i hate linux

[rmd]

actually, i think this has just escalated to "i hate computers".

so, i built this linux box a while ago to hold my cd collection as flac-encoded files, and it was running fine and i was happily ripping things.

then it kept wedging and stalling out. and it started complaining about a hard drive that wasn't actually mounted and i'm not sure existed.

so i pulled out the two oldest hard drives (which were both about 6 years old), just on principle. and started re-installing. and it crapped out in the middle of the reinstall. and so i tried it again, and the same thing happened.

and now it won't get past the POST screen -- in fact, i get the bios splash screen and it doesn't recognize me hitting the tab key and yelling "hey, stupid computer! show me the fucking post screen, damn you!"

so i disconnected all the various IDE devices and the floppy disk and i'm in the same situation.

harrumf.

Comments

[rmd.livejournal.com]

cool. i'll try the battery.

i'm troubleshooting and trying to narrow it down. it's not the video card, and i don't think it's the memory. i had a loose power connector, but that was probably done while i was mucking around in it the other day.

i think i may have a failing drive, since the IDE controller is listing it with the wrong size. or, you know, maybe it's the IDE controller. :-|

happily, i've only got about 20G worth of music ripped, and it's all sitting on another machine for now, so even if i have a catastrophic data failure on the other machine, i'm not too hosed.

one nice thing with Linux is that usually you can swap an existing drive array onto a new motherboard with little heartache
can you? that's great. it's one of the things i was wondering about -- i wasn't sure if any of the array state lived somewhere besides on the array disks.

thanks!