Initial setup and fears about Mandriva

piranha786 · Post by **piranha786** » 02 Jul 2005, 00:25

OK I rather came here, for the mandriva thingie, So do I burn the Iso's then ... is it automatically bootable discs? why 3 discs, winxp only have 1 cd,

does it mean that mandriva will take up alot of resources (exp to install, to run on RAM)

Post by **Azgard** » 02 Jul 2005, 00:30

Linux always takes up a lot of discs, some distros even come on DVDs now.

It will take a lot more space to install, in the region of about 2gb but it shouldn't take up any more RAM than XP, all the distributions I've tried have always been a lot faster than XP.

Don't know anything about those ISOs but shouldn't there be a guide how to do it on the CDs? I'd guess you can just burn them onto disc.

And I'm still up, so much for waking up early tomorrow

piranha786 · Post by **piranha786** » 02 Jul 2005, 00:34

so what is actually taking up the space?

Prime · Post by **Prime** » 02 Jul 2005, 00:35

mandriav install in its own partition on your hard drive alongside windows. three cds for all the included software like openoffice. insert boot cd 1 and set boot sequence with cd drive having priority.

Post by **Azgard** » 02 Jul 2005, 00:37

All the applications that come with it

You can easily install no games, or office apps etc.. and have a very small installation.

piranha786 · Post by **piranha786** » 02 Jul 2005, 00:41

I have a laptop now I just want to experiment with a new OS. only has a 60 gig hd so if I split it 30 : 30 and install xp on 1 and linux on the other. will it work. also if I put some programs on the linux partition, will xp de able to use it,

Prime · Post by **Prime** » 02 Jul 2005, 00:43

has some really cool games that actually require a really decent computer to play. wish there was nanosaur for Linux.

dont know what does the swap file/partition do

Post by **Azgard** » 02 Jul 2005, 00:46

piranha786 wrote:I have a laptop now I just want to experiment with a new OS. only has a 60 gig hd so if I split it 30 : 30 and install xp on 1 and linux on the other. will it work. also if I put some programs on the linux partition, will xp de able to use it,

The best way would be to make a 30gb partition for XP and then leave the other 30gb as unpartitioned space. Then when linux installs it will just auto allocate the unpartitioned space.

Windows XP won't be able to even see the linux partitions since they will most likely be in the EXT3 filesystem, and XP can only read and write FAT and NTFS. However from Linux you can read NTFS and FAT partitions but you can't write to them.

Prime · Post by **Prime** » 02 Jul 2005, 00:52

you can even partion the sytem with xp installed.

Post by **Azgard** » 02 Jul 2005, 00:56

Ya you can, but it will take longer since it's much harder to resize a partion than to create a few from unpartitioned space.

The SWAP partition is like the swap file in Windows, it's what the operating system uses when it runs out of RAM.

Prime · Post by **Prime** » 02 Jul 2005, 01:10

ah. how does a computer know when you slect reboot and switch to windows; to switch to windows

Post by **Azgard** » 02 Jul 2005, 01:18

It probably just changs the entry in it's bootloader from linux as default to windows as default. Or just shutdown the linux system and just adds the command to boot Windows at the end.

Not 100% sure about that.

Goodnight guys, now I need to get to sleep

Prime · Post by **Prime** » 02 Jul 2005, 01:24

cool. thanx. nite all

Jacquess · Post by **Jacquess** » 02 Jul 2005, 14:42

Ok, so Mandriva is installed now. Funny thing is, they still refer to it as Mandrake on the initial welcome screen and in alot of files in the OS. Anyway, now how do I get my internet connection up and running? Where do I go?

I want to use my nokia 6630 as the gprs modem as I do with windows but don't know if there are any linux drivers available...

Also, the bluetooth setup window looks a bit confusing, what should I do to get file exchange and BT modem setup?

Post by **Azgard** » 02 Jul 2005, 14:50

It's proper name is Mandrake I still think

There should be a network setup wizard you can run which will be the easiest. I've never tried to do anything like that before so sorry I can't help further

Prime · Post by **Prime** » 02 Jul 2005, 17:51

im still working on the lan thing. and then ill get stuck into my modem settings. where is this wizzard. btw azgard the dude has 5 alliances after him now.

piranha786 · Post by **piranha786** » 03 Jul 2005, 02:24

In the week i'll do a fomat of my pc, how does this sound :

60 gig drive:

I install xp on 40 gig, and leaf 20 open for linux. movies to be saved on linux, games to xp. will my laptop be slowed down if I have 2 OS's on it? will I be able to select the each time which os I will use?

Post by **Azgard** » 03 Jul 2005, 10:19

That sounds good to me, but then you won't be able to access any of your movies if your store them in linux.

Your laptop shouldn't be slowed down at all, and you should get a boot menu coming up asking you whether you want to boot Linux or Windows. It would be best to first install Windows cause when you install Linux if it sees Windows it adds it to the boot menu but when you install Windows it can't even see Linux so you might run into a problem booting Linux.

Freeman · Post by **Freeman** » 03 Jul 2005, 12:00

You can download Ext2Fsd from http://sourceforge.net/projects/ext2fsd
This allows you to mount your linux ext2/3 partitions in Windows, and browse them with explorer. I don't think it supports writing yet, but it gets updated from time to time.

Moses · Post by **Moses** » 03 Jul 2005, 20:48

If you install windows after linux, windows (arrogantly) overwrites the MBR, and you won't be able to boot Linux.

You can read and write to a FAT disk from linux, but only read from NTFS, that is why they recommend a FAT swap partition.

Post by **Azgard** » 03 Jul 2005, 20:51

Moses wrote:If you install windows after linux, windows (arrogantly) overwrites the MBR, and you won't be able to boot Linux.

You can read and write to a FAT disk from linux, but only read from NTFS, that is why they recommend a FAT swap partition.

Ok so they can write FAT, never knew that since I only use NTFS. What do you mean they recommend a FAT swap partition though?

Moses · Post by **Moses** » 03 Jul 2005, 21:30

Usually when installing linux a small FAT partition is created as default, so that you have windows on NTFS, linux on EXT3, and FAT in the middle, which can be read and written from both. ie if you want to copy a file from linux to your NTFS, you can copy it to the FAT, reboot into windows, and then copy it onto the NTFS.

Post by **Azgard** » 03 Jul 2005, 22:08

That sounds logical and quite clever actually.

So then is this the SWAP partition that linux creates? This however isn't the FAT filesystem is it?

A4 · Post by A4 » 04 Jul 2005, 15:54

Is it?????

Post by **Y0da** » 04 Jul 2005, 15:58

As far as I know the Swap(Fat) partition that Linux creates isn't accessable from Windows. So please explain?