New laptop with dual booting

[Quadophile]

I am getting a new laptop shortly and planning to have dual boot with any Linux OS without really disturbing the original software installed.

The Laptop in question would be an IBM T43 from the current crop and will have an 80 GB drive. I have yet to get hold of the machine I wanted to get but more or less the specs of the machine would be close to this

I am looking for any tips, advise, pointers, suggestions, opinions, comments etc etc. to make it easier for me to have a go at it once again. I have in the past indulged in installation of Linux as dual boot as well as a stand alone machine. The distros I used and had some experience of were Mandrake 10 and Red Hat 7.2 and 9. I have also tried Knoppix CD based Linux and another version of CD based Mandrake. I would call myself a novice rather than anything else when it comes to Linux

Anyone?

 

[ladypcer]

Wireless internet?
If so, Plum Ugly swears by Xandros for wireless.

 

[Quadophile]

To be precise, I will be at times using the CDMA wireless PCMCIA card for my internet needs also.

 

[muckshifter]

Well as the resident "expert" (tongue in cheek) I advise popping over to Linx Live CD and having a look at what is on offer, download a couple or three.

Try them on your system and see how you like them ... more important is, will they like your system.

The term we will be using is "New Linux User"




Bet you never knew there were that many Linux OSs around.

 

[Quadophile]

Mucks,

Since when did you get to be the "Resident Expert"? (tounge in cheek). I remember when I was at it you had got frustrated before even starting off and given up on Linux at OUR forum.

I will let you get away with that

 

[muckshifter]

I live here = resident ... I know it all = expert ...

My patience has gotten longer ... I will gladly step to one side ... have anybody in mind?

You should have seen me yesterday, I would have bitten your head off.

Today is 'play day' there is a lot under the hood on this OS, and some very clever people behind it all.

Apart from some silly little niggles I can't really complain. It works, it does all I need it to do and some of the things I never thought of doing. I even like Firfox.

 

[Quadophile]

Just kidding You do know a lot more than I do about computers and I have no hesitation in saying that on an open forum

 

[muckshifter]

Get out of here ... shouldn't you be at work? ... you on a day off or summit?

 

[Quadophile]

I am fully commited to installing the Linux OS on the new Laptop and while searching for sompatibility issues and most suitable distro, I came across some very useful information to to with the subject laptop which I must share with you all. Some of the information provided is specific to T43 model but others are general in nature, however, related to IBM laptops only. I will be doing a bit of reading later on the weekend as well and prepare a list ot Do's and Dont's for the installation.

http://sharadware.com/2005/06/13/installing-linux-on-the-ibm-thinkpad-t43/

http://www-307.ibm.com/pc/support/site.wss/MIGR-48NT8D.html

http://www.emperorlinux.com/mfgr/ibm/toucan/?tab=details&id=273

I also know that portable Linux exists and can be installed on standalone Hard Disks, not sure if they work flawlessly on USB enabled mobile drives. I have a mobile drive with 40GB capacity which I use for back up and more than half is empty, maybe that may come handy also. Can anyone share some info on that?

 

[muckshifter]

I have a mobile drive with 40GB capacity which I use for back up and more than half is empty, maybe that may come handy also. Can anyone share some info on that?

So far I cannot get my USB Ext HD to work. It is being seen by Suse and I know it is 'mounted' but I still need to do more research as to why I can't use it.

Some interesting insights there Quad.

I did not bother with dual boot, but then I can be a sadist to a PC.

 

[Quadophile]

Mucks,

The real reason for dual boot is that my office work demands that I have windows for several reasons, otherwise it is always a good idea to have a clean installation with just one OS as it is always stable and does not disturb the other OS in anyway. You may have noted that the real pain at times is the MBR and if not properly set up it can render the system useless and both OS would fail on startup. I have had these probelms before but did also manage to get the two OS work flawlessly for sometime on my home desktop.

I would suggest that you hop over to Hardware Compatibility list here to find out if your particular HD is listed and if it works or not. It is a handy link to have and to bookmark as you may need to use it for reference in future when you start to work on other machines or upgrade some hardware on your existing machines. This list also is great to have when you intend to buy new hardware and want to know if a particular hardware would work with Linux OS and which one.

PS I just checked the list and found out that my mobile drive will work with Linux without any problem as it has already been tested (same type albeit 160GB capacity) I do not see why mine which is 40 GB should not work.

 

[muckshifter]

Yes Quad, I know ... I don't have to work in an office.


... I haven't a compatability issue, Suse won't let me play with it, yet.

 

[tjm4fun]

Hi Quad! long time no see!

The issues you are likely to encounter are most likely going to be related to the wireless support. you may need to use the windows driver and ndiswrapper to enable it, if you can;t find any native linux support.

That aside, I suggest you do the following:
Use the xp utilities to shrink the xp partition, and leave the rest free space.
I would do the initial install with one of the more stable major distro's, ie Suse, Mandrivel... only because they are generally made to install on harddisk. many of the other popular ones are livecd's that cna install to hdd, and the tools and utilities are lacking in some.
This laptop I'm using now(t23)has a 60 gig drive. installed is w2kpro for work, slackware10, dsl1.5,Yoper, suse9.3pro, and pclinuxos.
I've have never had any issues with booting, I use lilo as the boot manager, and slack is the "owning os"

if you're interested, I can give you some setup thoughts for sucessful use.
I wouldn;t bother with a usb external install. just oo much hassle to have the proper usb support available at boot time. Most distro's are made to be on the local hdd. DSL will run from a usb key, but Idon;t know if it can run from a usb hdd.