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I've got Acer Aspire One. It came with Linpus which I didn't like so I put XP on it. It was never that great running XP and now has gone very slow and a bit unstable. The plan is to put Linux back on it, but a new flavour.
The problem is when I go to the boot menu i can select the USB drive but then it hangs. Sometimes I get a blinking cursor, other times a line about bootloader or something but it never gets any further. I've tried different USB sticks, different Linuxes (kuki, DSL, ubuntu) and different usb creators (unetbootin and universal USB creator), I've even updated the BIOS. Not sure what to try next
Can I put linux on it from windows? Its painfully slow and there's only 1Gb of space. I want to remove windows and format the drive if possible.
I think you can do a dual-boot install and then with something like gparted you can erase the windows partition and resize the linux one to incorporate the whole drive.
I've never tried it though, so maybe get a second opinion.
Which flavour of Linux are you installing? Try another, I just couldn't get Ubuntu on one laptop but tried Mint (Ubuntu based disto) which worked fine.
USB stick is normally the easiest route. That sort of hanging is perhaps a driver issue - try going into the BIOS and disabling stuff bit-by-bit (or disabling loads, and if it works, turning it on bit-by-bit) until you find the source of the problem.
That said, I've had a similar problem after I dropped a netbook and the DIMM module must have cracked, as it booted up fine when I put a new one in. Suspect that won't be the cause here though!
I used this link yesterday to get two laptops going (Vista was unloved by the owners and they were impressed by my Ubuntu-ran laptop):
http://www.ubuntu.com/
You will need a DVD-R but it's well worth it.
Is Windows stable? If it's crashing as well, I'd suggest RAM issues.
If it's fine, pff, maybe you've just been really unlucky so far? I've had good results with the USB creator at pendrivelinux and also the HP Drive Key utility, might be worth a punt.
I had a similar problem a while ago which was easily resolved by installing from a usb cd drive.
A few updates and answers to above:
I've tried ubuntu, DSL and Kuki, I don't think it is getting that far, though
No CD/DVD drive
Hardly any BIOS options to disable. Pretty much everything off or on makes no difference
Just tried an old USB creator and that gets a little bit further but says 'No DEFAULT or UI configuration directive found' and sits there waiting.
Thanks Woody
Just tried this
I also needed to rename the isolinux.bin and isolinux.cfg files in the syslinux folder to syslinux.bin and syslinux.cfg and then it works.
From that link and it booted straight up.
Now to try something similar for the actual version of Linux I want
What you could try is an older version of Ubuntu, say the 9.10, it'll install from a pendrive and you can update it from the net later. My wife's lenovo had a 10.04 and we just run a couple of system updates so it's all lovely now.
Or buy Linux Format (or whatever Linux mag there is at WHS) and use their disc. Fedora Core? Red Hut? LFS? Loads of options.
Have a read here too: http://distrowatch.com/