installing luinix on a laptop[New question]

b0bd0d

I got this hp pavilion ze4500 that my brother gave me. It's all half formatted with a windows install that's all messed up. I'm gonna install linuix to check it out. What's a good distro to install? I'm new to this, so...something easy till I figure it out. What, go back and format it for what, FAT32? install the distro? Boot? break, repair, etc? I'm going to be checking the googles tomarrow and what not but I figure I'll ask yall first. Cause you know, PA has that rep. specially SE++.

Edit: I got the ubuntu running but it's way too slow. I really dont want a windows clone. Is there a down and dirty version? I dont want no fancy stuff. Just some old school command line. Something I can start with and build up.

DrFrylock

Ubuntu is a very good distribution with very good hardware support and excellent, user-friendly installers and the like. It is also quite secure.

Linux generally doesn't use FAT32 partitions (although I believe that Linux can read and write FAT32 if you want). You'll probably partition and format for the ext3 filesystem (a Linux filesystem) when you install Ubuntu.

japan

The good thing about Ubuntu is that the installer comes on a LiveCD that boots into a full, working desktop. So if you download and burn the installation disc, you'll know as soon as you start it up whether you'll have hardware problems. Basically, if it starts up without errors, it'll install.

Googling about, there seems to be a few people who have successfully installed Ubuntu on your laptop, so you should be good to go. It's the easiest OS install I've ever performed, and that includes various versions of Windows. Boot it up, and the installer will step you through it.

Your hard disk will end up formatted as either ext2 or ext3, with a swap partition. Linux can natively read and write to FAT32, but I wouldn't recommend installing to a FAT32 partition. It will also read NTFS, but support for writing is considered experimental at best, and not recommended.

If you want an idea of what to expect, there's a good guide here. Bear in mind though that everything between the first "prepare disk space" screenshot and the one that says "ready to install" is optional. If you select "erase entire disk" at the "prepare disk space" screen, you'll jump straight to "ready to install." You don't need to delve into mount points and partitioning unless you really want to.

Lodbrok

I will second (third) ubuntu. I've run several distros, and none has been as troublefree as ubuntu, especially if you do not wish to get under the hood. However, if you have no preferences for a desktop environment, might I recommend that you go with Kubuntu? This is more or less the same distro as ubuntu but with the KDE deskptop instead of gnome. Even though it is easy to go from an Ubuntu install to Kubuntu (or the other way), you might want to determine from the start which one you like best... I prefer KDE but you might have a different opinion. Just something to think about, Linux is great in that if you do not like one desktop environment there are many others you can try... good luck.

redimpulse

Would it be alright if I fourth'd Ubuntu? It'd most likely be your best bet.

And yeah, you don't really want to install it to NTFS or FAT32. If you want to keep the current windows install available (for repair or whatever), just partition some of your empty space and format it ext3 like Frylock said.

Lodbrok

Oh yeah, another thing. If you decide to dual boot and reinstall windows, make sure you start by installing windows and then install linux. If you do it the other way around Windows will overwrite the linux bootloader so you cant boot into linux.

Chake99

I'd recommend Kubuntu, it is the same as ubuntu but has a KDE desktop environment which is better than GNOME, and would be more familiar to a windows user.

I'd recommend testing the live cd's of both versions 6.06 and 6.10 to see if your hardware is supported (6.10 first, 6.06 if it doesn't work). This would allow you to see if your computer would be able to run linux properly. Try to test your hardware as much as possible (e.g. try to connect to the internet).

As for file system, you can use Fat32 but ubuntu by default reformats on ext3 (runs faster) which is readable/writable with windows, so if you dual boot you can still access all your data. If you won't run windows something like RaiserFS or Raiser4 would most likely be better if Ubuntu supports it.

Ruckus

Also, Kubuntu. I've run plain ol' Ubuntu and Kubuntu, and even Xubuntu (uses XFCE Desktop instead of KDE), Kubuntu was the easiest to get the hang of.

Kreutz

Ubuntu is a fine distro, but make sure it works with your hardware before you commit to it. Just last week I removed my Ubuntu partition because it didn't support my wireless card.

Lodbrok

Ok, if you want to use the command-line and have a fast distro.... I would say Gentoo. This means you will have to compile almost everything yourself, but it will be fast and optimized for your system. In addition, gentoo has one of the best package management-systems out there. However, expect the installation to take a LONG time, it's been a while since I've done a gentoo install but I remember it taking me the better part of a day just to get the basic system up. If you want the fastest system possible, this is the way to go.

If you are feeling a bit less adventurous, there is also Vector Linux. I ran this distro on an old p3 laptop, and it was great, especially with the enlightenment window manager. It is based on slackware, one of the oldest distros, but optimized for older computers. This distro is probably not as fast as Gentoo, but honestly, I do not think you will notice the difference.

When I re-read your post, I wonder a bit... I have ran Kubuntu on worse hard-ware than that and it was not very slow. But you do realize that you do not have to re-install to try a different window-manager right? Because if it is slow, KDE is probably mainly to blame. Try installing a lighter windowmanager like icewm, fluxbox etc. Or hell, just press ctrl-alt-F1 and remove KDE altogether..... but I do not know why you would like to do this, are you going to use the computer as a server or something?

Barrakketh

You could try Xubuntu (package xubuntu-desktop). XFCE is a lightweight desktop environment, though it might not be minimalistic enough for you. You could also install something like fluxbox (as mentioned above).

Unless you're running a server there's not many good reasons to skip a desktop environment altogether. If you prefer to use a console there is nothing stopping you from opening one up and doing things that way.

b0bd0d

Im starting to think that it might be that the CD drive is somehow damaged or dirty or something. When I tried to run it live off of the cd, it was making nioses like a bad hard drive. It just basiclly stopped. Like wouldn't even load right and was all skippy. I'm gonna test the ram and see if anything is lose. It's acting really screwed up. The windows install on there was fine tho. Stupid computor! Why wount you work!