Upgrading Your Current System To Kernel 2.6

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."

sound

[spoonyfork]

I've been using Linux as a hobbyist since 1995. The one consistent thing over the releases that has always been a issue, at least for me, is getting sound to work. Various hardware, various distros, almost all require tweaking.

Does anyone else have the same observation?

Module loading

[Flaming_Monkey]

The biggest issue I'm facing with 2.6 is getting module loading to work correctly. Seems that Debian/Knoppix isn't reading through the correct config file at bootup, even with the correct version of module-init-tools running. SpeedStep seems a bit sketchy too, but it's Centrino, so it could just be a matter of time.

Has anyone else had this problem? I've read that it may be a symptom of running a mixed stable/testing system, but I have yet to see a solution for the problem.

Running smooth

[Geccoman]

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

Re:Yow.

[eln]

The term "white paper" is meaningless these days. Now that the marketing departments have gotten ahold of it, "white papers" are usually nothing more than the same information included in the colored brochures, only on a white piece of paper in black text.

The days of "white paper" meaning a strictly technical or educational document are gone. These days, "white papers" are just another form of advertising.

Reiserfs issues

[Riskable]

Anyone else had this problem when upgrading to 2.6? I previously tried upgrading my Mandrake 9.2 install to 2.6 and failed (on boot, no init found, no matter what I tried).

So I tried Mandrake 10 RC1 (which uses 2.6.2 by default). It booted and runs wonderfully. However, yesterday I tried to upgrade the kernel to 2.6.3 from kernel.org. Using "make oldconfig" (and following the rest of the compiliation procedures) on my Mandrake-supplied .config file, the system would not boot. For some reason it can't mount the root filesystem even though I have both ext2 and reiserfs support compiled into the kernel. Anyone else experience this? My only guess at this point is that I'm missing some sort of customization that Mandrake did to their version of the kernel.

Note: Abit IC7-G motherobard (not sure if that makes a difference).

Debina and 2.6 Kernel module loading at boot

[chivo]

The one problem I can't seem to find the answer to is how Debian tells the kernel which modules to autoload at boot. I know that for 2.4 kernels, there is a list in /etc/modules. However, with my 2.6 kernel. that file is ignored and I have to manually load all the modules I need after boot. A pain in the ass since I try to keep most of my device drivers as modules, like for my NICs, video card, USB, sound card, etc. Has anyone using Debian and 2.6 kernel found a solution to this?

OT: Debian

[What'sInAName]

Man, I keep seeing debian users posting one-liners like this, and I think to myself yet again, "I have to try Debian out one of these days." Is it really this simple? (I'm by no means a beginner at Linux, I just have to overcome some intertia. I started w/ Slackware back in the day, but now use SuSE. Any quick advice?)

AMEN!!

[Anonymous Coward]

If you've done this and know a lot about it, *please* document somewhere, I could really use the help.

Re:OT: Debian

[dsouth]

Advice? The first install is the worst. :-)

After that, debian gets much better -- my laptop has gone through three major debian releases (potato, woody, and now sid) using nothing more that apt-get commands. [Actually, I guess I'm not really qualified to comment on the debian install process since I haven't really installed it in the last three years -- I just keep updating the existing install.]

At the time I did the initial install of potato, the installer dumped you into dselect, which is confusing if you've never seen it before. It may be better now, but even if it isn't, you can always apt-get anything you forgot. And building your own kernel is a snap (get the sources from kernel.org, make xconfig to select what you want, make-kpkg clean, make-kpkg kerne_image modules_image, then dpkg -i to install your shiny new kernel.

I've also had good luck using alien to translate rpm->deb for the occasional time when I needed some software that wasn't available as a deb. YMMV. In a related vein, I've had good luck with the blackdown java debs (debian doesn't provide Java due to conflicts with Sun's license terms).

Overall, I've had fewer problems with Debian than I have with Red Hat (which I maintain for my employer) and Mandrake (which was my personal distro of choice before Debian). In particular, I find maintenance and bug-fixes much much easier (just run apt-get update, apt-get upgrade) and everything ``just works''.

Crazy clock drift

[nuggz]

My only problem was that my clock has gone nuts.

With 2.4 it was stable, but now under 2.6 some days it stays the same, other days it might move by 15+ minutes in a 24 hour period (I ntp it back of course)

And sound support for the nforce2 mobo is better.

good with fedora

[srichand]

i upgraded to 2.6.2 sometime back. it integrates quite beautifully with fedora core 1, the gui seems a lot faster, and a bit more stable now. NTFS write support is still experimental.

Re:I wish I had this two months ago

[bonch]

Windows isn't user-friendly.

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.

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?

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

Just today I showed a friend of mine KDE 3.2. She thought it was "too pretty" and wondered why she should change from something that "already works."

Easy easy easy

[spaceyhackerlady]

I must live a charmed life, think pure thoughts or something, because my 2.6 experience has been nothing but positive.

My first experience was with a Compaq laptop, Slackware 9.0 and 2.6.0-test4. I found that I broke the 2.4 modutils when I upgraded to module-init-tools, but since 2.6 worked so well, I really didn't care. Oh, and I've never had any trouble with that crazy mouse touchpad thingy.

Slackware 9.1 says it's 2.6-ready, and it is. I've installed it on a number of systems and upgraded the kernel easily.

My current challenge is my Sun Ultra 5, which currently runs Debian (woody) with the 2.4.18 kernel it came with. I ended up building 64 bit SPARC gcc and friends as cross compilers on an x86 box. But hello world still doesn't link... :-(

...laura

One man's woes

[Anonymous Coward]

I recently gave the 2.6 kernel a shot (slack 9.1), and the only thing I've noticed so far is that my external modem (serial port) disconnects immediately after making a connection. I wonder if there is some setting I might have missed or if it's a bug in the kernel. Has anyone had a similar experience?

thanks

My experience

[Doug Neal]

My setup - Debian on a Dell Inspiron 8100.

First of all the menuconfig menus are a lot more well organised and there are a lot more options, too. Configured it up and it booted OK... I've upgraded to every version so far. The good things:
* Much less work required with "external" device drivers. With 2.4 I had to separately compile ACPI, ALSA, the nVidia driver, PCMCIA and Lucent modem drivers. Now it's just the Lucent and nVidia drivers as the other three are now included already.
* ACPI support is better. Won't bore you with the details, but it is ;)
* Everything's faster, although I was using the new scheduler stuff as a patch to 2.4 so it didn't make too much difference.
* probably lots of little things I can't think of right now

The bad things - there seem to have been a few nasty bugs, but that's to be expected with such a big upgrade and most of them have been sorted. Currently ACPI battery support is doing funny things and occasionally reporting that the battery's empty, when it's not. Give it a couple of releases though and it should be all good :) With the addition of KDE 3.2 getting released this has been a really good upgrade and I would definitely recommend anyone else to do the same...

Good author

[Mark19960]

this author has written several papers about various portions of linux, configuring and setup.
I actually read his stuff, because it tends to make a lot of sense, and he has really good ideas.
I look forward to more articls from this author.

So far, a pain in the ass

[SnapperHead]

I am running Debian stable, and let me tell ya, its been nothing but trouble trying to upgrade the kernel.

First problem, was getting the new module utilitys installed, I had to setup pinning. Not too hard, but was a pain to find some clear docs on this.

After that, I had many issues with getting iptables working. I can't find the damn thing in menuconfig, maybe I am blind, but I ended up just editing the .config file.

iptables still isn't fully working, I can't even connect to the internet using the machine it self. Why ? Becuase, bind9 is bitching about the kernel version. dhcpd isn't working either, due to kernel version.

When I migrated from 2.2 -> 2.4, there wasn't this many issues. I understand that the changes are needed, and things will clean up over time. I just wish there was better docs explaining WHAT has to be done.

Another intresting note, is that insmod doesn't work correctly, however modprobe does. Which, is very odd in it self.

I am too frustered after tooling around with it today, spent 2 hours on it. I will try it again next week.

I really want to upgrade to 2.6, since it better supports the opteron chips and better support (From what I have heard) on SATA / raid cards. (I have a 3ware SATA raid controller)

This man suffer, help him

[kinsoa]

Two weeks ago I tried to switch a server to Debian due to the arguments of two Debian fanatics friends (ok, to be honnest I tried Debian because Fedora kernel crash on all my SMP systems, but that's another story). I took two days to do that. I don't want to describe all technical problems I had, but this morning, seeing that the system was not usable (apt-get don't work anymore and login take 30 minutes to let me in, I never had such trouble with a unix system), I re-install Fedora on it. It takes exactly 45 minutes and all work perfectly.

Debian IS NOT user friendly. Or maybe it is if you have only debian systems and if you are ready to lose your stability if you don't follow the Debian Way to configure something, I don't know.

Guys, a system is user-friendly if it help you. Debian really don't help me. A system that install itself without problem and *just work* is friendly.

One of the more interesting problems...

[Aldurn]

I upgraded to 2.6 a while ago, just because I wanted all of the neat goodies it brings with it (QoS, Bluetooth, etc.). My server has no compiler, and I have no "backup" system, so I compile things on various other Linux systems I run.

It basically runs Gentoo, in that I copied the boot CD, stripped out anything I didn't need, and manually installed things like ssh, apache, etc. The upside is that it's small. The downside is that it's a pain in the butt to upgrade.

The 2.6 install worked without too many initial problems, except the whole devfsd being required, and me not getting around to removing the requirement. That is, until I tried to reboot:

server root # shutdown -r now

Broadcast message from root (pts/0) (Wed Feb 25 11:24:11 2004):

The system is going down for reboot NOW! /dev/null
RK_Init: idt=0xc05dc000, FUCK: Can't find sys_call_table[]
server root #

At this point, I'm blaiming the redhat compiler for stripping out something it shouldn't have. Though, anyone else have any suggestions?

Re:I wish I had this two months ago

[bonch]

She's using Windows XP. She immediately set it to the Classic theme.