[ILUG-BOM] sad and depressed - Help! system hangs, files vanish

[jtd]

On Wednesday 14 April 2004 14:02, Vickram Crishna wrote:
> Hello
>
> I am a new user, and new to this list too, although I was here a
> couple of years back too.
>
> I am running Red Hat 9.0 on my home PC, and the installation (which
> was a simple straightforward home selection from the install choice
> menu) has some troubling behaviour - namely the computer hangs from
> time to time. The hardware is an old Compaq Celeron, with 128 MB.
> It lacks a reset button, and in fact lacks an off switch. 

 It is well known that lack of power and reset switch is a major cause 
of maniac depression and suicidal tendencies when using some OSes. 
But it can also produce the same effect when using GNU/Linux.
Since Psychotherapy software is not what it should be, Please get a 
technician to FIX the reset switch.
> When the 
> machine hangs I have no choice but to pull the plug from the mains.
> It has an On switch, but pressing this twice will not restart the
> machine. In fact, once the switch is pressed on, it no longer has
> any function. When the machine hangs I lose control of both the
> mouse and the keyboard. This happens at least once a week (the
> machine is usually on).
Check the bios settings. Your system may be programmed to 
"powersave"  , without startup "on any key". Also keeping the power 
switch pressed for several seconds shuts down the machine. After 
which it wont turn on with the same switch - switch off /on mains. 
Ingenous security feature. On several machines it is the internal 
battery which is the cause of this behaviour.
>
> So far so good - or not so good.

Use the reiserfs file system. It is very robust and has worked 
extremely well for me. No fs corruption even with repeated power 
cycling without umount.

> Right now, although it allows me to start up under the registered
> login identities (including root) the GUI has been disturbed, with
> the standard icons and the wallpaper missing. I logged in as root
> and found the files missing from the /home/[username] folder were
> visible, but greyed out. The Find command says the files do not
> exist.

Check lost & found.

Compaq pressario had numerous hardware problems. Please google.
Afaik idedma was a problem.

And by the way, if u use a commercial distro, use the ones which have 
support, and utilise the support. Otherwise stick to Debian stable.