Dual Boot Baby!

Yeppers, I done did it! I am now a proud owner of a dual boot system. Pretty cool. Yesterday, I finally installed Linux on my system!

I kept my original Windows XP Media Center Edition on the master hard drive and installed the latest version of Ubuntu Linux on the slave hard drive. Really it was pretty easy. I just downloaded the Ubuntu Linux. Burned the image on to a CD, and I was ready to go. The hardest part was taking the hard drive out of my old computer and putting it in my new one. Even the brain transplant wouldn’t have been that hard, except Gateway used a ribbon cable that barely reached with one hard drive. When I installed the slave drive, the cable wouldn’t reach! Thanx a lot Gateway! :0) So, I had to go down to CompUSA (our nearest Fry’s Electronics is about 100 miles away) and put down $10 for a new, and longer, cable.

After I put everything back together, I just booted to the Ubuntu CD and installed it on “hdab.” Ubuntu even handled the Grub boot partition automatically. My Windows drive was otherwise untouched, so all of my original files, and configuration remain intact. Now, when I reboot my computer, I just choose Windows or Linux and it boots up accordingly! The Linux was free and the ribbon cable was $10.

Originally, I installed Ubuntu on my old computer. I ended up with a problem though. Ubuntu didn’t recognize the ATI All-in-Wonder graphics card I had installed. So, after hours of “guessing” on the manual configuration for my video card, I got it to work! I had a dual boot system with Windows 98 and Ubuntu sharing that same hard drive. That was fine, but it wasn’t long after that when I got my new computer. This was all about two years ago. I was going to put Ubuntu on the whole drive of my old computer since Windows 98 isn’t even supported by Windows and is less than secure. So, I installed Ubuntu, but without the ATI All-in-Wonder card. It installed just fine, but then I discovered the on board graphics card was messing up. I was getting a glitchy picture. My old computer has been sitting since. I didn’t want to hassle with the manual video card configuration again.

However, this new arrangement is better! Otherwise, I would have needed a KVM switch to use two computers with one mouse/keyboard. Probably $50. Or, two desks, each with their own computer. Not very efficient.

So, now I can explore Linux without losing my Windows setup. My favorite thing about Linux so far is the free Mahjong. It’s the best version I’ve played, and it’s free! I already have the top 5 scores :-)

My old computer is now parts. Maybe my local high school could use ‘em?

Happy computing!