Q: I just got linux installed and i cant connect to the internet. Using Suse 10.0 and ethernet (not USB). HELP!?

A:
You need to ensure that the network card is configured correctly.

I assume we can take for granted that you have the correct network cable connected to the router (i.e. cat 5 and not crossover - modern NIC's and routers should be able to cope with a crossover, but it is better not to use one).

So, assuming it is a configuration problem:

1) Open YaST (In KDE click on the KDE Menu icon, default is the little greedn lizard head, go to System and select YaST, in Gnome drop down the System menu and click on YaST).

2) You should be running from a user account, so you will be asked to now enter the root password. This is the one you set-up during installation.

3) Go to the Network Devices section of YaST and click on the network card option.

4) This should open a list of the network cards, assuming it is the same Realtek card that is shown in the image, then click on said cards name in the dialog that appears and click on Edit/Change (my system is in German here, so I'm doing literal translations in most cases, so please bear with me).

5) At the top of the form should be your Mac address for the card, this is the "Physical Address" line on the photo you posted, and is the hard coded mac address the manufacturer gives the card.

Underneath this, you should have a configuration method section. This should be set to "Automatic Address configuration (with DHCP)" or something similar wording. This should then pick up the details from the router for you.

6) Click on Hostname and Nameserver

The hostname can be anything you want it to be (no spaces or special characters), the Domain name is what you call the local network. I name mine the same as my Windows network.

The Nameserver and Domain search list should have the "Update Nameserver and search list through DHCP checked. Double check that it has picked up the correct address 192.168.1.1 in the case of the image you posted.

Click on OK.

7) Click on Routing, this is possibly where you are having problems. I've noticed that with some routers, my PC doesn't pick up the gateway correctly. If it hasn't automatically picked up the correct gateway address (the IP address of your router), you will need to enter the correct Gateway address, going from the image posted, you need to give this as 192.168.1.1

Click on OK

8) Click Next, you should be returned to the network card selection page, click Next again. YaST should take your changes and rewrite the configuration files and shutdown and restart the network card(s).

That should be it, if the information is now correct as per the image, then you should be able to surf the web.

Try a "ping 192.168.1.1" in a terminal window, if that works, you can see the router, then try pinging a website or other external address to see if you can see outside your network.

Note: After reconfiguring something in Linux, you just need to re-start the service you have adjusted. The only time you need to restart the PC is when you have downloaded a Kernel update.

If you are still having problems seeing the router with the above DHCP settings, try going through again and giving hard addresses for each section (PC address, DNS server address and Gateway) and see if that helps, it could be that the router is using a botched "Windows-only-extended" DHCP and not standard DHCP.

BTW, to get the equivalent to the ipconfig output in the image you've shown, open/go to a terminal window and type 'su' and press return (this brings up "substitute user", a method to work in somebody elses name, without a username it assumes you want to use root). This will ask for the root password.

Now type 'ifconfig' and it should list your network card configuration

Note: In both cases above, remove the single quotes from the command.

ifconfig is normally only available to root because it allows you to maniplulate the network card, not just look at its configuration - you can stop and start the card from the command line for example (E.g. ifconfig eth0 down, ifconfig eth0 up), so isn't usually available under your normal working account.