My Linux box had to be replaced ...

Over the week-end, the Linux server at my house shut down several times. It provides
- file service to
   - the desktops in the house (Windows desktop, Mac desktop, my travel laptop)
   - the Sonos music system
- email service for my private domain
- web server for my personal website including password-protected access to
      - the document storage
      - the music collection
      - 10 years of photo albums and some home videos
      - a Wiki note-taking server

This was quite annoying, since it was doing it at a time when I was trying to finish up my 2013 tax filings, and of course the program is on my (Windows) desktop but the files are mounted from Samba shares on the Linux box.

At first, I thought it was happening when I was doing certain file operations, so I attributed it to a bug in a recent update to the Samba file service, but then it occurred to me, that an ordinary system crash should lead to a reboot. So I thought maybe I had picked up some malware. The uptimes were getting shorter ... under an hour. So I went to look at /var/log/messages and learned that a motherboard temperature sensor was triggering a shutdown when it reached 139 degrees Celsius. My next thought was a failed fan in CPU or power supply, but after opening the case, I found all the fans in good working order. But a large chip with a 4cm x 4cm heat sink was hot enough to fry an egg. A google search for the motherboard's model name gave me a board layout picture which identified the hot chip as the SouthBridge (disk controller, mostly). So it was clear that I needed a new box.

The old box was a HP Pavillion, and the local Best Buy had a current HP Pavillion for just under $500, so I picked it up Monday afternoon and after dinner, I started scouting out how to get online again.

My first hope was that I could just remove the hard drive in the new computer and plug in the old drives and see if it booted. No such luck: No bootable files found. I swapped the drive connectors with no improvement.

Next thought was to boot from a Fedora Linux Live CD and look around. But it would not boot from the CD. I tried a lot of things to find a boot configuration menu, but without luck:
- The power-up screen offered no suggestions
- The Quick Start booklet had no useful information other than to suggest that if I started up windows, I would find a program that might give me more documentation or information about a telephone number for technical support.

I put the Windows drive back in, and did the "first boot and system setup" for Windows 8.1. I found the so-called documentation, which was useless. Finally, I called the 800-number for technical support. In India. After insisting on taking all my personal information before I could ask how to boot from a CD, he asked why I wanted to do that. "To install Linux instead of Windows", I explained. "Why would you want to do that?" I explained. He explained that running Linux on HP Consumer grade computers was not supported and would void the warranty. I explained that I am used to installing and managing Linux systems, but I needed to know how to boot from a CD. He did not know, but put me on hold while he "explored resources". After about 10 minutes he came back to tell me that he would transfer me to another support group that might know something about Linux. And after 30 seconds of switching noises, I landed on a recording that explained that "this office is now closed, please call back during business hours".

I called back to the 800 number. Went through the same script with a new person, who told me that I would get a boot device selection menu if I hot the "Fn" key. I had reused my old keyboard, which did not have an Fn key, but the keyboard that came with the new computer had one. I made the mistake of thanking the support rep; he hung up. I switched keyboard and rebooted a fair number of times while tapping the Fn key. No result at all.

I called back to the 800 number. Same script. Same promise of a referral "but I will stay with you to make sure you get connected". Still the call got lost after about 5 minutes in the hold queue after the alleged transfer.

Called back 4th time. By now, the wait before the first rep was 35 minutes. After going through the script, this rep saw that I had been through the mill 3 times, and sent me to the US-based professional workstation support group. When the rep there answered after about 5 minutes in the second hold queue, he was surprised that I had been transferred, because he was not supposed to touch consumer products and did not have any documentation for Pavillion desktops. He did know a lot about unix. He also had used the Pavillions and gave be some hints about boot escape keys:
- ESC is an EFI configuration menu called "Startup Menu"
- F2 is firmware based hardware diagnostics
- F9 is "Boot Menu", selecting a boot device for this boot only
- F10 is "BIOS setup Menu".
When I tried to boot from the CD, I got "Secure Boot Failure - Unsigned Content".
He thought I should be able to select a "Legacy Boot" option instead of the "Secure Boot" default configuration, but reminded me that he really was not trained on advanced configuration of Pavillion Systems. He then promised to find me a competent support rep in the consumer product group.

While I waited on hold again, I figured out how to switch to "Legacy Boot". At that point, the machine would no longer boot the Windows hard drive, but it booted the Linux CD, which allowed me to see the old drive that was still plugged in. So I exchanged the Windows drive for my old Linux system disk ... and the system booted to my old Fedora Linux desktop.

I had almost forgotten my Workstation support rep, but he came back and apologized for having been unable to find me help. He would file an escalation request and someone should call me back within a day or so. But he was pleased when I told him that once I had the basic information on where to find the menu, I had solved the problem myself. He was as disgusted as I was about the poor quality of the documentation and the support. He did suggest that if I would buy professional products instead of consumer products, I would get technical support from the United States instead of from India. And I pointed out that those products cost about twice as much for similar capabilities.

The irony is that a few years ago, I had a couple of HP laptops for which I needed technical support, and the support reps in India were EXCELLENT, well trained, polite, knowledgeable and patient. This was a great factor in my purchase of a HP desktop rather than a Dell or an ASUS (is that who took over Gateway/eMachines?) But I can no longer recommend these HP systems.