Hi People, I have downloaded Ubuntu 64 bit and 32bit but not installed them. My question is:-
1) Can I install them on an external drive?
2) Which is the best one to install as I am running Windows 7 Ultimate 64 bit.
3)With an external drive can I boot into ether Windows or Ubuntu on the external drive.
4) If I transfer the Ubuntu download from the C drive to a dongle or directly onto the external drive.
5) Will Ubuntu support the drivers needed for my PC and printer.

I am running a home built PC with 8gig of RAM, 1.5TB hard drive, Video Card Saphire Toxic HD4870 1G, the printer is a Epson SX200

Any help will be very much appreciated, thanks.

1) Yes, but if Grub points to that drive , it must be plugged in or grub will complain.
2) 64-bit Ubuntu
3) see 1
4) ??? Are you referring to making a LiveUSB vs LiveCD?
5) Boot the LiveCD and if everything works ok, most likely when installed it will work. From livecd try printing. It mostly depends on your hardware - video, ram

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Hi, bootneck02
I'm just a newbie, but I followed an excellent how-to at:
http://www.howtoforge.com/the-perfec....04-lucid-lynx
>1) Can I install them on an external drive?
I assume you've downloaded iso files (files with a .iso at the end).
If so, use a simple CD burner program to "burn image" - don't just copy the file to a data CD. Linux is famous for being installable on even a USB memory stick. If your motherboard BIOS will let you boot from a USB-connected device. the answer is Yes.
>2) Which is the best one to install as I am running Windows 7 Ultimate 64 bit?
So your motherboard and chipset support 64-bit, then. I installed the 64-bit version of Ubuntu 9.04, and it worked really fast, but I had trouble getting hold of certain applications I wanted in 64-bit (perticularly Adobe Flash is a pig to install). So when I upgraded to 10.04, I used the 32-bit version. Very little noticeable diference in speed. But if you want to access more than 3GB of RAM, 64-bit is what you need.
>3)With an external drive can I boot into either Windows or Ubuntu on the external drive?
If, towards the end of the install, when the installer asks where to put the boot-loader (grub), you point it at the external drive (and you leave the external drive as your default boot drive in BIOS), you should get (on reboot) a startup screen that lets you pick which system to boot into.
>4) If I transfer the Ubuntu download from the C drive to a dongle or directly onto the external drive.
Simply copying the .iso file will do nothing. It is a CD image file; it needs to be "burnt" to a CD. You then boot up, with the BIOS set to boot from CD before any hard disc.
>5) Will Ubuntu support the drivers needed for my PC and printer?
Hardware detection and driver installation in Linux is almost always done transparently during installation. I, too have a non-standard handbuilt setup. I had to do a search for a Linux driver for the SiS sound chip, but everything else was automatic. I have an AMD64 CPU, and an SiS chipset (mostly). But i could hear sound from the first reboot, I just wanted some special functions on the Sis Sound chip, and could have done most things with the default driver that Linux chose.
I understand Epson printers are particularly well supported.
I wish you luck: don't forget to check the link above (after you've burnt your CDs).
Regards,
Flos

Hi, You didn't tell us what you downloaded precisily, but I will assume it's an ISO image.
So first burn the image to a CD/DVD. Boot the CD/DVD and go from there.

As of your questions.

1) Yes you can install on an external harddisk. But make sure you install grub on the ext. HD too.
Most Bios's give you the option to boot from an ext. HD nowadays. This means if you no longer want to use Ubuntu just boot WIN7 reformat the ext. HD and all is fine.

2) Go for the 64-bit. 32-bit OS's can't address more than 4 GB.

3) See 1. Most modern Bios's give you an option to select the boot drive at bootup time.

4) Someone correct me if I'm wrong, but Ubuntu should have an option to create and bootable USB stick.

5) Checkout http://www.linuxquestions.org/hcl/

__________________
Gerrard

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Best thing about those disks should be that you can boot to the disks and run them as they are. Try the 64 bit first. If not get the live cd versions to try.


Personally I'd play with virtual machines if I were you. Use the external drive to store the virtual files. You should find that you can learn a lot and it should work for most people.

Thanks for all your input and knowledge Will let you know how I get on

And if you want to check on the compatibility with your hardware, burn the iso file as image on a disk and try it out in Live mode. Also if you put the cd in the tray with windows running, you could install Ubuntu inside windows using Wubi. This will allow you to install Ubuntu inside a folder in windows. And you could always remove it if you want to just like any other windows application from Add/remove applications.

Hi,

You can boot from External USB drive if your BIOS supports that.

Burn that ISO and Install Ubuntu.

If you want to dual boot the system
(This is just an example)

If you have windows installed in your system and it has following portioning scheme:

C:50 GB
D:50 GB
E:50 GB

Then remove the contents of E drive

Then boot from ubuntu dvd/cd and at the time of portioning do partitioning manually(custom)

delete tat 50GB E drive

Now you have 50GB free space to install Ubuntu.

Also learn before install
waht is /
/boot
/home and swap partitions....



Refer this link to install ubuntu http://www.ubuntugeek.com/step-by-st...ion-guide.html

Hi Guy's well I have dual booted Ubuntu and allowed it 300Gig on the C drive thanks for your help. Now I all seems to be working fine but I do not have any sound, with Windows there are plenty of sites wgere one get drivers is there any that provide drivers for Ubuntu?

Hi,


Follow this link to get multimedia working on Ubuntu

https://help.ubuntu.com/community/Multimedia

Thank you PRAYAG Pjs for the link and the help, I will look into it tomorow as am just off to bed