On Mon, 18 Dec 2006, Eva Myers wrote:

> I am having difficulty installing SL4.4 on a new machine.  The
> relevant hardware details are:
> 
> Motherboard + processor: Intel D965SSCK Core 2 Duo 6300 2MB cache
> Hard disk: 160GB - ST3160811AS -  7200rpm Serial ATA Seagate
> Network card: Intel PCI 10/100/1000MB Ethernet card (the motherboard
>     also has onboard networking)
> 

Which model Intel PCI 10/100/1000MB Ethernet card do you have?

> When I boot from the boot CD and press Return at the boot prompt, the
> install hangs at
> 
> PCI: Probing PCI hardware (bus 00)
> 
> Searching the archives suggested typing "linux all-generic-ide
> pci=nommconf" at the boot prompt, though I am not clear what these

You can try it without without the pci=nommconf part.  I have only had to 
use 

 linux all-generic-ide

for my 965 based motherboards.

> options mean.  This got past the freeze, but it seems that there is
> also some kind of trouble with networking.  If the onboard network
> socket is connected up, networking does not appear to work at all (the
> machine is not pingable).  If the network card is connected up, the
> machine is pingable but won't get past the "FTP Setup" screen in the
> install process.  Using the http install option instead gave an error
> message: "Unable to retrieve... stage2.img".

This implies that your network card is not working.  Can you check 
ctrl-alt-f3 and ctrl-alt-f4 for messages about your networking.

> 
> I also tried installing SL305 on this machine as I have installed it

Not much hope that SL305 will understand this new chipset.  Maybe SL308.

> on several Dell Optiplex GX620s with no trouble in the past.  There
> was no freeze early on (and no need for special options) but I had
> much the same networking problems - not pingable using the onboard
> networking, "Failed to connect to FTP server" using the PCI network
> card.
> 
> Any clues on what is happening here?  Also, can anyone explain why it
> seems that there are so many hardware pitfalls one can encounter while
> attempting to install Linux?

Because opensource trails paid for drivers.

> Eva.
> 

-Connie Sieh