Hello Jeremy, On Thu, 2013-06-13 at 22:35 +1000, Jeremy Visser wrote:
On 13/06/13 22:12, Mark Trickett wrote:
I am about to load Debian 7 (Wheezy) on an Acer notebook. I have the .debs from Squeeze, will they work, do I need to rename, where might I be able to get the appropriate Wheezy variants. I found these via Google, and have in the root directory on a USB stick.
firmware-ipw2x00_0.28+squeeze1_all.deb firmware-linux-nonfree_0.28+squeeze1_all.deb
Pardon me if I’m missing something obvious, but why can’t you do what normal people do and go:
# apt-get update # apt-get install firmware-ipw2x00 firmware-linux-nonfree
When I do the install, it will ask for the .debs, and the easiest way is in the root directory of a USB memory stick. Since they cover the networking hardware, that means I can then get on the net to further update as the next step.
If you want to find out more about packages before you install the OS, http://packages.debian.org/ is your best bet. For example:
http://packages.debian.org/search?keywords=firmware-linux-nonfree http://packages.debian.org/search?keywords=firmware-ipw2x00
If you absolutely insist on downloading the .deb files individually as you have indicated above, then you can do that on the packages.debian.org site as well.
I did find a mirror site, and have snagged. It is a matter of appropriate preparation for hardware that is not supported without the unfree firmware blobs, and as commented, needed for subsequent networking. This whole unfree thing is a ripe PITA. As to choice of hardware, it is an effective second hand Acer notebook, and no notebook manufacturer that I can currently afford, and get in a rural low income context, will be much different. The one I have will serve, but I have learnt a few things to make life easier. Regards, Mark Trickett