aint gotta clue where to start please help
 

hi everyone, im totally new to linux but very keen to get started asap. i built my own pc but with windows but im keen on making a duel boot system, i have a spare 200gb maxtor harddrive to do it but very unsure what i need to do and what linux is best to use i heard suse is good for beginners but which vesion??? any help and guideence will be great and im findin it hard to find my way around at the moment.

Theres a few distros that are "newbie friendly" i.e. that will configure stuff for you (otherwise theres a lot that needs to be learned about).

got a burner ? if so, then have a look at distrowatch, and check out "live" versions. download a couple (which might take a while) like one of the *buntu's (I'd suggest kubuntu as it's KDE front end would feel a bit more familiar).

burn the image to disc (yes it can be done with a windows application), then boot it (make sure that your BIOS is set to boot from cd/dvd).

You still might have to configure a few things though, like the internet connection - but it should give you a feel for how things are.

That's gonna be a good place to start.

regards

John

p.s. from the distrowatch front page Ubuntu is #1, PCLinuxOS is #4 (I think thats a live distro - it's supposed to be very new user friendly), Mandriva #6, Sabayon #8 (again, I think it's live but not sure - it's based on Gentoo, which is considered a "power" distro but apparently much easier to handle/manage/use), Knoppix #12 (can be installed, but better suited to "live" use, has some of the best hardware detection available), Kubuntu is #15 it's Ubuntu with kde instead of gnome (and yes you could just install Ubuntu and then add the Kde desktop, personally I don't like gnome - after trying it 4 or 5 times I've not managed to get on with it at all).

Oh, and when you find one that you like the look of, and seems to boot your system OK, then it's onto the next stage i.e. partition up the 200 gig drive (more than enough room there) and actually installing it.

Some stuff to try and learn? Well I'm thinking about how partitions are named as compared to windows (you'd have to say whether it's normal EIDE/PATA, SATA or SCSI hard drive), what you want to do with the linux install - because that might affect packages/selections that you need to make etc etc Oh and the file structure and how it looks like a tree (in block diagram format), and users, so you know that the user account is basically limited and that the "root" (tree structure ! ) account is the system manager.

regards

John

right as we speek im downloading linux 9.2 live cd-64 bit im guessing it will be o.k coz i got an amd 64 processer, this hard drive i got was used in my ps2 so it needs formatting before any thing else, sorry to be a pain in the arse with all this. it has a standard ide connection on it. the hard drive i have windows on is a sata connection, does this make and difference to things?

What is "Linux 9.2"?

As for SATA, any of the top distros will have SATA support--but if you put Linux on the IDE, then it makes no difference.

The installer will format the disk, so you do not need to worry about that

If you are going to install SuSE, the current version is 10.2. Why not download the regular version instead of the live version. If you have 200GB to work with you don't need to use the live version.

hi there, im now downloading SUSE 10.2-x86_64.iso will this be o.k i have an AMD64 processor, im well inpressed with the live cd and cant wait to get it fully installed! so can i just install my hard disk into my pc any configeration or does it have to be specific? i dont wanna mess my windows install up is this the safest way to go about it? thanx for all your help in this matter. once all the hard ware is installed and software downloaded do i just boot from the SUSE dvd and it will install on my new hard disk format any everything like windows or is there a bit more to it?

You can install Linux w/ no problems (im a noob, and it works fine for me). Also, since u got that huge hard-drive, you could partition it and install multiple Linux distros or even Windows (but make sure u install Windows first). Also, the x86_64 versions of Linux is not always the best idea, it has something to do with compatibility and configuration.

i see but because i already have windows on another hard drive which works fine i was hoping to install linux on my 200gb one do i need to have windows on it before installing linux on it? can anyone give me detailed instuctions on what i need to do to complete my project, i understand it might be a pain but it would be a big help

I run the x86_64 version of SuSE 10.2. For some packages, like firefox, the 32 bit version is installed instead so that you can use the 32bit plugins. For other packages like Open Office, the 32 bit version is the only one available because a 64 bit version isn't ready yet. So there is less of a problem running the 64 bit version than with some of the other 64 bit disto's. There are also two sets of libraries installed as well.

Ironically, if you installed the 64 bit version of Vista, you would have more of a problem finding device drivers! Linux has been running 64 bits for quite some time because it had been ported to the Alpha and PPC machines. That means that most applications have been converted as well years ago.

As a new user with a newly built PC, I downloaded the 64 bit version of SUSE 10.2 last week. It installed very well, but I had the Windows HDD disconnected at the time. I am very impressed at the way it recognised my hardware, AMD x2 CPU, SATA2 HDD and internet connection. I had to install the drivers for the Nvidia grafix card, but that was easy. The Network printer attached to the hub took a little time though.
The only problem that I have now is that I have to connect the HDD for either Linux or Windows and have the other disconnected as Grub was loaded onto the Linux drive and not the windows drive. I would like to have Grub give me the option to boot from either drive.
Since installing I have not looked back and have been running Linux 95% of the time.

right now i got suse 10.2 downloaded, all i need to do is wack in the hard drive and boot from disk?? is that right??? does it know what drive to install on? do i need to install the new hard disk in windows first? cant wait to get started now getting close1 all need to do then is work out how to sort out so it dual boots so i can pick what i want to run, cheers for all the info

You need to have the windows disc in and the second hard disc in too. When it sets up the second disc for linux it will ask you before it does anything. If your windows disc is hda then the second disc will be hdb. If you disconnect the windows disc and then load Linux you will end up with the same problem that I have - Grub won't know that windows is there!

Boot the disc, but read the pages carefully (safety measure so that you follow what it's doing).

If the 200gig hard drive is blank then it's probable that it will offer it to you for the linux installation, but sometimes (long time since I used any SuSE) distros have a default offering, that could be anything - obviously if it want's to blank the windows first, then thats bad, so you should watch and see what it seems to be calling the drives - I'm guessing that it will see the SATA one as sda (and if your windows install has multiple partitions - they'd be shown as sda1, sda2, etc etc), whereas the IDE one should just show as hda (with any partitions shown as hda1, hda2, etc etc).

With that in mind, you can probably just do the default thing, which is "probably" a / (a.k.a. root) partition and a /swap (thats not definite because I don't recall what the SuSE default might be). IMO that'd be a waste of a 200gig hdd. My 120 gig drive only has linux on it (I don't have windows), but I set it up as 1 gig for /boot (where all the boot files etc go - 1 gig cos it's a nice round number, but probably too big in truth), my / (root) is about 25 gigs, so I can install whatever I want and don't have too worry about log files getting too large (and consequently don't worry about them at all), my /swap is 1.5 gigs, because of the traditional linux wisdom of having a /swap 2 times the size of the installed RAM - again, I doubt that it's ever used as I don't do anything that has massive files (photo/video editing for example) and the rest is my /home.

I don't know whether you'd have to start meddling with primary and logical partition stuff, because all my 4 partitions are primary and I don't have any unallocated space - though if you wanted the possibility of meddling further and running more than one distro, I suspect that you'd have to think about that - others will know more to confirm/deny that.

The installer should then format the partitions once they're made - you'd probably have to be in the "advanced" mode anyway for a partitioning scheme other than the default - I don't know what the default file systems are for SuSE, but ext3 should be fine, reiser is good as well (I didn't bother to change anything with this install so that left mine as ext3 for the /boot, / and /home, the /swap must be formatted as /swap but the installer should (theoretically) know that.

Then, theoretically (again), the install should go through smoothly - the only stuff you might need to consider then, could be something like graphics drivers (possibly proprietary ones like either the ATi or nvidia ones - depends on the graphics card of course), plus the internet connection as it depends on how you connect as to whether it might set it up automagically or whether you'd have to do some config yourself (example - I use an ethernet modem/router, no DHCP etc, but my ISP gives me a static IP address so I usually have to configure my ethernet card myself - whereas, my elderly aunt (late 70's) wanted a linux dual boot, so I installed Kubuntu and it found her NTL (now virgin media) cable modem (still connected by ethernet) and did all the config for her, she was online straight away, post install).

finally, theres a myriad of ways to boot an installed linux system. It's quite normal to install the linux bootloader (either lilo or grub - I think that SuSE uses grub) to the first section of the MBR (major boot record) on the first hard drive (in your case, the SATA one as I understand). Yes it might sound spooky when I say that it will overwrite the windows bootloader, but it needs to do that to be able to see all installed OS and then offer you the choice of which one you want to boot into.

don't worry about that, as it's quite trivial to re-install the windows bootloader. Otherwise without that, you have to either change the boot order in the BIOS everytime you want to boot into the "other" OS or you have to find out how to make boot floppies or boot CD's - IMO, a complete PITA.

You might want to have a google about to see about any stuff you can just to read up on installing SuSE. Theres SuSE forums here in the disto's section of LQ, or here and here (they were the ones I used to use when I had SuSE installed last).

regards

John

It has been my experience, that you should always leave the Windows drive on the machine when setting up your dual-boot system. However, before you do your installation change your Windows drive from the master drive to the slave or second drive. (jumpers & cable location if IDE). That way when you run your installation Grub or Lilo will "see" both drives before you make your selection where to install Linux. When the boot loader is installed, it will recognize your Windows drive and give you a choice as to which OS to use at boot-up. If you don't have your Windows drive hooked up during installation, your boot loader will only be set up for a single OS and won't be able to "see" the other drive at boot time. That will involve re-configuring the bootloader after installation.