Hello. I know a guy with Mandrake Linux (latest version), and he is always
laughing at me for having bought Red Linux 5.2 and never installing it. I
just haven't had time, and, up until recently, not enough hard drive space,
and now, well, it's outdated. I'm thinking of connecting my 6GB hard drive
with one of those Y cables to have my 13GB HD, 6GB HD and 24x CD-ROM all at
the same time. The 6GB would, of course, go to Mandrake. Has anyone here
ever installed Linux like this (separate HD)? I need all the help I can get.
I am really, really meticulous and careful when I do anything to my
computer. I need all the information in plain english. Please give me any
suggestions you can. I would like to get things going just as good as I have
them in Windows 98: a simple, easy to follow GUI, POV-Ray, games, Internet,
speadsheets, e-mail, the works. Thanks in advance to everyone. =)

Post a reply to this message

TonyB wrote:
> 
> Hello. I know a guy with Mandrake Linux (latest version), and he is always
> laughing at me for having bought Red Linux 5.2 and never installing it. I
> just haven't had time, and, up until recently, not enough hard drive space,
> and now, well, it's outdated. I'm thinking of connecting my 6GB hard drive
> with one of those Y cables to have my 13GB HD, 6GB HD and 24x CD-ROM all at
> the same time. The 6GB would, of course, go to Mandrake. Has anyone here
> ever installed Linux like this (separate HD)? I need all the help I can get.
> I am really, really meticulous and careful when I do anything to my
> computer. I need all the information in plain english. Please give me any
> suggestions you can. I would like to get things going just as good as I have
> them in Windows 98: a simple, easy to follow GUI, POV-Ray, games, Internet,
> speadsheets, e-mail, the works. Thanks in advance to everyone. =)

Hi Anthony!

It's especially easy to install Linux on a computer when you have a
seperate HD at hand. 6GB are still a lot (I only have 1GB for Linux and
WIN95 + my zip disks). The first thing you is to create a linux boot
disk for your computer or if you have a bootable CD-ROM boot linux from
the CD. Then you prepare several partitions (SuSE has a GUI for it) for
LINUX on the HD, which should be documented in the docs of the
distribution and format the HD. This is the trickiest part. After that
the software you wish to install is selected and played onto the
partitions. Then you or a installation GUI create a user and voila, you
are into Linux. After that Xwindows needs to be configured (the second
big step for newbies). 
If you can get help from a friend who has done this before ask his.
Otherwise read the manual carefully. I know many people dislike SuSE but
at least their manual (in german) has allways been good.

This is a rough outline of the work to do. 
You can configure the computer in a way that if you say nothing WIN98
will be booted and Linux only when you wish to boot it. Very helpful
when you have a wife like mine :-)

I don't know Mandrake but heard nothing bad about it!


All the Best and don't bother to ask further questions,

Marc

Post a reply to this message

>It's especially easy to install Linux on a computer when you have a
>seperate HD at hand.

Great... even if it will be the slave HD?

>Then you prepare several partitions (SuSE has a GUI for it) for
>LINUX on the HD, which should be documented in the docs of the
>distribution and format the HD.

OK, so why do I need several partitions, and how many shall I need?

>After that Xwindows needs to be configured (the second
>big step for newbies).

Could you elaborate more on this? I've also heard of Gnome and KDE. Are
these better than XWindows?

>If you can get help from a friend who has done this before ask his.

I have the e-mail of some guy who lives in Panama and that has used Linux
since his days in college in the 60s (he must be old...), but I don't feel
like having a complete stranger come over.

>Otherwise read the manual carefully. I know many people dislike SuSE but
>at least their manual (in german) has allways been good.

My aquaintance (with Mandrake) used SuSE before.

>This is a rough outline of the work to do.
>You can configure the computer in a way that if you say nothing WIN98
>will be booted and Linux only when you wish to boot it. Very helpful
>when you have a wife like mine :-)

=) I've read something about that. Isn't that LILO? Can I also use the Boot
Manager from Partition Magic?


>I don't know Mandrake but heard nothing bad about it!


I hear it is basically a derivative of the RedHat distribution.

>All the Best and don't *bother* to ask further questions,

But I need to ask more... :(  I know so little...

Post a reply to this message

>I have the e-mail of some guy who lives in Panama and that has used Linux
>since his days in college in the 60s (he must be old...), but I don't feel
>like having a complete stranger come over.


Sorry. That would be UNIX, not LINUX...

Post a reply to this message

TonyB wrote:
> 
> Great... even if it will be the slave HD?

Linux needs to boot from one of your first two IDE drives if you're
using IDE (I don't think this requirement holds for SCSI).  It also has
to be on a partition in the first Iforgethowmany cylinders.

> >Then you prepare several partitions (SuSE has a GUI for it) for
> >LINUX on the HD, which should be documented in the docs of the
> >distribution and format the HD.
> 
> OK, so why do I need several partitions, and how many shall I need?

You really only need two: root and swap.  You should have a swap
partition (unless you have gobs of memory), and Linux prefers (very
strongly) a partition dedicated to that purpose.
 
> Could you elaborate more on this? I've also heard of Gnome and KDE. Are
> these better than XWindows?

X provides a very low-level GUI and doesn't include all the fancy bells
and whistles you're used to from a GUI (right-click menus, task bar,
drag & drop between windows, that sorta stuff), though it does provide
the low-level support for such things.  They end up being provided by
other software packages that runs on top of X. Gnome and KDE combine
aspects of a GUI API and a higher-level GUI with which applications can
interact, and each provides some such applications.  Then you also have
a window manager, something like fvwm, Enlightenment, AfterStep, etc.
that provides more of the look and feel as well as the widgets in your
window frames.  It's all very modular, highly customizable, and still in
development. :-P
  
> =) I've read something about that. Isn't that LILO? Can I also use the Boot
> Manager from Partition Magic?
> 
> >I don't know Mandrake but heard nothing bad about it!

LILO should be an option (not sure how well it gets along with Win98). 
I don't know about Partition Magic.
 
> I hear it is basically a derivative of the RedHat distribution.

There's a religious war between KDE and Gnome, and Red Hat sided with
Gnome, largely for ideological reasons.  Some people preferred KDE
(which is more mature than Gnome) and built a KDE-oriented distribution
around Red Hat (something like what Red Hat would be like had they
chosen KDE instead of Gnome).  That's how I understand Mandrake,
anyways.
 
> But I need to ask more... :(  I know so little...

Ask away.

-Mark Gordon

Post a reply to this message

>Linux needs to boot from one of your first two IDE drives if you're
>using IDE (I don't think this requirement holds for SCSI).  It also has
>to be on a partition in the first Iforgethowmany cylinders.

Excellent. Then I shouldn't have any problems. I just need to get one of
those IDE Y-cables.

>You really only need two: root and swap.  You should have a swap
>partition (unless you have gobs of memory), and Linux prefers (very
>strongly) a partition dedicated to that purpose.

OK, so for POV, and all my other future Linuxing needs I only require two?
That should be easy enough. BTW, I have 128MB of memory, is that enough?
(OK, stupid question, I know... POV can eat that up very fast...)

>It's all very modular, highly customizable, and still in
>development. :-P

A little too modular. :| Let me review this: X Windows is the base, upon
which I add KDE, which gives me more interactivity between the GUI and my
mouse, and then fvwm/Elightenment/AfterStep (which is best?) add the
Minimize, Maximize and Kill to the window edge? Sounds complicated... :/


>LILO should be an option (not sure how well it gets along with Win98).
>I don't know about Partition Magic.

Not PM, but the Boot Manager from it. I think it and Windows coexist
happily. I've tried it before (with '95).

>There's a religious war between KDE and Gnome, and Red Hat sided with
>Gnome, largely for ideological reasons.

Odd. Such as?

>Some people preferred KDE
>(which is more mature than Gnome) and built a KDE-oriented distribution
>around Red Hat (something like what Red Hat would be like had they
>chosen KDE instead of Gnome).  That's how I understand Mandrake,
>anyways.


Ooohhh... then yay, Mandrake! ^_^  (Right?)

>Ask away.


Thanks. =)

Post a reply to this message

TonyB wrote:

> >You really only need two: root and swap.  You should have a swap
> >partition (unless you have gobs of memory), and Linux prefers (very
> >strongly) a partition dedicated to that purpose.
>
> OK, so for POV, and all my other future Linuxing needs I only require two?
> That should be easy enough. BTW, I have 128MB of memory, is that enough?
> (OK, stupid question, I know... POV can eat that up very fast...)

Although some installations mention having a separate partition for /home
I guess part of that is so that you can completely blow away the Linux system
and re-install while preserving any user data you have.

Also, if your computer's BIOS handles it, you might be able to boot and
install straight from the CD.

> >It's all very modular, highly customizable, and still in
> >development. :-P
>
> A little too modular. :| Let me review this: X Windows is the base, upon
> which I add KDE, which gives me more interactivity between the GUI and my
> mouse, and then fvwm/Elightenment/AfterStep (which is best?) add the
> Minimize, Maximize and Kill to the window edge? Sounds complicated... :/

1) Linux gives you the core OS.

2) X-Windows gives you a graphical display.

3) A window manager running on top of that gives you frames for the windows,
helps them move, etc.
(I'd suggest using Enlightenment, with maybe Window Maker if you reaaaaaaly
don't like Enlightenment)

4) On top of X and the window manager runs your desktop environment, if you
so choose to have one. This is usually either KDE (booo hiss) or GNOME.


> >LILO should be an option (not sure how well it gets along with Win98).
> >I don't know about Partition Magic.
>
> Not PM, but the Boot Manager from it. I think it and Windows coexist
> happily. I've tried it before (with '95).

From what I read a little, sticking with LILO is the better thing to do. I
scanned the newsgroups this last spring when I bought Partition Magic and
first installed Linux at home.


> >There's a religious war between KDE and Gnome, and Red Hat sided with
> >Gnome, largely for ideological reasons.
>
> Odd. Such as?

Well, KDE is built on top of the Qt widget library which was not really open
until recently. Details can be drudged up if needed, but part of the gripe
extends to the current stuff, where only the Linux version of their (Troll
tech) stuff is free, but it costs $$ for other platforms (MS Windows, etc.)

Gnome is built on top of GTK+, which is completely open source and free (as
in free speach). It also is being ported to Win32 and BeOS as we speak.


> >Some people preferred KDE
> >(which is more mature than Gnome) and built a KDE-oriented distribution
> >around Red Hat (something like what Red Hat would be like had they
> >chosen KDE instead of Gnome).  That's how I understand Mandrake,
> >anyways.
>
> Ooohhh... then yay, Mandrake! ^_^  (Right?)

Also, as of the later versions of Red Hat, KDE has been present as an option.



BTW, if forgot to mention. I'd strongly suggest going with Red Hat 6.0 over
5.2. Among other things, there is the change from the 2.0.x kernel to the
2.2.x series. If you want, you can get the free version from places like
CheapBytes for $1.99 + S/H for a bootable install CD. (that's all I ever use)

--
"My new computer's got the clocks, it rocks
But it was obsolete before I opened the box" - W.A.Y.

Post a reply to this message

Mark Gordon wrote:
> 
> Linux needs to boot from one of your first two IDE drives if you're
> using IDE (I don't think this requirement holds for SCSI).  It also has
> to be on a partition in the first Iforgethowmany cylinders.
> 

The first 1024 ! :-)

That the reason why at least three partitions are a good idea. You can
but a very small / - partition into the first 1024 cylinders and then
use a /usr and a /home partition. But that very much into the detail.
The manuals are more precise then I could be. 

Marc

-- 
Marc Schimmler

Post a reply to this message

Hi Tony,
just a few comments, first, the things already said are my opinion. But
one thing to note, don't try to switch between Windows and Linux via
BIOS. I did that with my SCSI-system, and it's plain pain. That's
because linux and windows identify the drives differently. So don't
change the order of drives by bios.
I use lilo at home with no problems, at the office we use loadlin. It's
just plain cool to have a little penguin icon on your desktop to boot
linux :-)
Just a last comment on partitions. A lot of things tend to go on the
/opt-tree. Thats more or less religion, some folks like /usr/local for
extra stuff, I like /opt. Some distributions use /opt/kde and /opt/gnome
by default (SuSE does) for KDE and GNOME. These get large! I tend to
like the opt-thing because both KDE and GNOME are rapidly evolving, so
cleaning up the tree is easier in /opt/gnome than stripping all gnome
and kde and docbook and ... stuff.

Axel

Post a reply to this message

On Tue, 28 Sep 1999 22:46:35 -0700, Jon A. Cruz wrote:
>> >LILO should be an option (not sure how well it gets along with Win98).
>> >I don't know about Partition Magic.
>>
>> Not PM, but the Boot Manager from it. I think it and Windows coexist
>> happily. I've tried it before (with '95).
>
>From what I read a little, sticking with LILO is the better thing to do. I
>scanned the newsgroups this last spring when I bought Partition Magic and
>first installed Linux at home.

Caldera OpenLinux 2.2 (and the new 2.3, I suspect) have a Windows-based 
install program that will help you with the partitioning and other stuff
you need to do to install Linux.  In addition, it comes with a free "lite"
version of Partition Magic and of Boot Magic.  Boot Magic works fine for
Linux.

Post a reply to this message