[NTLUG:Discuss] help request

[Fred James]

Fred Stevens
I am no pro at diagnostics on this kind of thing, so someone else may 
have a better, cleaner way, but I personally would suggest:
(1) backup the important stuff
(2) run some kind of disk checking
(2.1) if the disk is OK, reload the OS and any add on applications 
appropriate
(2.2) if the disk is iffy - get a new on, load the OS, applications, and 
backed up data
Hope this helps
Regards
Fred James

Fred wrote:

>Well, it finally happened. My dear momma's computer bit the dust.
>Partially, that is and I am embarassed that I cannot figure out what
>is wrong. I have a few ideas, but...
>
>X won't start on boot. The OS (Mandrake 9.0) says it is at init 5
>(multiuser, X). I cannot glean much from the log files. The system
>had been working for 2 years and suddenly quit (A big clue). Console
>operations work ok. 
>
>Error messages are few, but there is one about no mouse (sorry, it
>was a few days ago and I don't remember the exact wording) and
>another about file not found when attempting a startx command. 
>
>What would cause this kind of failure? A scribbled disk? Maybe from a
>power hit? She has no battery backup and she leaves the system on all
>the time.
>
>Her operations are all web based (email, banking, etc) which drove
>the decision to install Linux instead of Windows. I have not heard of
>any virii or other problems affecting Linux in the wild, especially
>not something like this.
>
>I have the original cd's around here somewhere, so I could reload the
>os, but I worry about what will get wiped out in the process. /home
>should be ok. I could take the drive and add it to my system and
>backup everything to data dvd first. I could also bring the system up
>to date with SuSE9.3 but I doubt that will happen unless the time it
>takes to fix the problem is more that it takes to replace it.
>
>I welcome all thoughts and suggestions.
>
>Fred
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