YAUMIP – (Yet Another USB Mouse Installation Problem) [LONG]

[dechah]

a.k.a. My Adventures In X

I know this topic is done to death around here, but I have tried to fix this problem using all the resources of these forums I could muster, but my USB Logitech MouseMan Dual Optical mouse flat out refuses to co-operate with my X-Server.

Hardware:

Mouse: Logitech Mouse Man Dual Optical USB Wheel Mouse
Video Card: Nvidia GeForce2 with 32MB of ram

This is what I have done so far:

1. Installed Gentoo, using the latest version 1.2 network install build ISO (a gimme I know, but you have no idea how proud of myself I was when I saw that shiny new login prompt at the end of quite a few hours of compiling toil.)

2. I then followed the desktop configuration doc and followed it faithfully to the point where I ran “emerge kde” This compiled for about an hour, but at some point, my system crashed, that is, the monitor was on, but all I could see was a black screen. No amount of tapping on the keyboard could wake it up. “shutdown now” would not work, and even “ctl – alt – del” would not shutdown the system, which just left me with the one finger reboot.

3. The crash appeared to have occurred in the KDE part, as I discovered the X server had compiled.

4. I setup the XFree86Config file as per the instructions:
Section "InputDevice"
Identifier "Mouse1"
Driver "mouse"
Option "Protocol" "IMPS/2"
Option "Device" "/dev/input/mice"
Option "ZAxisMapping" "4 5"

5. I then typed “startx” and a very ugly x-window appeared (as expected) with a mouse curser, but unfortunately the damn thing would not move. [I guess this confirms that my system at least has a properly complied X-server]. Not being able to do much more, I then typed “ctl-alt-bckspce” to close the x-server and return to the system prompt. This crashed my system, again I had a completely black screen that was unresponsive.

6. I then tried a dozen different tweaks of the XFree86Config file, and the ones that still allowed me to start an X session would perform exactly the same, i.e. ugly X-window with unresponsive mouse pointer. Again, each “ctl-alt-bckspce” resulted in a system crash that required a one finger reboot.

7. I noticed in the desktop configuration guide that there was some nividia drivers that people with nvidia chipsets should install using “emerge media-video/nvidia-kernel media-video/nvidia-glx” This installed without a hitch and I went in and edited my XFree86Config file to accommodate the new drivers. Restarted an X session and whoilla, I still have the ugly X session with the unresponsive mouse pinter, but now, when I “ctl-alt-bckspce” X closes properly and I am returned to the system prompt, no more one finger salutes! (I was well and truly chuffed at this stage as I felt I had made a little bit of progress in getting this X beast tamed)

8. I then conferred with the installing a USB mouse/keyboard document that was posted by Vlad in the documentation section of the forums and added the support into my kernel as per the instructions. I then compiled a new kernel and checked to see that the modules hid.o and usb-uhci.o where created. I edited the /etc/modules.autoload file and added the lines:

input
mousedev
hid
usb-uhci

I also remembered to copy the new bzImage file into my /boot partition.

9. I then rebooted my machine, and now I get an error that the usb-uhci module failed to load. I then tried several kernel recompiles. First I tried to select the alternate UHCI Alternate Driver (JE) support and that had no effect (after editing my /etc/modules.autoload to use the new module), I then recompiled the kernel this time with the support directly in the kernel, i.e. not compiled as modules, and removed the lines from the /etc/modules.autoload file. In this kernel, I had no input device boot up errors, but restarting X after a reboot simply left me with the same old problem, ugly X session witrh non-responsive mouse curser, and mouse with no lights lit up.

So this is where I reached the end of my limited abilities. I have no idea what to do next. Is it possible that I have a setting somewhere in my kernel config that conflicts with the settings I made to accommodate the USB pointing device? Would it be worth doing one more kernel recompile, with everything taken out etc the bare essentials required to get the system running.

Why is it that when I inserted the Gentoo 1.2 network installation CD into my system yesterday at the beginning of this saga, it had no trouble auto detecting my USB mouse. It lit up like a Christmas tree moments after booting from the CD, and yet after doing all the above, my mouse just sits here beside me in a coma.

One last thing before I overstay my welcome, I re-ran the “emerge kde” last night before going to bed and woke up this morning with a system that had not crashed, and I found this morning that I can type “kdm” now and get a shiny new kdm screen, but the old problem of an unresponsive mouse curser. I guess I am right in assuming that because I can at least start x, and at least can start kdm, that I can assume both of those are compiled and installed properly, and that I am just facing either a conflict or configuration issue.
_________________
Cheers

Dechah

[delta407]

This is a workaround, not a fix, but... can you use a USB to PS/2 adapter?

[dechah]

I shall try that this evening when get home from work

[sburnett]

I have the same mouse and it works fine. I did have some trouble setting it up, though. Try this (as root):

rmmod mousedev hid usb-uhci
rm /dev/input/mice
modprobe mousedev hid usb-uhci

This seemed to work, as a "hard copy" of /dev/input/mice was overwriting the one provided by devfs. This solved it for me (but it still is a long shot).

Good luck.

[neuron]

one thing it seems some people forget, did you mount /boot before you copied bzImage over?

also, check with ls that it is indeed properly mounted.

[dechah]

I don't really know how to mount /boot, I assumed it was already mounted when I read that in the installation guide.

What I was doing to make sure things happened was typing "cd /boot" then "ls" to see the bzImage file is there. I then type "mv bzImage bzimage.old", finally I then copy the bzImage file I just compiled into /boot. I then did another "ls" just to make sure it arrived, which it did

I guessed this had the same effect as moutning /boot, please correct me if I am wrong.

[delta407]

/boot is just another directory unless it has your partition attached to it. So, your bzImage never left your root partition -- you have to mount /boot, copy, and umount /boot again. (/boot isn't mounted automatically because leaving it unmounted reduces the chance of bad things happening to it.)

[dechah]

How stupid of me, of course, /boot could simply be a directory under my root partition, and might explain why the modules for my USB mouse are not loaded at startup because they are appearing in the /etc/module.autorun file but not in the bzImage that is booting up!!!

Now I am keen to go home from work early and have a tinker.

This leaves me with the dumb question concerning mounting boot however. Taking a guess the command would be "mount /boot" - correct?

[delta407]