Where to start? Hey thanks ever so much guys for all your answers. Trying to remember here everything thats been asked by you.

So, watched the links, created using unetbootin a USB stick (formatted FAT32 as recommended), having chosen the Mint as a distribution.

Went into BIOS, to boot mode, but you cannot change the value UEFI to legacy (as asked by one of you here) its greyed out and not an option.

You can change the list underneath, which is the USB, HDD, network bootup etc. etc.

I chose the USB HDD to be at top of list, saved and exited.

On startup, the new laptop went straight to loading Linpus Lite again with flashing cursor. It ignores the USB totally.

It also doesn't recognise the command startx

It basically switches on and gets to the first photo I uploaded (sorry but not sure why they are upside down on here). A black screen and flashing cursor saying root@localhost

I dont get any form of desktop, nothing. So, I've tried making this bootable USB stick, but cannot get that to work. Any more ideas please to just get some basic desktop functionality here?
Thanks

Don't know what to say about a greyed out bios button. It's there but cannot use it? Might just be a mouse click or key stroke to enable it. I know my atom netbooks have 2 ways to play with boot order. F12 and ESC key.

2 different functions in those modes. But I am talking older gear and non uefi bios.

Edit: Might be worth a shot. Take a picture of bios screen. Upload picture to some off site hosting like http://www.postmyimage.com/. Use the link it gives you in next reply box.
We can go offsite to view the screen.

Edit: Just a old image of mine to explain a little better what I am saying.

http://oi44.tinypic.com/2afbqzr.jpg

My 2¢. Perhaps you need to turn off secure boot before you can turn off UEFI. But then again, Mint should install in UEFI mode. Perhaps the USB you created is not UEFI bootable? Have you tested it in another computer?

Pick a distro.

distrowatch.com

And go to their mainsite and start reading. A lot of times there's an image that you can put on a usb storage device and boot from that device. With instructions on how to do that various ways from various OSes. ubuntu is a common one. Fedora was kind of nice installer wise the last time I tried it v.23?. But I find annoyances with each and ultimately end up back on debian which annoys me the least. If you just want to browse the web, you might try linux lite. An ubuntu flavor, but without most of the ubuntu annoyances out of the gate.

@LQgurus: can a USB be 'burned' ?as? uefi. (in uefi format)? Does the uefi link I found have anything useful in it?

@OP: be patient!!! UEFI is actually your 'modern friend' (tho I don't know &fear it)
I'm heartbroken (no, just kidding) that you didn't fall in love with the CLI that I love
Could I, just to see what was there (my curiosity), talk you into trying (&posting 1 more great pic):
df | grep -v tmpfs ; parted -l ; efibootmgr -v
(I'm curious whether that oem linpus, may it RestInPeace, has those last 2 cmds).

Best wishes!!! The LQ'ers will get you to a beautiful gooeyGUI Yumi Mint
(&future n00b LiveSlackUEFI-signedUSBburners will learn one EFIheck of a lot!!!)

I hope you meant what I added in red!!! (Not a single usbHdd, like ext 4TB)

1 members found this post helpful.

+1 isohybrid!!! Motivates me to wiki my (future) efi
Now, I wonder IF op's Mac (or my friend's iPadj/k) can 'run' it....
(Does 'signed' have anything to do with all this? Did op's mac unetbootin already do 'this'?)
I think unetbootin may have just resolved my n00bYumiSlackBlog
DDG in progress: isohybrid mac os x uefi signed multiboot
(most humans like to 'make it work'; I only like to 'know how it works', bottom-up)

Update:
Hopefully, OP can figure out 'how' ('cookbook'? I haven't grok'ed it, bottom-up, yet. OP is doing great so far; Linux does have 'curves in its road to Heaven'!!!)
(Maybe that's why I've seen "not unetbootin" before on lq)

@OP: I believe that the SatanicCoincidences of CLI are trying to force you to visit them, who have been hiding in your MacGUI, under the 'Unix terminal', since you first got it

I don't think unetbootin works in uefi mode. However most 64bit iso's will work in efi mode if done as Emerson's suggestion in the link provide.

Hi newbielinux,I am new to Linux and this forum. Your situation sounds like an excellent opportunity to try out this alternative to Microsoft's operating system and software on your laptop. I had some old PCs and laptops that ran Windows XP, had some time to tinker, so I started with a 32 bit variant of Zorin on a laptop. Now I am using 32 bit Ubuntu MATE 17.04 installed on an old 2003 Powerspec PC with a Pentium 4 processor and 80 GB hard drive. The old system works is stable and works well. I can surf the web with Mozilla and software available with the install is compatible with MS Office suite. The Ubuntu MATE GU interface looks and acts very much like Windows. I will continue to learn and use Linux. I am looking forward to installing a 64 bit version of Ubuntu (likely) on a more modern laptop. Give UbuntuMATE or some other variation of Linux for desktop a whirl.

1 members found this post helpful.

There may be more problems to overcome. Let me describe my boot adventures with Intel NUC.
First, I wanted to boot it in UEFI mode. And I could not. After lots of tinkering I found out the damn thing has 32-bit UEFI. Why Intel is doing such a thing - I don't know. OK, I thought, I will boot it in CSM mode. And ... it did boot in CSM mode, but only once. Every time I booted it I had to go into BIOS setup and set boot device and every time I rebooted it the setting was lost. Annoying as hell. Finally I got it fixed by creating protective MBR on otherwise GPT disk and flagging the boot partition bootable! Totally brain dead BIOS/UEFI. I still do not know why I couldn't get it booting with rEFInd 32-bit bootloader. Maybe I should have renamed it to something Microsoftish, some brain dead UEFI firmwares ignore UEFI standard and load Microsoft bootloader by name only. It is booting in CSM mode now and I do not feel I want to tinker with it more.

one thing to try is copy the 32bit loader to /EFI/Boot and rename it BOOTX64.EFI