question about mandrake & laptops & PC

[crowdaddy00]

i have mandrake 8.0 and would like to know if i install another HD to my PC, can i just have it on that one and not have it dual boot with windows on my other HD? i would just go into the BIOS and have the other HD with linux on it boot up instead and switch back and forth when i need to. is that possible? also, i'm in the market of looking for a cheap laptop(at least 200mhz CPU & a 2.1gig HD) to run linux. which one would be best to look at? thanks

[MaXimum SMOKE]

I haven't seen a BIOS that allows hard drive swapping... master for slave, personally. If you don't mind using a floppy disk to boot the system, do a custom install, and when it asks about the loader, tell it to put it on the second disk, the one with the Linux install on it. make sure you build the floppy boot disk. Use the floppy to boot the system. I can't really advise you on the laptop.

[crowdaddy00]

i thought that in my BIOS, it has a part where u select what to boot first. i haven't tried yet but i think u can select either one of the HD's if you want to boot up first. i might just do it your way though. thanks a lot

[MaXimum SMOKE]

If you can do so, it might work. Just select the second HD as the boot device, then do a normal install. Linux may think that the drive it is on is the primary disk and that it is installing to it's MBR At least that's what we hope, any how If you do custom partitioning, you should see the disk drives enough to tell. If it were to install lilo to that drive, you may be ok.

[crowdaddy00]

well i just installed mandrake 8.0 and i just had it install as a dual boot system. i have problems with mandrake now. since i know nothing about it, i cant configure the video card or the sound card. i also have a lot of other things in the other catagory(mainly intel stuff) that wont load properly. i can see the screen but going into harddrake, it doesnt show it there. the video card is a ATI Radeon 8500. the sound card is a soundblaster audigy. everything else seems fine. i set up the root dir for 3.4gig and the home dir for 24gig. is that right? thanks again

[MaXimum SMOKE]

It has been I while since I looked at 8.0, (8.2 is the current 'stable' and 9.0 b1 seems to be the current beta) I have used an ATI rage without issue, but haven't tried the Radeon) I think audigy uses the same chip as the ?? Live?? Can you acquire the current stable? It may help. Partitions are a personal preference thing. I usually do a primary part as /boot , which is small 60 meg or so then a logical partition as SWAP like about 300 meg or so. Put up another logical like 1 gig for storage so I don't loose stuff when I do an upgrade (due to over-writes) /Storage then turn the rest to a logical / (root , not /root ) So / becomes /home /usr and the rest of that stuff as the OS dictates. (Primary = partition # 1-4) Logical is #5 - whatever) Is the intel stuff like motherboard items? A newer version may help.

[crowdaddy00]

well i guess i better go and get the new version then. i will have to go to the store and buy it like i did with 8.0 cause of my slow 56k modem. thanks for the help

[TMAN]

The radeon *should* work. I've seen mandrake install the r128 driver instead of the radeon driver. I believe the audigy and the live are two different chips. Be patient, Creative is working on a driver for Linux. You shouldn't have to download a new version of linux- yet. Going to the distro site and downloading the drivers should be given a chance first. A 56k modem should be able to handle that :-).

[crowdaddy00]

could i possibly install mandrake on an old compaq deskpro 400mhz pentium 2? thanks

[Streams]

Yes mandrake will run fine on a 400Mhz compaq.

[crowdaddy00]

thanks a lot. i wanna learn how to use linux so i can be more well rounded in my computer knowledge. thanks again

[Streams]

How much RAM does this compaq have? 128megs and up will be fine 64MB is OK but a bit too slow for me.

[crowdaddy00]

it has 128mb. i have mandrake installed but the sound isn't working. it has onboard sound. its not a big deal cause i don't know anything about linux and this is only for me to learn. sound is not that importent. i am going to start my adventure in linux in the morning. wish me luck.

[jglen490]

Originally posted by crowdaddy00 i have mandrake 8.0 and would like to know if i install another HD to my PC, can i just have it on that one and not have it dual boot with windows on my other HD? i would just go into the BIOS and have the other HD with linux on it boot up instead and switch back and forth when i need to. is that possible? also, i'm in the market of looking for a cheap laptop(at least 200mhz CPU & a 2.1gig HD) to run linux. which one would be best to look at? thanks

On your first question. You can do all that, but that's really awkward. Why not simply let Linux put a boot manager (Grub or Lilo) on the MBR of the primary hard drive? Then you can select from the menu whether to boot Windoze or Linux. It's really not a major problem and it won't bother your Windoze space at all.

As to your second question, any major brand (IBM, Dell, Compaq) produced within the past 3 - 4 years should work just fine. There are resources to help you with that selection. Try the Linux hardware database and Linux on Laptops . I run Mandrake 8.2 on my IBM TP365XD, which is a 1996 era laptop.