Hi Mike,
I'm one and a half steps ahead of you in terms of being a newbie to Linux.
I've just installed Mandrake 9.1 onto my Acer desknote 2.66Ghz, 80GB, 1GB
ram Intel4 chip PC.
It wasn't the 'breeze' I thought it would be as the distro seemed to have
some problems identifying components and kept hanging up ('lost
interrupt')when first installing. I had to get Geoff Palmer from PC World
(who sold me the 3 CD distro for $25) to come up with the command line
'noapi' or similar after hitting F1 on bootup... (no idea what it did!) -
things started to load OK then. After following the GUI install instructions
I came to the partitioning part. The Drake partitioning tool worked
perfectly for my NTFS hard drive and it was simply a case of useing the
spare disc space in my windows partition (default option) and shrinking the
windows partition down to a more manageable size. NOTE: Backup any important
data first and carry out a hard drive scan and de-frag prior to installing
Mandrake.
My 'half' step is installing a modem driver. Typically my modem is a
'half-breed' and a pukka driver is not due out till 'fall' this year. I've
downladed a possible driver but so far been unable to load it. This has
really put the kaibosh on the Linux for me at the moment. I went (for the
first time) to the CLUG last Monday in the hope of meeting people who might
'have a clue' as to how to fix things. The overview of Linux was very
intersting but it would seem i really need an 'installfest' - my advice
would be that if you are about to jump into Linux for the first time perhaps
it would be a good idea to hold back till the guys and girls at CLUG hold
their next 'installfest'...I've found that it makes a BIG difference being
able to talk to someone when trying to learn something totally new...
I've no idea when the next 'fest' will be...soon I hope...does anyone out
there know?
Ralph
----- Original Message -----
From: "michael - (mike) brooker" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Sent: Wednesday, October 01, 2003 1:14 PM
Subject: LINUX QUESTIONS
> Hi, As yet I am not a LINUX user. First I want to find out the
> best (read easiest) format to use, eg. REDHAT, X, or whatever.
>
> So, will someone please point me in the right direction?
> Where do I download the free Linux?
> Is there a site with an internet download?
> Or do I need to download set-up discs?
> I'm running win98 on a celeron chip. I have a 40 gig HDD, and 128 RAM -
> and limited computer intelligence. Well, not too low!
>
> Thanks for any help.
>
> mike brooker
>
>
