I'm new to Linux and have attempted to run the latest version as a live USB on boot-up. When it gets to 'Starting HAL daemon' the PC simply freezes.

I'm running this on an old Dell Dimension 4550 with a NVIDAIA GeForce4 MX420 graphics card and Windows XP. I was planning on switching to Linux.

My friend gave me a live CD PCLinuxOS to try dated 2007 and this runs without any problems.

The live USB runs without any problems on my Windows 7 laptop.

Can anyone help?

At first guess I'd think pae.

What cpu and how much ram does this have?

I used to like live usb's made from live cd's but they have issues that are hard to overcome. I prefer making real installs to usb drives instead.

In some cases the live cd and usb naming is being confused based on how it boots up.

Thank you for your response.

What is 'pae'?

My CPU is an Intel Pentium 4 2.8 MHz with 1.0 GB RAM.

I created a live USB by downloading the ISO and then used Universal-USB-Installer-1.9.5.3 to create the live USB. When booting the PC, I choose F8 and then boot to live USB.

As well as PCLinxOS, I've tried Mint, Ubuntu and some other distros that were on a Linux magazine DVD, they all seem to freeze. The only CD that I've managed to run successfully was PCLinuxOS dated 2007.

Pretty sure you'd need a 32 bit version to begin with. I'm guessing that processor is only 32 bit. Not sure you'd get that far with a 64 bit distro. I'm still not sure about physical address (pae) .

Not sure what you have in these magazines.

If you had a modern kernel they have changed a lot of things. One is how it interacts with video.

In a very simple sense, linux follows hardware. You might try an older still supported version, some of the Long Term Support LTS distro's may be worth a try.

It may be that you can use a boot option or safe boot mode. Many of those distro's should offer that.

I still don't like live usb creators.

All the distros I tried were 32 bit. I've tried live booting Tails, Lubuntu and Ubuntu 14.04 from the DVD supplied with the Linux User & Developer magazine.

What older LTS distros would you suggest?

How do you get into a boot option or safe boot mode and what do you do when you get that far?

First I might get a live distro like Knoppix to test. Not only does it normally boot up it also has cheat sheets for special situations. One that may not be noted is no-atapi for some cd readers. Get maybe knoppix 4.x. Lets see how that boots up.

A LTS like Ubuntu 12 might be a choice but we still need to know ram. Might need more data on this cpu.

Can also try puppy or slacko or DSL or slitaz for tests.

I tried Puppy and found that when starting up it caused the monitor to turn off and then froze. Pressing the on/off switch had no affect until I rebooted back into Windows.

I then tried Knoppix, could not find version 4.x anywhere, this seems to date back to 2005 and all the links to the download sites were broken. Downloaded latest version 7.20 and after the start screen, pressed F2 to get into the menu I then selected the Knoppix option.

This got as far as:

[mod] [udev] [drm] [log] [snd] [hw] [dbus] [hal] [acpi] [net] [swap] [by]
System Setup =============================== OK
INIT: Entering runlevel: 5
root@Muroknopix:/#

and then it froze!

More information on CPU and RAM below:

Operating System
Windows XP Home Edition 32-bit SP3
CPU
Intel Pentium 4
Northwood 0.13um Technology
RAM
1.00GB DDR @ 132MHz (2.5-3-3-6)
Motherboard
Dell Computer Corp.
Graphics
MD7475AB (1024x768@75Hz)
64MB NVIDIA GeForce4 MX 420 (NVIDIA)
Storage
111GB Seagate ST3120023A (ATA) 42 °C
Optical Drives
SAMSUNG DVD-ROM SD-616T
SAMSUNG CD-R/RW SW-248F
Audio
Creative SB Live! Series (WDM)


RAM
Memory slots
Total memory slots 2
Used memory slots 2
Free memory slots 0
Memory
Type DDR
Size 1024 MBytes
DRAM Frequency 132.9 MHz
CAS# Latency (CL) 2.5 clocks
RAS# to CAS# Delay (tRCD) 3 clocks
RAS# Precharge (tRP) 3 clocks
Cycle Time (tRAS) 6 clocks
Physical Memory
Memory Usage 64 %
Total Physical MB
Available Physical 366 MB
Total Virtual 1.47 GB
Available Virtual 906 MB
SPD
Number Of SPD Modules 2
Slot #1
Slot #2

CPU
Intel Pentium 4
Cores 1
Threads 1
Name Intel Pentium 4
Code Name Northwood
Package Socket 478 mPGA
Technology 0.13um
Specification Intel Pentium 4 CPU 2.80GHz
Family F
Extended Family F
Model 2
Extended Model 2
Stepping 7
Revision C1
Instructions MMX, SSE, SSE2
Virtualization Not supported
Hyperthreading Not supported
Bus Speed 132.9 MHz
Rated Bus Speed 531.5 MHz
Stock Core Speed 2800 MHz
Stock Bus Speed 133 MHz
Caches
L1 Data Cache Size 8 KBytes
L1 trace cache 12 KBytes
L2 Unified Cache Size 512 KBytes
Cores
Core Speed Multiplier Bus Speed Rated Bus Speed Threads
Core 0 2790.3 MHz x 21.0 132.9 MHz 531.5 MHz APIC ID: 0