Linux Noob Seeks Advice

[WhizzBang]

I know that a fair amount of people who frequent these boards use Linux and so I am posting here for some advice.

I have got hold of an old laptop and I am using it to try to get into the world of Linux. The details of the machine are:
Name: Toshiba Satellite 1555CDS
RAM: 160MB
Processer: AMD K6-2 380 MHz
Hard Drive: 80GB

The machine currently runs Windows XP and connects to the internet using a Prism 802.11B PCMIA network card.


I have tried to install Ubuntu on it but it ran out of memory during the install set up (there was an error message with something abouot overflow).

Next I tried XUbuntu which does not give any error messages, but does halt installation once it gets to 'Configuring network interfaces...'. Nothing happens after this point and if i press any key on the keyboard, the letters start to appear on the screen as if using DOS.

Next I tried Puppy Linux. This did run off CD. when setting up I used XVesa as teh display system as Xorg would only allow me the resolution 640x480 while I want to run it in 800x600. Once Puppy was up and running i tried to get it on the internet but after much effort have found that Puppy diables the PCMIA slots when booting up so it cannot find the network card.


Can anyone recommend another low-overhead Linux ditribution I could try? Or does anyone know anything I could try to get the above distributions working and connecting to the internet.

At the moment, my goal is just to get this laptop running on Linux and connected to the internet. From there I hope to have lots of fun trying out and learning new stuff in Linux.

 

[Miika]

I am not THAT much into linux, but I have had SuSE and Debian installed, SuSE on my 350MHz pentium II.
Have you tried that Damn Small Linux? You could try booting it from an USB stick. Also, you could try the Knoppix live CD/DVD, which I think would be best for you.
The Knoppix I tried has several webbrowsers in it and did not need any setup, booted straight from the disc!

http://www.knoppix.org/

 

[Bingo Jesus]

Have you tried the alternate install CD for Xubuntu, that only requires 64MBs of RAM, unlike the normal install CD which requires 192MB to install?

 

[WhizzBang]

Thanks guys - I shall look into those and see if I can get any further.

 

[Javacat]

Name: Toshiba Satellite 1555CDS
RAM: 160MB
Processer: AMD K6-2 380 MHz
Hard Drive: 80GB

That's a massive hard drive for a laptop of that age and spec

I'd also give Knoppix a go, or maybe BackTrack.

 

[WhizzBang]

That's a massive hard drive for a laptop of that age and spec

I'd also give Knoppix a go, or maybe BackTrack.



Well I bought it off eBay for £50 and it originally only had a 5GB hard drive. However, when the seller sent it to me the hard drive broke during transit and so the machine could not boot up when I received it. The seller was very good about it and refunded all my money, so I went on the net and got a new hard drive for £25 and have now got it up and running with Win98 and XP both working very well.

I shall take a look at Knopix too, I have run out of CDRs at the moment so I need to get some more today.

 

[a Mammoth]

Knoppix would be annoying as it has a relatively long boot time if you wanted to use it regularly. I recommend the xubuntu alt disc.

But if you want to just use it not that regularly and don't care if the programs take one heck of a long time to boot, go knoppix, but I'd still recommend a more permanent solution.

 

[Ravnos]

If you're not afraid of a steep learning curve and you're actually doing this to learn Linux, then I recommend Gentoo. The other posts here are fine short-term solutions for the most part, but if you want to build a system that you're actually planning on using, and you want to know more about how to do things "the Linux way", then Gentoo will be your best bet. The installation is fairly involved (make sure you have another computer working so you can check the Gentoo Handbook while you do it) and can take a while because everything needs to compile, but by the end of the whole thing you should have a system tailor made for your computer without any of the cruft that most other distros include.

If that sounds intimidating but you're still not afraid of a bit of work, then try Debian or Slackware and just install a text-based system, then install whatever window manager you want from there. FreeBSD is also an option, though there are a few pieces of Linux software that don't run (or at least won't compile properly for whatever reason) it runs just about everything Linux does. It's also very easy to set up a totally customised system that will run great on your hardware, and most of the skills you learn on a BSD system are transferrable to just about any Unix-like OS, including most Linux distros.

 

[Lint]

I'd say, if this is your first time trying linux, ask someone experienced to install it for you...

It's much more likely for you to enjoy having a good time using a pre-configured Linux them to worry hours and hours about configurating, setting up drivers, kernel modules, recompilations, runlevels, local users, etc etc etc.... Just sit down and enjoy the ride, after you get used to linux you can try install a Linux by yourself

and whenever possible, choose for installing it on your hard drive... you'll have less to worry about and system will be always faster, specially since you're low on mem for nowadays' standard
Slackware shall do good to boot with anything from 128mb upwards, even lower if you don't run KDE...