Newest of the Newbies Needing Help, PLS
 

Hi all,

First post, anyway I want to install Debian Linux and Windows XP Home Edition on my PC. I have 2 SATA HDD's and I want both of the OS's to run using RAID 0 (striped). Is this possible?

Also I would like some information on how to install it ect. I have only started downloading it off Bittorrent I have Broadband so it should only take a few days.

Thanks for your help :)

Perhaps you should try something debian based, i.e. a derivative? Debian "proper" is not what I'd call a "user friendly" distro if you're just starting out!

Don't see why you shouldn't be able to do what you've asked, but debian will probably require lots of manual config. Maybe Ubuntu or Kubuntu (first is gnome frontended, second is kde - though you should be able to get kde if you prefer using it via the package manager) - I hear good reports of hardware detection etc and as the base install etc is all on the one disc then it should be quicker than getting debian proper.

Also, if you have broadband, why bother with bittorrent? surely it's gonna be considerably quicker to use one of the debian mirrors?

Maybe, you could download a Knoppix ISO and try that too see if your RAID is recognised ok (hell you can even install it to the hdd if you want - it's debian based afterall) but in any case it should prove your hardware just from the live CD!

Sorry I can't be more specific.

regards

John

The main reason I am installing Linux is to learn as much as I can from it, sorry I didn't mention that before. I really don't want another installation of something that is all point and click as I want to learn a lot, thanks :)

Most "point-and-click" Linux distros don't hide the system from you. You can still use the command-line. You can still install programs from source (if you want to). You can still edit configuration files.

In order to do raid like this, you'll need TRUE hardware raid. No driver-based or other software raid. You need a card that makes the two hard drives appear as one. Linux and windows drivers will not implement software raid in the same way and WILL cause corruption to one or both filesystems.

Then again, if you want to take the plunge and maybe struggle a bit but be forced to learn a lot, feel free to use a "harder" distro. I went straight from Windows to Slackware (supposed to be one of the harder distros) without many problems. It definitely took time, but I'm glad I did that rather than get too used to the KDE graphical config tools that aren't always really clear about what they're changing.

Thank you for all of your help, I might just stick with having JBOD for my HDD setup and install MS and Linux on two seperate drives, as it seems a bit too complicated unfortunately for me. But yes,your answers were helpful and I appreciate that.

No problem. Let us know if we can be of any other help. :)

Ok, I have downloaded debian-31r0a-i386-binary-1.iso what do I need to do next, can someone point me to a site that has instructions please.

Thanks in advance.

You'll need to burn it to a CD and then boot to that CD. Use the "Burn ISO File" or "Burn Image" setting in your burner software (it won't work if you just put it on a data CD).

But I need the drivers for all of my hardware first, is that correct?

Well before you worry about drivers and configuring hardware, you need to burn the CD, backup important data, resize/add partitions as appropriate (depending on what's on there now), install Debian, configure your display, etc.

Hello,

I have a problem during installation. When I put the DVD ISO in and change to boot from CD in BIOS. After that I get to see all the Linux options like choose your language, intall ect.

Then it starts installing all of the drivers, gets up to Loading Module 'Sd_Mod' for 'SCSI disk support'... . Then it stops installing at 92%.

Any help on this problem would be great,

thank you.

Do you have any scsi drives? If not, try adding "noscsi" as a boot option for the installer.

I have 2 SATA drives one already has Windows XP on it, but I want to reformat it and install Windows XP again. And also install Linux Debian as a second boot option. I think my computer sees the SATA as SCSI, correct me if I'm wrong, thank you.

::EDIT::

Can someone tell me what "fake RAID" is?