I need help installing Linux on a notebook computer. Is there going to be 
an installfest soon?

Background
==========
I have a new laptop from hp, the nc6000. None of the distributions I've 
tried (Debian, Mandrake, Knoppix) work perfectly; each has flaws.

Debian 3.0r1 installs but doesn't find any network adaptors (there are two: 
a Broadcom 10/100/1000 NIC and a wireless 802.11a/b/g adaptor).

Mandrake 9.2 installs and finds the Broadcom NIC, but not the wireless. 
Other problems: sound is muted and the "troubleshooting" instructions don't 
seem to work (aumix is not available); wireless is not configured; power 
management is broken (says battery is at zero on fully-charged batter). 
XFree86 doesn't come up correctly unless the display is set to "vesa"; none 
of the Radeon display settings work but they should.

Mandrake 10.0 (cooker 20031231) fixes the power messages, but power 
management isn't turned on in the kernel. Sound is still broken, wireless 
adaptor is still not found. Radeon (fbdev) doesn't work, but plain Radeon 
does. Internal modem not configured either (probably broken in 9.2 as well 
as other distributions, but have not confirmed).

Knoppix 3.3 (booted from CD) doesn't find any network devices, but the 
sound works. Power doesn't.

Specific Needs
==============
Here is a numbered list of items where I need help.

1. I am not tied to a particular distribution and am willing to try 
another. Recommendations accepted.

Otherwise I plan to stick with Mandrake 10.0 and get it to work. The 
devices I need to get configured are:

2. sound. ALSA snd-intel8x0 is the default module and it is loaded. The PCI 
ID is 8086:24c5:103c:0890, description is "ICH4 845G/GL Chipset AC'97 Audio 
Controller". The external light indicating MUTE is turned on, but pressing 
buttons to raise/lower volume or unmute have no effect. I have run a 
character-based mixer program (the usual troubleshooting advice say to run 
aumix but that is not installed!) and verified that volumes are up and 
nothing is muted except the microphone. What next?

3. Wireless network configuration. I really need this to work and am not 
sure what I need to do. The PCI ID is 168c:0013:0e11:00e5.

4. Need to enable power management options in Kernel and rebuild.

Any advice is greatly appreciated.

-Jeff
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