Ubuntu + KDE

Having just upgraded to a more spacious hard drive, my interest in Linux has been renewed and I'm ready to try again.

With Ubuntu, my wireless works, but with Kubuntu it doesn't. Something about KDE messes it up perhaps. In any case I've tried everything, including installing Ubuntu and then upgrading it to Kubuntu using the sudo command line.

So this time I'd like to install Ubuntu and install JUST the KDE package, NOT the Kubuntu package from adept. What command do I use to do this?

Also, I don't really like the behaviour of the GRUB bootloader. Every time it asks me whether I want to use Windows/Linux, and I have to give a keyboard input, otherwise the computer does nothinf for 30 seconds. I'd rather have to press some key within 3 seconds or so to boot Linux, otherwise it boots Windows. How do I set this up?

Any help is much appreciated.

 

"sudo apt-get install kde" will install kde without the kubuntu packages. I'd say you've got a problem with one of them not configuring your card correctly. By Kubuntu do you mean installing the kubuntu packages, using a kubuntu livecd, or actually installing kubuntu straight from a kubuntu cd?

for grub, do "sudo gedit /boot/grub/menu.lst", then change the "timeout" line to whatever amount of time you want, in seconds. You can also change the "default" entry from "0" to "saved" (all of this without the quotes), which will make grub automatically load whatever OS you chose to load last time (very handy when installing a dozen windows updates that all need reboots).

 

You probably want to install "knetworkmanager", which will let you deal with your wireless card easier under KDE. It's what I use.

 

Thanks alot for the help guys.

"for grub, do "sudo gedit /boot/grub/menu.lst", then change the "timeout" line to whatever amount of time you want, in seconds. You can also change the "default" entry from "0" to "saved" (all of this without the quotes), which will make grub automatically load whatever OS you chose to load last time (very handy when installing a dozen windows updates that all need reboots)."

In case I make it automatic, how would I load Linux?

 

Also, if you don't want to see the grub menu, you can uncomment the line "hiddenmenu". It would look something like this after the modifications:

## timeout sec
# Set a timeout, in SEC seconds, before automatically booting the default entry
# (normally the first entry defined).
timeout 0

## hiddenmenu
# Hides the menu by default (press ESC to see the menu)
hiddenmenu

If you need to see the menu to log into your alternate os, then just press escape when the screen says that it's "starting up", and the grub menu will appear.