Rightardia upgraded an HP NC 8000 laptop and with a refurb Toshiba 60 GB drive that lasted about two weeks before it failed. Wirehead thought it would make make more sense to purchase a digital drive that had no moving parts.
We looked a Tiger Direct and found a PATA drive that would work but it was only 16GB. For the same price we ordered the big brother 32 GB Kingspec SSD Professional drive from China.
We experimented with Ubuntu Linux 9.04, 9.10, 10.04 and the brand new 10.04 and Ubuntu Netbook. We also tried Linux Mint and Dream Linux, a Brazilian Linux version, and even XP Pro.
The digital drives specs indicate it was tested with XP Pro, but XP Pro could not detect the drive. We found that the latest 32-bit version of Ubuntu Linux 9.10 Live could format the drive. However, there are a few items you need to pay attention to.
Before you try to install Ubuntu Live 9.10, make sure you can see the drive in Desktop Places after you boot off of the CD. You will have to go into the BIOS and setup your laptop to boot off of the CD.
Make sure the new partition is bootable if you have this option by checking the bootable radio button.
If you cannot see the drive , you will have to reformat until you can see it in Desktop Places. You can use the Gnome Disk Utility to reformat the drive.
Wirehead prefers the Disk Utility because it it allows you to delete the partition, reformat the drive and make the drive bootable. The GParted utility can also be able to detect a missing drive.
We recommend that you reformat the drive as EXT 2 if Linux installer can't see the drive and then reboot off of the CD. Now the Linux installer will be able to see the drive and in step 4 of the Linux install, it will reformat the drive with an EXT3 or EXT4 format.
If the disk doesn't boot, reboot using the CD and use the Disk Utility to check the a partitions to make sure they are bootable. also make sure the disk is mounted. Make sure you unmount the drive before you try to install Linux.
If it still won't boot, reboot off of the CD and reinstall the Linux Live Ubuntu 9.10 OS.
After installation, you will be prompted to remove the CD or DVD. We also recommend you change the BIOS boot options to boot off of the HD.
Wirehead found he could get Ubutu 9.10 to work on the digital drive, but the updates to the OS created a mess.
Wirehead had run into a similar problem when he formatted his wife's PC for Linux more than a year ago. He used a Fedora ll (Red Hat Linux) to format the PATA hard drive so he could install Ubuntu Linux 9.04.
His wife has been happily using Ubuntu for more than a year without much trouble and not a single reinstall.
When Wirehead bought the recent copy of Linux Pro magazine, he noticed that a copy of Fedora 13 was enclosed. He tried installing Fedora 13.
Back to the drawing boards. The first Fedora install failed because the Grub boot loader did get installed at the very end of the Fedora install. The second install worked, but installing Adobe Flash and better screensavers locked up Fedora 13. The third attempt was a success.
Fedora 13 is a cut above Ubuntu Linux in many respects. It is as pretty as Linux Mint and has an excellent firewall front end. The wireless connection came up a lot faster than in Ubuntu which may take a 30-minute wait after the wireless adapter is manually configured with a static IP address. The updates worked and did not corrupt the OS.
Here is what a Fedora formatted digital drive looks like.
This is what the Fedora LVM volume or partition looks like:
A digital drive is quiet and resistant to vibration. The drive is expected to last 10,000 hours. Oh yes, the drive is very fast. One blogger, Ben Moore, reported:
With the Hitachi HD the (Thinkpad) X40 took 2:14 to hibernate and 1:05 to resume. With the KingSpec SSD it takes :29 to hibernate and :20 to resume. These aren't terribly scientific nor comprehensive but they are what I care about.
A digital HD is a great update for an older laptop. You need some patience to get this drive to work in Linux.
Subscribe to the Rightardia feed: feeds.feedburner.com/blogspot/IGiu
Netcraft rank: 8665
http://toolbar.netcraft.com/site_report?url=http://rightardia.blogspot.com
No comments:
Post a Comment