Linux -Mandrake

[Al Pollock]

Hello people ............well got my grubby little hands on a copy of Linux-Mandrake and tried to install it on a brand new system just for fun.............tried expert and auto and I keep coming up with the same error ???? when it ask to install on the HD it can't seem to find the Hd or doesn'tr recognize it ???
The system has a abit MB NF8-V2, Athalon 64 3000+ and a Maxtor 80 gig HD no floppy just dvd/cd burner and 1/2 gig of ram..................






Thanks all


AL

[glc]

Is the hard drive seen in the bios? If you try to install Windows, does it see the hard drive?

[Al Pollock]

Hey GLC ....Yup !! on both accounts ,would have no problem installing windows . I get it to the point where it ask do you want to use druid ( If I remember)or fdisk .then after that it gives me messages about partion's etc

[glc]

Okay - if you choose one of those, what does it do next?

[Al Pollock]

I try to edit or continue or retry and thats when it says it can't recognize partion ?? I t's a 80 gig maxtor and I have it partioned into two part. 40 gig each and fat 32...no materr what i do I can't get passed this point .......Am I suppose to be able to use the keyboard at this point ? if so it does work up until this point and then all I can do is exit or go to menu...???

[glc]

Why is the drive already partitioned? Remove the partitions and let the Linux setup do that for you.

[kilgoretrout]

Do as glc says - delete the partition, leave that space unallocated and direct the install program to install on the unallocated space. I believe that is a specific option with the mandrake installer. You cannot install linux on a FAT32 partition by the way. If you where trying to do so, that is the reason for the error messages.
Finally, if the version you have is called "Mandrake", you are dealing with a pretty old version of that distro. Mandrake changed its name to "Mandriva" in early 2005 IIRC. You can download Mandriva 2006 for free and the freely downloadable version of Mandriva 2007 will be out in about six months. I wouldn't recommend using the beta version of 2007 which is freely downloadable now as it's pretty buggy and mainly for developers at this point.

[Al Pollock]

Sorry it took me so long to get back to you guys gets kind of crazy around here....I had built a small system for some one and hadn't received the OS for it yet so I was playing with Mandrake which some one had given me....and yes it was set up for fat 32 and I did have more problems after I did whatGLC mentioned ,now I know why ...........

Thank's

AL

[Al Pollock]

What actually shoud the file system be for Linux

[kilgoretrout]

You have a variety to choose from; the most popular at the moment are reiserfs and ext3. Personally, I like reiserfs for desktops because it handles hard shutdowns better in my experience. Other linux filesystems include xfs, ext2 and jfs. Just go with reiserfs or ext3 and you should be fine.

[Al Pollock]

Thank's !!