e Vista POS was far more trouble that FC6. I spent about 2 hours trying to get Vista whacked around into something at least marginally useful, and after giving up in disgust, I stuck the FC6 install disk 1 in the CD/DVD drive and crossed my fingers.

Well, it installed with no trouble at all. I mean, nothing, nada, zip in the way of problems. No need for any additional kernel parameters at all. SATA disk was recognized without any extra intervention. Oh, there was a minor misconfig in xorg.conf that kept X11 from coming up on the first boot, but that was easily fixed. After that, I just buttoned the box down, turning off unwanted services, and did a "yum update". Ran into the infamous i586 instead of i686 kernel bug, but again, this was easily set right. After that, the livna NVIDIA drivers and beryl all went in without a hitch. Life is good....

Although a bit quiet. Seems fedora isn't playing nice with the onboard audio. Not sure of the exact chipset, but it is the built in audio on the MB. If anyone has any insights on how to get that working, I'd sure appreciate the help.

Thanks, Bert

[bseltzer]

I got the sound card issue resolved. All I really needed to do was search this forum and make a few minor tweaks in modprobe.conf as directed in some of postings my searches turned up. So....

We are happy campers here. FC 6 just screams on the new hardware, and beryl is really looking good now that I've got a halfway decent vidoe board behind it.

Thanks all,
Bert