I know there is a similar thread to this, but i was having trouble following it once the second person added a problem.
I have a feeling my problem is slightly more simple to solve and i'm not ready for all the technical stuff that i don't need to know

so here it is.

I recently bought a copy of Sobell's "a practical guide to red hat linux" as i believe this is the software we are using at uni. Included is FC5 and I am trying to install it so that i can have a dual boot system.

I am using a vaio laptop, intel dual core, 1.83 ghz, 1gb ram, 80gb partitioned ( i believe) harddrive (20gb for c: and windows installation, 60 gb for the rest)

I have bought a portable external harddrive (Western Digital 120gb) and I wish to use this to load the FC5 to.

Can i do this? because when i get to the drive selection, all i have is something like dv/sda or something (can't remember from top of head) and it is ticked and grayed out. i assume this is my internal drive because it has 76000ish mb.

can anyone help me with this. i desperately need it installed on my computer to complete an assignment.

I would also appreciate it if you assume i have no technical knowledge as sometimes people just jump right into it. I am primarily a java programmer and have not yet learnt about the finer points of the computer system. that said, im also not a complete numpty... just a n00b

Thanks guys,
any help would be appreciated


also, do i need to format the harddrive to ntsf format?
this is what i would assume....

Sorry Elendrael,... I'm a newbie too
I've tried to installing windows XP and mandriva one in the same computer.
It's success (with some problem of course)

You don't need to format yor harddrive into NTFS.
Linux can't be installed in ntfs format (as far as I know)

May be you can use some tools like swissknife or partition magic (try to download their shareware). You will able to partition your harddrives as U wish,..

Then U can install your RedHat from the CD ROM

Here are your step-by-step:

1. make sure your external drive is connected to your laptop
2. boot your laptop up with the FC5 CD
3. follow the default until you get to partitioning
4. here is where it get scary --- FC5 should be able to see both the internal and external drive.
5. use custom partition so you can select your external drive to install FC5 on.
6. you can use these partition scheme:
/boot = 150MB
swap partion = 1024MB
LVM = the rest of the space
create your Logical volume on the Physical Volume of your LVM
then create your /usr = 4096MB
/var = 2048MB
/ = the rest of the space
7. Use the default option for grub --- but make sure it's create on your external drive.
8. Next step which allow you to select which package to install.
9. From here it's ready to install on your external drive.
10. Make sure your BIOS is set to boot from external drive first.

Hope this will get you start. Be very careful when you setting up your partition and not use the wrong drive or you will wipe out your windows partition. Let me know if you have anymore questions.

hey guys, thanks for your help.

Unfortunately it arrived after i had finally figured out how to install.

What I did, to find the external drive, was:
in the main menu when the cd loads hit F2 for options
then I typed linux dd - to find other drives (it was meant to be to find a driver disc other than the cd)
then i selected my external harddrive, and cancelled out of it all.

This found my harddrive and from there i installed as normal
i selected "remove all partitions and create default"
and this worked...

Now i have a new problem.
Reboot was meant to bring up a linux login and it didnt... took me straight to windows.

now i need to figure that out... i think this is the problem that interrupted the other thread so i will go back to that one now.

Thanks again

[QUOTE/]

10. Make sure your BIOS is set to boot from external drive first.

[/QUOTE]

How do i do this?
and will it affect me when i dont have it attached?

Depending on your motherboard.
what kind of scripts do you looks when your computer turned on?
May be it's something like:

..................
..............bla bla bla
press del to enter setup press f1 to continue

Then U must press del button on your keyboard. That is BIOS (Basic Input and Output System)

Try to find something like boot priority

Set to Your external device....
That's all I know,....

my computer was too quick for me a couple of times so i had a bit of trouble getting in (prior to reading this) but now i have discovered that im missing some bootload file on my harddrive....

new problem again

see "changed bios to usb hd #1 - "missing operating systems"
etc topic...

thanks

I believe F2 to get into the BIOS on Sony. So, hit F2 when you first turn on your laptop.

Be sure that your OS in usb is inatalled properly.
If it is, then maybe your OS corrupted
Reinstalling maybe can fix your ptoblem

I reinstalled because ihad the grub loadin from the MBR or something so i changed it to the other setting. Now it gets to the boot screen but when it enters the linux system there are a number of errrs to do with the logical volumes and the PCI - not sure what to do about that. there is another thread regarding this problem

Thanks

Ow,...
I don't have any idea of that,...
may be U've some hardware problems,...
May be your hardware is too new for linux,...