Replacing your Operating System
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sgunhouse Moderator Volunteer last edited by
If you can arrange to boot it, you can put it anywhere. The menu has to be on your primary (physical) drive, if you don't have some way of changing primary drives. And the menu doesn't actually all fit in the boot sector, so Linux has to be on the same physical drive. But Windows itself doesn't recognize non-Windows partitions, hence logical drives in the Windows sense don't matter - if you install Linux in place of some existing logical drive, Windows will act like the drive no longer exists.
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linuxmint7 last edited by
Best thing to do (for Linux anyway) is burn a live-CD from some of the more popular, accessible and easy to use distributions (Ubuntu, Linux Mint, Debian, PCLinuxOS etc), boot from it and try them out for yourself. See which one/s you like and go from there. No point discussing how to install/dual-boot Linux when you haven't even tried it (in it's many forms) as you may not even like it.
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joshl last edited by
If you can arrange to boot it,...
What does that mean?
But Windows itself doesn't recognize non-Windows partitions, hence logical drives in the Windows sense don't matter - if you install Linux in place of some existing logical drive, Windows will act like the drive no longer exists.
I'm not sure...
If I remember correctly, I was somehow informed that the drive is physically one, but divided into two logical discs. All the current operational (for the Windows and other stuff) seems to be on disc C, while the other one is o'k - not used by any soft, has enough memory and doesn't need defragmentation (checked). -
joshl last edited by
Best thing to do (for Linux anyway) is burn a live-CD from some of the more popular, accessible and easy to use distributions (Ubuntu, Linux Mint, Debian, PCLinuxOS etc), boot from it and try them out for yourself. See which one/s you like and go from there. No point discussing how to install/dual-boot Linux when you haven't even tried it as you may not even like it.
It seems irrelevant now whether I like it or not. As I'm not going to have an "advanced" Windows instead, and the only other way for a PC is to get Linux.
So what do you say? I don't need to install-install Linux for now - but can rather do something - what is it exactly?
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sgunhouse Moderator Volunteer last edited by
What does that mean?
I've heard of computers computers which could be set in BIOS which HDD to boot from, if you only have one physical drive it does not matter.
Are you sure the other drive is empty, and large enough? Most systems do have 2 or more partitions, but that's because the BIOS can't actually boot drive C. The other drive is what the BIOS boots, which has enough code to actually boot Windows. Either that, or the other drive contains your system backup image ...
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joshl last edited by
Are you sure the other drive is empty, and large enough?
Not empty. Should it be EMPTY?? Like empty-empty??
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joshl last edited by
Either that, or the other drive contains your system backup image ...
I have no idea about the "image". No backups of the system I could see; disc D seems free from that, in any case >_>
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linuxmint7 last edited by
Ah!/oh!, It's a netbook, and does not have a CD drive.
Do you have a 4GB USB flash drive/Memory stick that is empty/blank joshl ?.
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joshl last edited by
Most of those take SD cards ...
That's true.
So, will I need to throw away/move gigabytes of files to make it for a second OS? Cards and sticks are not tidily enough incorporated to the hard body of the PC. Then - move?..
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linuxmint7 last edited by
You could use a USB flash drive/memory stick just for testing Linux and (if you like it) installing it to the computers internal hard drive (as dual boot) then format/wipe/blank the USB flash drive/memory stick, as it would not be needed any more.
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joshl last edited by
Linux, to give it a try, shall I have a totally empty drive?
(It is irrelevant if it'll be a USB or SD, isn't it?) -
linuxmint7 last edited by
Yes, it is best if it is empty. Do you have an empty SD card or USB flash drive/memory stick ?.
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joshl last edited by
Yes, it is best if it is empty.
What if it's just bought, for example - should I better format it still? Or will it be not necessary?
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linuxmint7 last edited by
Does it have anything on it when you look inside it on the computer ?, I'm asking because a lot of new flash drives come with software on them already, such as 'Back-up' software or 'Encryption' software. If it does have anything on it (such as the above), then yes, it is best to format it first.
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joshl last edited by
You are talking about reformatting it, there had better be nothing you can't lose there.
Steve, what if that disc is more-than-half empty (btw, there's a fair uninterrupted space on the disc - as long as my defragmentation analysis has shown)?
Is formatting truly necessary? Am I to lose those stored files if I try to put a Linux there as it is now?
