2 problems after switching to linux

[atomjetsam]

after a few bluescreens on windows, and having become increasingly frustrated with gatesland, i was convinced by a friend to make the switch to linux. i settled for mint maya xfce. i am no tech-head, and really only use my system for web browsing, downloading, playing music, looking at photos and watching films. i have a samsung n210 netbook, with a 1TB external hard drive which stores my collection. this is where the first problem comes in. when i booted up the hard drive for the first time on mint, a large amount of files on it were "hidden". it seemed to be blocks of stuff in certain folders. i have tried cutting and pasting to a folder on the desktop and returning them from whence they came, but they still appear as hidden, and have no idea how to "unhide" them, or indeeed why they have become hidden. everything was fine before the switch, although i suspect my system had a virus, as these hidden files include my entire ripped cd collection, which, since i have moved, remains shelved, and is my pride and joy, i am concerned. any help on this would be great.

the second problem is the internet connection. i feel i have gone back in time to the days of dial-up. it is truly terrible. i am on a wireless connection. the router is quite a way off to be fair, travelling through a couple of walls and a good 10 metres of outside world, but with (here i use the curse word again) windows, it was generally stable and quick, now it is unbearable, continually dropping out, taking minutes to load a page if it will at all. i have tried to find information on the driver, but there's only so many times i can read a message saying "problem loading page" before i have to smash something. i don't have a lot of china and windows (the kind you look through and open in the summer) are expensive to replace, so here i am on this forum lookin for help. perhaps there is a distro with better internet capabilities than mint? certainly there i things i do not understand...

other than these issues, i am happy with the switch to linux, making the break from gates-dom seems like a step into a better world, just want to make it better still.

[bimsebasse]

Hidden folders in Mint are revealed with the Ctrl+H shortcut.

[teilnehmer]

Regarding the wifi problem, you might want to websearch "ndiswrapper" and your wifi adapter. Ndiswrapper is included in Mint and allows the use of Windows drivers for your Wifi. I've read a few times that people have problems with the included wifi drivers.
I'm afraid I can't walk you through it, but maybe you'll find something searching for it, or someone else might walk you through if you provide brand and model of your wifi adapter.

Concerning the "hidden" folders, I don't quite understand the issue. Can you see these files? I assume to copy them you had to see them. If so: What exactly is amiss?
Is the anything in file properties that is different for those files compared to others? (Like file ownership or user rights)

Kind regards,

Jan

[thegreatgazoo]

About the hidden files. Do you mean that in windows you do not see them in your music folder but in Linux Mint you see all sorts of extra files in there?
If this is the case, It's normal. Windows and programs in windows usually put extra files in media folders for meta data like album art, icons, and custom folder options.
If you see extra files and folders with labels like "albumart" music.desktop, ._itunes, ._device, those are normal and not usually shown on windows.
I don't have a windows computer handy, so if you could list some of the hidden files you are talking about, that would really help. Especially a screenshot.

[homerscousin]

Just kind of a guess here on the hidden files issue. Does it have anything to do with the file extensions? Like .mkv, .avi, .mp3 etc? Maybe your files aren't recognized by Linux or whatever program you are trying to use to access them? Could it be the codecs or lack of them? Just not sure what you mean by hidden. Post some more info.

[Jix]

About the hidden files, do you mean other HDDs and subsequent folder/files (if you have them shortcutted to desktop) are not appearing by default? If that's the case, Linux has the perplexing habit of not mounting drives by default. You have to download this app from Synaptics: ntfs-config. Configure it to auto-mount the other HDD.