Thank you to everyone that responded. It looks like I need to do some studying in the file section here. The Toshiba did come with Windows 7. It is both good and bad. A lot of my beloved programs will not work. sure The laptop did come with a lot of "junk" downloaded. I am not sure yet what is needed and what is not. I am a former Mac person that has been using a PC for a bit now. I really want to learn Linux, and it looks like the best bet may be for me to obtain it on disk.
There is a Linux group, well, supposed to be. I joined up with it and they have still not had a meeting. I joined up about two months ago. I emailed them and receive no response. So, it looks like they are dead in the water right now. Thanks again for all the information provided.
--- In LINUX_Newbies@yahoogroups.com, "dbneeley" <dbneeley@...> wrote:
>
> I would agree that if you can, putting Linux on the internal drive would be a superior approach. If you have a Linux User Group in your area, they usually have "install fests" in conjunction with their meetings to help in cases like this.
>
> I also believe that Loyal, while his conclusions were largely correct, left out a few steps that can save you potential problems.
>
> I presume the Toshiba now has Windows installed on the drive. Before you do anything else, be sure you have cleaned up the Windows install of any surplus files--things like applications you are not interested in including adware the manufacturers seem to love to load on these things. For that, there is a very nice little program you can download for free from freeware sites called "PCDeCrapifier"...it will deal with most of those things in short order. Be sure it is compatible with your version of Windows--if you have a new machine, it probably has Windows 7 on it, and this may not be supported by the freeware app--you should check that.
>
> Next, get rid of temporary files of all types--again, a freeware download from Piriform called "CCleaner" is probably your best bet here, as it is simple to use and works quite well. It also has the ability to purge the registry of listings that are no longer applicable once you have removed some of the excess apps you don't want.
>
> Finally, defragment the disk to get all the Windows files into a nice, compact arrangement on the disk. This makes a Linux installation much faster and simpler.
>
> I would also back up the Windows installation on the external hard disk; there are freeware tools for doing that, too. This way, should anything fail for any reason during the later install, you can recover easily.
>
> Setting up a machine for dual boot between Linux and Windows is actually pretty easy, once you have seen it done at least. There are many different versions of Linux, as you are discovering, and many of them work a little differently in the installation routine--so it is difficult to give you detailed instructions that would be applicable in all cases.
>
> However, many distributions of Linux are actually a bit trickier to install on an external USB drive than they are to install on the main hard disk. Thus, if you have someone nearby who is a Linux enthusiast, many of them will be happy to help you set things up either way.
>
> Personally, I would probably format the 320 GB hard disk as follows:
>
> 90 GB Windows;
> 20 GB Linux root partition
> 60 GB Linux /home partition
> 6 GB Linux swap partition
> Balance in an NTFS data partition.
>
> Linux distributions generally can handle the repartitioning with little risk these days. I have never had a failure in this process, doing basically what I am suggesting you do (including getting your Windows partition well maintained to begin with).
>
> Later, you can use the external drive for data storage easily enough. For that purpose, I'd probably partition it as well into two pieces--one for the Windows partition backup, the other for data--and both formatted with NTFS so they can be accessed by both Linux and Windows.
>
> Note that NTFS actually isn't very good, but for these purposes it will serve.
>
> I also agree that the various netbook editions are not all that hot for a full-resource notebook. I have both Kubuntu and Mint dual booted on this machine, as a matter of fact. I use a small root partition for each, a much larger home partition that both use, and a data partition that is a left-over from when this disk was actually used in a backup role in an external case. When the other hard drive failed, I slipped this one in the machine, reloaded Linux and had it up and running in less than an hour all told.
>
> For the distribution of choice, there are some things I still like Ubuntu for on the Gnome side. For example, the Ubuntu Software Center seems far superior to the comparable Mint one, which some folks have had issues with it seems. I ran across an article a few days ago that covered how to install the Ubuntu Software Center onto Mint 9, though, and that seems to work very well.
>
> I would also be sure to look into the various programs that help install the most common programs and repositories. Ubuntu Tweak is the most popular of these, and will work on Ubuntu and its family as well as on Mint.
>
> A utility I use often is a pop-up terminal program. The Gnome version is called Guake; in KDE the version is Yaquake. These simply pop up a terminal when you press F12...very handy indeed as you get used to the speed and power of command line use. I also often use the Apt-Fast accelerated installation script. It is many times faster than apt-get, as it uses the Axel download accelerator. Again, as you become proficient with some basic command line use, that may be extremely handy to know about.
>
> Good luck--and let us know how things proceed for you.
>
> David
>
> --- In LINUX_Newbies@yahoogroups.com, "Gabrielle" <dawnyisrael13@> wrote:
> >
> > Greetings to the Group,
> >
> > Well, I finally have my own computer and am ready to install Linux. I now that a Toshiba Laptop with a dual core processor, 3Gb/320 gb hard Drive. I also obtained an external Seagate 500Gb HD. That is where I would like to put the Linux is onto this external HD. I want to set it up and do it correct. I went to the Ubuntu Netbook download page. I am not sure if it will ask me if I am going to partition my hard drive or use an external HD. Should I use the Netbook download or should I do something else and how to proceed. Thank you
> >
>
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