Re: Will Soon Install Linux on Old Win Machine
- From: slick_shoes <slick_shoes_mailing@xxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Mon, 11 Sep 2006 16:30:05 -0700
On 11 Sep 2006 13:44:02 -0700
"Dano" <dan@xxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
I recently bought a surplus computer from my work: Gateway 600MHz
Pentium III with a 20 GB hard drive, and 258 MB RAM. By all accounts,
this should be fine for a Linux box, yes?
This is perfect. I have 350MHz boxes with 64MB RAM that run Linux just
fine.
I have done some research, and will likely install Ubuntu Linux (when
my discs arrive in the mail), and in the meantime, I have downloaded a
version of Feather Linux and Damn Small Linux (on a dialup! Yikes!) to
play around with.
Just a word of warning with the free Ubuntu disks that come in the
mail: they take /forever/ to come! You might be better off just
downloading them, even with your dial-up connection.
I want to convert the "new to me" Gateway box into a strictly Linux
box, so I want to completely get rid of the Windows that currently
resides on (infests? ;) ) its hard drive. Do I simply do a "format
c:\" DOS command to erase the hard drive, or is there some better way
to make sure it goes away completely. (I just ran across the term
"zerofill utility" today, and if anyone could clarify this, that'd be
great!)
Don't worry about "completely getting rid of Windows." Installing Linux
on the hard drive does this just fine. During installation, you'll have
to repartition the hard-drive for use with Linux, and once it
installs, it will go right over the top of where Windows once
lived. In case you're curious though, a "zero-fill utility" is just a
program that starts at the beginning of a hard-drive, and fills it with
a bunch of zeros. You shouldn't need to do this, except in special
circumstances.
Then, when it comes time to install Linux, do I just pop a CD in, and
it automagically installs using the BIOS or any remnants of DOS that
might remain?
Correct. You'll need to tell you BIOS to boot from a CD-ROM, and then
turn your computer on with the Linux installation disk in the drive.
The installation program will come up, and you'll be ready to rock.
I'm fairly good with computers, but this is my first foray into the
Linux world. I'm anxious to learn, which is why I'm doing it in the
first place. So any pointers the experts out there can give me would
be much appreciated! Thanks in advance!
I'd recommend getting one or two good books. One of my favorites is
"Running Linux," published by O'Reilly. I think it's in the 5th edition
now. It's a pretty good introduction to Linux.
Other than that, make sure you check out www.tldp.org; it contains a
lot of useful texts.
Dano
Good luck, and have fun!
slick_shoes
.
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