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Upgrading Your Current System To Kernel 2.6

Posted by timothy on from the share-and-enjoy dept.

An anonymous reader writes "This white paper provides an overview of the process of moving an existing desktop system to the 2.6 kernel. It will highlight other software requirements imposed by the new kernel and administrative changes that you must make when migrating an existing system to the 2.6 kernel. It supplements previous whitepapers in the same series about Customizing the 2.6 kernel [Slashdot discussion here(1)] and porting drivers to the 2.6 kernel [Slashdot discussion here(2)] to the 2.6 kernel."

16 of 442 comments (clear)

  1. I can't find it anywhere.... by MeanE · · Score: 5, Funny

    on Windows update?!? Where the heck is it?

  2. I wish I had this two months ago by $calar · · Score: 5, Informative

    I had all kinds of trouble upgrading to 2.6. Sound and networking didn't work, as well as some of my filesystems. Luckily, I'm smart enough to setup lilo to run multiple kernels, so going back to 2.4 was no trouble to tweak my config file and recompile and try again. I never got everything totally working right. I was going to just wait until the next series of distro releases solved these problems for me, but maybe I should give it another shot.

    1. Re:I wish I had this two months ago by scrytch · · Score: 5, Funny

      Stories like this do nothing to help build a convincing argument to Windows users that Linux is in fact the better OS. If even seasoned Linux users have problems upgrading their kernel, think of how frustrating it would be for someone less technically-inclined.

      Tell me about it, the other day I just slapped the Win2k kernel into my win98 box and it just sailed right through, no problems at all...

      --
      I've finally had it: until slashdot gets article moderation, I am not coming back.
    2. Re:I wish I had this two months ago by El+Cubano · · Score: 5, Informative

      If you need a newer kernel, install a newer distribution.

      Really? apt-get install kernel-image-2.6.3-1-686, followed by a reboot didn't seem too overly difficult for my little brother (very much a non-techie).

    3. Re:I wish I had this two months ago by barawn · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Second, if you use debian, you have no right to bitch about Linux being difficult to use. It's not exactly the most user-friendly system around.

      No, it's not the most Windows-like system around. It is the most Linux-like system around, and it's absolute craploads easier to use than Windows. Everything is documented, and everything is modifiable.

      As a simple example: Windows XP doesn't handle wireless connections terribly well - if I standby my laptop with one wireless connection that uses DHCP, and then wake it up in an area where it has a different wireless connection, it doesn't release/renew the DHCP lease. I have to do it myself. This is stupid - on a Linux system, if the distribution was screwed up, I could just script it in a moment's notice.

      Windows's help system is also a joke - most of the programs don't properly document what things do (the number of times I've seen "There is no help available for this option...") and so you're left hoping that things work.

      Windows is by far one of the least user-friendly operating systems around. The problem is that it's so pervasive that everyone's used to believing that user-friendly = Windows-like = "everything just works". That's not true, because no operating system just works, because no operating system knows everything you could possibly do with it.

      Linux forces you to learn about a problem before solving it. That actually makes it very user-friendly, because it means that users can realize that they can do more than what they originally thought they could do - meaning the OS makes them more productive.

      Windows isn't user-friendly. The simplest way to illustrate that is to ask this: how much does it allow you, the user, to do, and how much does it try to do it for you? An operating system that does everything for you and allows you to do nothing isn't user-friendly, because what if you don't want to do what it wants? An operating system that allows you to do everything but does nothing for you isn't user-friendly, because, well, it's a computer. It can do things automatically. The best operating system is one that tries to do everything for you, but allows you to do everything as well, and that's Debian.

    4. Re:I wish I had this two months ago by barawn · · Score: 5, Insightful


      Uh, yes it is. That's why so many people I try to introduce Linux to don't want to switch. Linux is too much of a hassle to use.

      Read the post again. I said

      The problem is that it's so pervasive that everyone's used to believing that user-friendly = Windows-like = "everything just works"

      and

      No, it's not the most Windows-like system around.

      People who start off using Windows learn its quirks and idiosyncracies and think of them as "normal". They're not. Linux isn't "Windows-ex-user-friendly", but I'm glad it's not, because Windows isn't userfriendly to begin with. In fact, there are quite a few different paradigms that Linux has that the Windows paradigm doesn't have that are far more user-friendly. See WindowMaker, for instance, with the NeXTSTEP interface, or Emacs with almost everything bound to keybindings, or LyX.

      A high learning curve does not make something non-user-friendly, especially when there are rewards for the high learning curve. There's absolutely no doubt that there are more powerful tools under Linux - Emacs was virtually designed from the ground up to allow people to edit files as fast and as easily as possible (hence the reason that cursor editing keys are all control-combinations of home row keys). A person who chooses not to go through the "hassle" of not climbing a learning curve which has obvious benefits is not avoiding the program because it's not user-friendly - they're avoiding the program because they're lazy .

      Start off with people who have never used a computer (or at least, never used Windows), and are willing to learn to use one, and they'll learn Linux rather easily. That's how most of us did.

      Only tech-nerds like us think that way. That's a made-up definition of user-friendly.

      Am I a user? Yes. Is an operating system that doesn't let me do what I want non-friendly to me? Yes. Then it's not user-friendly, now is it?

      Last time I checked the definition of user-friendly is "friendly to the user". If an operating system doesn't let the user do what he wants, it's not being friendly, now is it? :)

      why she should change from something that "already works."

      She already had a Windows mindset - that is, "Microsoft is smarter than you. You only want to do what Microsoft lets you do. You do not want to do anything else. Microsoft is good to you." She's not a user - she's a Windows user.

      Windows doesn't "work". No operating system works. There's at least one thing broken about every operating system/distribution in existence. The question as to whether or not it's user friendly is whether or not you can deal with the broken parts well.

  3. What I'd like to see... by ageoffri · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I'd like to see a nice up to date list distributions that are built around the 2.6 kernel. Trying to update a Mandrake system to 2.6 didn't work for me and these days I don't have the time to track down errors.

    --
    -- Slashdot, making the Left look conservative since 1997.
    1. Re:What I'd like to see... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

      On Gentoo anything that only takes a couple of hours *is* a breeze.

  4. If you've got a... by cs02rm0 · · Score: 5, Informative

    ...laptop touchpad don't bother going near 2.6 if you don't know exactly what you're doing. I still haven't got the mouse working. I can't even find anyone who can tell me how to confirm if the touchpad is a synaptic.

    I'm not the only one suffering this.

    Works great on my slackware desktop.

  5. There's are problems upgrading? by H0ek · · Score: 5, Insightful

    If there are, I didn't see them. All I did was:

    apt-get install kernel-image-2.6.2-1-686
    update-grub

    Two lines on the command line and a reboot and I've been happy ever since.

    Oh, wait, we're talking outside Debian. Nevermind.

    --
    H0ek
    Think you're smart? Prove you've got brains!
  6. Running smooth by Geccoman · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I upgraded to the 2.6 kernel about a month ago, and have been nothing but impressed. I got increased speed, my sound works great (ALSA) and with 1280x1024 Framebuffer and Bootsplash (85Hz refresh no-less) even my console is nice to look at.

    My NVidia drivers worked flawlessly with the new kernel, as well as my wireless network.

    I get oooh's and ahhh's from the co-workers with 3DDesk, and my boss is impressed with my setup, even though he's got a shiny new G5 under his desk.

    That's just my experience, though... YMMV

    --
    I'm on a chair.
  7. Fast mouse? Check your XF86Config by Alan · · Score: 5, Informative

    One thing that was a blocker for me to move to 2.6 was my mouse would go a lot faster while in X. I finally found that it was the new input system. Under 2.4 the default XF86Config file would have two mouse input settings, one for ps/2 and one for USB. Under 2.6 both of these were picked up regardless of the mouse being ps/2 or usb so all mouse events, clicks, etc were picked up twice. Removing one of the mouse entries made everything work as normal.

    Probably everyone but me knew this, but thought I'd throw it out in case anyone else is in the same boat.

  8. My experiences with 2.6 by Cytlid · · Score: 5, Informative

    Here's my experience with 2.6 kernel (been running it since 2.6.0 was released).

    DVDs look awesome. I had to tweak the hdparms for DMA, but they work great.

    Ever since NVidia came out with the latest drivers, things like the UT2k4 Demo fun fantastic.

    I was a little hung up on modules... seeing as I rarely use them, it wasn't a show-stopper. The conversion from modutils to module-init-tools was mostly painless.

    Recently, I've been playing with MTD, and trying to get a test machine to use 12 out of the 16 megs of an AGP Voodoo3 3000 card's memory as a device I can format or use as swap. I have been unsuccessful. (2.6.3). This is also on a testing machine, not my "main" machine.

    On a slightly OT note, planning on building a Mini ITX system with a Via Epia board (one of the 800 mhz ones). Should have the case this week, jury's still out on the mb.

    Other than that, no complaints, it's been fantastic. I'm running 2.6.3 on 3 different machines (with different responsibilies) and it feels like there's no going back now!

    --
    FLR
  9. easier than 2.4 by rudog · · Score: 5, Informative

    I run gentoo on a dual pIII-600 with an ATI radeon7000 / SBlive / intelpro100. Kernels 2.4.18 through 2.4.22 took several hours of tweaking before I could even get the thing to boot correctly. ( 2.2 never had this problem )

    Last week I took about 30 minutes and grabbed 2.6.3 did a clean/config/make, which took about the majority of that time, and booted into the fastest Linux box I have ever had.

    2.6 booted with OpenGL without any tweaks pushing glgears to 1600fps and ALSA kicked in without errors on the emu10k1. Device drivers posed no issues for either the USB keyboard/mouse or hardrive or nework card.

    No 'migration' was necessary for either windowmaker / enlightenment / blender / JACK or any of my other 100 some odd apps.

  10. ObOldSaw by sharkey · · Score: 5, Funny
    It's not exactly the most user-friendly system around.

    Sure it is. It's just picky about who its friends are.

    --

    --
    "Outlook not so good." That magic 8-ball knows everything! I'll ask about Exchange Server next.
  11. My weird problem with 2.6 by Sark666 · · Score: 5, Informative

    I've tried all versions of 2.6 (2.6.1,2,3) but still get this problem. Everything seems smoother/more responsive except for a problem I have with a game (enemy territory). In 2.4 this game usually loads a map in 20-30 seconds. In 2.6 it takes about the same time but every map thereafter gets longer and longer, until they start taking several minutes. I did a test by launching my own server and just kept reloading the same map. 1st try 32 seconds, 5th try over 4 minutes. If anything it should be slightly quicker as some would be in memory/swap. The only other game I have in linux similar to enemy territory is quake3. It has the same normal load times in both 2.4 and 2.6, but it's maps are much smaller than enemy territory's so it doesn't stress the system as much. This leads me to believe that it's more a swap/memory issue than a graphics driver issue. I did hdparm tests and dma is enabled and I'm getting about the same speed in 2.4 as in 2.6. My system is a p4 1.6 with 128 megs ram gf4ti 4200. Now, I realize 128 megs is low these days, and would probably help aleviate this problem but it seems when a system is stressed in this way 2.4 performs better than 2.6. In 2.4 I can play on a server for as much as I want but with 2.6 I usually get kicked within a couple of new maps due to it timing out. Reconnecting to the server doesnt help, but quiting ET and restarting helps for that initial map, but then the cycle repeats. I don't see a way on this forum of attaching my config, I compiled the kernel myself and have gone over it several times to see if some option could be the cause of this. The first thing I tried was turning off the preemptive kernel option, but didn't help. My system is debian based (morphix distro) and as I mentioned I compile the kernel myself, not a precompiled kernel. I also made sure X doesn't have a negative nice value. You might suggest to throw more ram at the problem and even though it might help, I shouldn't have to as 2.4 seems to get by.