need help: fc1 for amd64

[Gene C.]

OK, I got my amd64 hardware ... actually an Opteron 140 but am having some 
problems.

Hardware:

After much hassle I got an ASUS SK8V MB.  I first ordered a Gigabyte 
K8NNXP-940 (looked pretty good and I had good luck with another Gigabyte MB 
for dual athlons).  This proved to an advertised and not really available 
product so I switch the order to an ASUS SK8N.  When I went to pick it up, I 
was told that the RUMOR (NOTE, this is RUMOR, not FACT) that the SK8N had 
been recalled and if I wanted, they had an SK8V I could have.  Now, this 
seemed better because the VIA chipset does not apparently have the acpi 
problem so I got it.

The video adapter is an ATI 9100 and (as expected from other comments) the 
onboard NIC did not work so I added a Linksys (tulip) NIC.  The system has 
1GB ECC Reg ram.

I installed i386 FC1 with no (well, see below) problems so this is hardware 
that FC1 should handle.

Problem 1 (I do not really expect help here but who knows):

I have a Dell 2000FP (analog) monitor which is connected to a total of four 
systems via a Belkin KVM switch.  I have had zero problems with this setup 
(runs 1600x1200 just fine) on my other systems (dual P-III, single P-III and 
dual athlon).

When I poweron the Opteron the screen blinks a couple of times, some text 
comes up for some IDE/raid controllers but then I get a blank screen with the 
Dell saying it is in power-save mode.  I finally dug out an old NEC XV17+ and 
connected it directly.  OK, it comes up and I was finally able the get into 
BIOS Setup via the DEL key.  I turned off some fancy ASUS/AMI graphic boot 
stuff and otherwise configured the BIOS to be more friendly ... this resulted 
in being able to at least bootup on the Dell but still unable to get into 
BIOS Setup this way (or at least get it to display).  On the Dell this BIOS 
Setup image flashes but then the monitor goes into power-save mode.  Once I 
get to with the FC1 i386 cdrom prompt or (after install) the grub panel, the 
display works fine.

OK, the conclusion I have come to is that the ASUS/AMI BIOS is using some 
video adapter parameters which drives the Dell monitor nuts and forces it 
into "off" mode.  

I can't get this system to boot the floppy (it does boot the Maxtor harddrive 
and the cdrom (DVD drive) but not the floppy) -- I am not sure the floppy 
drive is even seen.  This means that I cannot update the BIOS although there 
is an update available.

I have not yet tried attaching the Dell monitor directly or to use the DVI 
interface (both the 9100 adapter and the Dell monitor have a DVI interface in 
addition to an analog interface).  However, I do not expect this to work any 
better since it seems (to me) to be video parameters that the ASUS/AMI BIOS 
is using.

As I said, I don't expect help here but any would be appreciated.

Problem 2 (installing FC1 X86_64):

I downloaded all of the files from fedora.linux.duke.edu, burned a cdrom using 
images/boot.iso, and made the directory tree available via an NFS share.  The 
nfs shared fc1 directory tree has both i386 and x86_64 subtrees and I 
successfully installed fc1-i386 off the i386 tree.

When I boot the x86_64 boot.iso cdrom it comes up.  I enter the appropriate 
system name and directory tree but then get "unable to mount" popup and am 
unable to get any further.  As I said, I used this same process to install 
i386 FC1 and have checked the permission and they are OK.

Another strange thing is that I cannot switch to VT2 (ctl-alt-F2) although I 
can switch to VT3 and VT4 ... maybe I am not far along enough for VT2 to 
work.

Any help appreciated.
-- 
Gene