Freespire

i want to try linux, so ive downloaded a copy of freespire. thing is, after ive downloaded the freespire.iso file off the net i dont know what to do next? i cant seem to see any type of installaion program and as for the live cd option, how do i go about it?

 

you have to burn the .iso file to a CD / DVD, then reboot and boot from the CD (alter boot order in BIOS)

Edit: make sure you have a Live CD version of Linspire, because a non Live disc will start installing Freespire

 

that was a quick reply donkey!

im burning the the file now.. hope it works

 

not sure it worked.. something called Caldrea DR DOS on the screen, also said something about no FAT32 volumes found. my hd nots formatted in FAT32. is this a problem? or have i burnt the CD wrong?

 

i think the problem is i havent decompressed the correct files yet. can some one provide a list of files i have to decompress once the file has downloaded of the net? (kinda like a step by step for noobs)!

 

:good: good luck with it :good:

BTW: a very good distro is PCLinuxOS, also have you thought about using virtualisation software like VMware, it's also free, with VMware you can install an OS without touching anything on your current OS, it creates a virtual computer (s) that run on your current OS.

 

VMware is a little too slow at the moment, especially wth heavy graphical sessions. The extra overhead seems to make the OS I use with it slower than it actually is, distorting my opinion of it.

 

what!, even after installing VMware tools into th guest OS

 

You can't simply burn the ISO to the CD as a file. The ISO is a CD-ROM image that contains lots of files within. You need to use a program such as Nero and choose 'Burn ISO to CD'

 

See the instructions here

Note the instructions on how to burn and how to install.

You shouldn't need to decompress anything.

 

i managed to do the 'burn iso to cd' thingy, seems so obvious now!!

im trying to copy mac files unto my pc, so i copied some files as a test off my usb drive onto the ubuntu desktop. when i reboot, i cant seem to find it. im using the live cd version, if it makes a difference.

any ideas where i should copy files to so that i can see them when i reboot into XP?

 

A liveCD will not retain info stored on the desktop. You will need to mount the windows drive, which ever one you use for data, and move files there. Freespire should do this easily but I have never used it and can't say exactly how to di it. Look at the freespire manual.

 

i ended up using ubuntu and setting up a second drive in the pc for linux. my problem is now that i once i copy all my apple mac files from my usb drive into the linux volume and reboot, XP cant see my second drive. is there anyway i can see the linux volume in XP or am i doomed?:x:

 

Windows is not friendly with linux, so you will NEVER be able to access files on the ubuntu drives from within windows. Data that you want to share needs to be on a common drive that is formatted fat32 that both linux and windows can read. If you don't need to share this data then just put it on your windows (I'll assume NTFS) drive.

When I used windows I always had a separate partition for my data and NEVER ever put it on the same partition as the OS. When I started messing with other OSen on the system, I already had this set up in a way to make it accessable from any other OS that reads fat32.

Just a suggestion: OS and DATA never on the same partition, no matter what you use.

 

so ive formatted one drive FAT32 using computer management in XP, but in Ubuntu, i cant mount the FAT32 drive and so not able to copy anything over to the FAT32 Drive. what am i doing wrong?

 

Does ubuntu give an error? Please post it.

Also, how are you attempting to mount the drive?

 

im mounting it by right clicking on the drive icon and selecting mount.

the error i get is " mount: can't find /dev/hdd1 in /etc/fstab/ or /etc/mtab

please check device plugged correctly"

 

personally i would just edit fstab, here's the command

Code:

gksu gedit /etc/fstab

then save it

just add the line

Code:

/dev/<drive to mount> /mnt/<where to mount it> msdos<partition type>

here's my fstab

 

any chance you can explain to me what is fstab and how to go bout editing it..?:doh:

 

The FSTAB is a text file that contains the configuration information for your hard disks and removeable media.

Before we can troubleshoot, can you post the contents of your FSTAB?

Navagate to /etc in the file manager and double click 'fstab'. Copy and paste the contents here