Flashed it. Changed the uboot variables as directed, tried to boot, it made it to starting kernel and locked up. I tried some variations of the commands.. Like my rootfs isn't jffs2, so I set it to ext2, didn't help. I removed the command completely, since I didn't have it before. Didn't help. Decided I should start over, so I entered resetenv.. Now everything seems hosed, those aren't anything like the "factory defaults" I expected it to have.  I'm so lost.

Ok, I'm back with a new question.. In the readme script:
I'm running Debian Lenny on an SD card.. /etc/sysctl.d is an empty directory.. Do I need to make this change somewhere else, create this file with that in it, or is it something I don't need to worry about at all? Thanks.

I could have sworn a searched aptitude for mtd, and installed something similar to that name. Ahh well, your suggestion did the trick. Thanks. Now I can go and try to brick my plug, err, I mean update my kernel. Thanks.

I have a Debian install on my SD card, I've decided to throw caution to the wind and flash a new kernel into my NAND.. So I downloaded the script and went to do it this evening.. Unfortunately I ran into a brick wall when it went to do the flashing..

I tried searching aptitude for it, no sign of it.. I assume this was included in the original install, but I'm not running that anymore.. Where would I get that? I did some searching of the forums, almost had it, but the link was no good.. Googled, no sign of it.. I need the erase_flash program as well.. Thanks.

Hmm.. Found your guide.. Man I wish I had found that sooner.. Looks like I'll pretty much have to start over and redo my install.

Drat.. You should edit the wiki.. hehe.. Where are your instructions at? I'll compare them and see if I can figure out how to change this myself.

http://www.openplug.org/plugwiki/index.php/Debian   I followed those instructions to a T (except replaced SDA1 with mmcblk0p1), not sure if those are your instructions or not, but they seemed to be the most straightforward.  /boot on my SD card is empty.. It looks like, from the bootargs at the end of that guide, that I'm referencing using something in NAND.. So I guess I am using the kernel in the NAND.. Is it straightforward to change that to using the SD card? Seems like I could test that pretty easily with no risk of bricking the thing..

So if I've installed Debian Lenny to an SD card, I can't just put the new kernel on the SD card and boot from it? Am I stuck flashing the new kernel into the onboard NAND?

Which is better? Anyone know the differences well enough to be able to compare/contrast the two options? I know one of them is more resource intensive than the other. I've got a remote X session working great on my LAN with the plug now. I fire up X11 on my OSX machine, and ran xterm, typed xhost + sheevaplugip  and then ssh'd into the plug and typed export DISPLAY=osxmachineip:0.0
Now when I run X apps from the ssh session, they appear on my screen on the OSX computer.. Lovin it..

Ok, I'm starting to catch on.. Sad to say, I used to know this sort of stuff 10 years ago, back when this was how you used Linux.. Several years of Ubuntu has made me soft.. It's all slowly starting to come back to me though. Thanks. You're right, this thing is hardly touching the ram, that's awesome.

Debian-Lenny on a 8gb SD card. There are a couple that I compiled an installed manually, not on this list.. Like Transmission.. apt-get got me version 1.22?!? I downloaded 1.76 and compiled/installed it myself..

I could have sworn I read something on here about each thread defaulting to using too much ram, and there being a way to turn it down a touch. But I can't seem to find that thread now, I spent quite a bit of time trying different search terms last night, never did find it. I did find some good info though. Anyways, here's my TOP command list:

Sorry that's a bit large.. It's all of the processes running on my machine. Note how at the top it says I only have 4megs free, it seems to be hanging out around there, the buffers change from 2 to 6mb free. I see a lot of my processes list a large amount of virtual memory.. Especially the php-cgi processes (why are there so many of them?), is that virtual memory free to be given to other processes, or do they actually have it locked down?
It's amazing, it wasn't all that long ago that I felt 512mb ram in a Linux machine was very very generous, now.. It feels kinda tight. I'm hoping it's just imaginary, and there's actually plenty of free ram left..

I got hung up on getting PHP working on my machine, the steps mentioned here didn't work for me.. After doing a remove --purge and a fresh install, I stopped long enough to read what was on the sample html page..
"lighty-enable-mod fastcgi"  was all I had to do to turn on PHP without breaking anything else.. This is on Debian Lenny.. Hope it helps anyone else stumbling through here in the future.

Ok, I guess I was a little slow.. It's hostname is Debian, but when I finally plugged in the USB cable and connected that way, it clearly states it's Jaunty ubuntu.. I've got Debian Lenny installed to an 8gb class 4 SDHC card now, and it's set to boot that by default.
It seems like the wiki is lacking.. I'm going to have to trudge through the threads on this forum to find the tips I've read over the past month or two while dreaming of owning this thing.

I got my Sheevaplug today. Plugged it in and ssh'd into it.. It identifies itself as "debian".. Have they switched to preinstalling Debian on these things now? I'm reading through the Wiki right now, noticed it says it would have Ubuntu on it.. Might need to update that. I plan to do a fresh install on an 8gb SD card anyways..
I love how the "Warranty Void if broken" sticker was only stuck to one side of the case.. So I can pop the thing open without voiding the warranty if I feel like it.. hahaha..
I decided not to fight with the USB-serial drivers on OSX and just fired up XP in VMWare.

There it is on my left speaker..