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ArtDog
10-15-2001, 11:20 PM
I know nothing about Linux whatsoever, but I wanted to try it out, so here's the deal. I have a Dell Inspiron 8000 with Win2000 on it and I would like to format my hard drive and set it up so I can dual boot between Linux and WindowsXP (I know Microsoft is evil, but I use it for all my gaming needs). Is this possible? If so how do I go about doing this? Will XP let me? I need to partition the hard drive right? Will Linux run okay on the laptop or are the drivers to specialized and funky for it to deal with? What distro would you recommend? A friend of mine uses Slackware and swears by it, will that handle my hardware without any problems? Help me please, it would be greatly appreciated.
If you need any specialized information on my hardware configuration, just let me know and I'll post it.
My email:
arthur.jacobson@uconn.edu
[ 15 October 2001: Message edited by: ArtDog ]
Syngin
10-15-2001, 11:24 PM
Hmm, there must be an NHF about this.
Here's a link to help you get started at least: http://www.linuxnewbie.org/nhf/intel/installation/preinstall.html
DwarfBaby
10-16-2001, 02:37 AM
You probably already know this but not all games will run on WIN/XP particularly older games. Even some fairly newer games will not be tweaked by XP's release. I mean I have some games that still won't run on WIN/2k and probably never will. For now WIN/98 SE still might be the best bet for games. Just my opinion though.
Eroberer
10-16-2001, 06:22 PM
ArtDog, do you happen to have a DVD/CDRW combo drive (Toshiba DVD-ROM SD-2002)? I'm going to try installing Linux on an Inspiron 8000, too.
ArtDog
10-17-2001, 12:46 PM
Nope, I opted to get the separate drives instead of the combo. It turned out to be a wise decision because my CD-RW broke last week and I at least had the DVD drive to fall back on. Dell's service & support is good though, a replacement is already in the mail.
BTW, lemme know how your installation goes.
[ 17 October 2001: Message edited by: ArtDog ]
Matches Malone
10-17-2001, 02:05 PM
Overall, ya need to repartition your drives, and if ya install Win first leaving space, Mandrake nicely partitions for you, easy-like(sliders n all :) )
I may not SWEAR by Mandrake in the future, but fer now it's the only one I haven't had trouble with(at least not trouble that either trashed my drive or trouble I couldn't at least TRY to fix) :D
Eroberer
10-17-2001, 02:40 PM
What if I opt to have the entire disk formatted in ntfs file system, with WinXP? Will anything in Mandrake or RH7.2 reformat for me?
ArtDog
10-17-2001, 04:04 PM
Can Linux handle NTFS or does it run better on FAT32? I would really prefer to use NTFS, but only if it works with Linux.
Originally posted by Eroberer:
<STRONG>What if I opt to have the entire disk formatted in ntfs file system, with WinXP? Will anything in Mandrake or RH7.2 reformat for me?</STRONG>The Mandrake and RH installation processes will allow you to create new partitions or reformat/delete existing ones, but they won't non-destructively resize an existing partition. If you have an NTFS part (with data on it that you want to keep) which needs to be shrunk, you'll have to use a third-party resizing utility that can deal with NTFS.
Originally posted by ArtDog:
<STRONG>Can Linux handle NTFS or does it run better on FAT32? I would really prefer to use NTFS, but only if it works with Linux.</STRONG> Linux can access NTFS and VFAT filesystems, but inherently runs on its own (ext2 or Reiser FS).
[ 17 October 2001: Message edited by: DMR ]