[SOLVED] Problem getting old Dell to boot Puppy

jfraymondpa · 05-12-2012, 08:06 AM

Have an old Dell Inspirion 1000 that I'm trying to get Puppy installed on.
It has 256mb Ram and a 30gb hd.
It had Windows on it, I booted Puppy from CD and used Gparted to setup the hd for Swap, Root and Home partitons.

My problem is it won't boot from the hd, I installed Grub but still can't get booted.

I'm sure I blew the boot record on the disk.

How do I get this working?

Thanks,
John

jymm56 · 05-12-2012, 07:35 PM

I am no expert, I am new myself. I would try Lubuntu. It has a great install, does the partition and install itself, you don't have to partition. It will work fine on your system. I am not sure if it will find windows if you want a dual boot, but it would be worth a try. Lubuntu will tell you if it finds windows. Otherwise I hope someone else has a better answer for you.

jfraymondpa · 05-13-2012, 06:10 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by jymm56

... try Lubuntu. It has a great install, does the partition and install itself, you don't have to partition. ...

Won't boot, there is a work around using "Smart Boot Manager". So I don't have much faith that Lubuntu will work in the long run.

Puppy boots from the live CD and finds all the hardware, sets up the wireless and connects to the internet.
I just can't get it to boot from the hard drive.

Windows has been wiped from this machine and I need help getting Puppy to boot.

HELP!

nitehawk1 · 05-13-2012, 08:04 PM

hmmm,..
I do love running a Puppy!
Have you considered using the Grub4Dos (or something like that). That's what I use a lot,..and I get all kinds of Puppy Linux up and running on my older computers. Your computer you mentioned should do so very well with a Puppy Linux. (I love running Puppy on my old computers!!).
Have you considered going with your question to the Puppy Linux forum?
http://www.murga-linux.com/puppy/

jefro · 05-13-2012, 08:31 PM

Puppy has two versions. One of them may be needed for your old system. I can't remember if it used syslinux or isolinux what to boot. See the puppy doc's.

Posting specs of system, and grub errors may help to provide better answers.

It can't hurt to try other OS's but that is not the question you asked.

jfraymondpa · 05-20-2012, 10:00 AM

Well I've got this working, but only by booting from the CD.
I can use the hard drive and for what I want to use this laptop for that will suffice,
I plan on using it for an interface to my model railroad using JMRI.