Laptops :: Worth looking at?



So, this is a lot of fun.  I have an old Compaq Armada laying around, it is built like a tank and really kind of cool...but it runs windows 3.1 or something ancient.  It features:

no modern ports (no usb, firewire, ethernet, etc)
an infrared port  (wow, why was this a good idea?)
a 7 gig hd
a p2 something-or-other processor
and two pcmia slots

I got a pcmia wifi card I'd like to use on it in conjunction with DSL, but I have no way of getting the OS onto the hard drive.  I have a pcmia ethernet card, but it doesn't have built-in TCPIP support (IT IS OLD).  

It does have a serial and a parallel port.  Now, do you know of anyway I could network boot from a serial port?  If I can get DSL on there I can get all the drivers needed to run it in DSL through the PCMIA ethernet card, and from there get the wifi card working.  I've tried everything, from taking the HD out and putting it in another pc (DSL wouldn't read it as a USB or ide device for some reason, even though it will still boot windows if I put it back in)

So, bottom line is that I know its possible to ethernet install linux distros, what about parallel or serial port?  Any help or advice beyond "buy a new laptop" would be greatly appreciated.

Thank you,

-red
You could transfer dsl to the hd via a serial or parallel "laplink"/"null modem" cable or via the infra red port or via a pcmcia memory card.

Does the machine have a floppy drive you could boot from?
Would it be possible to install DSL to the HD by taking it out, installing DSL through another laptop, and then putting the HD back into this one?
What kind of HD adapter did you use? Or was it in another laptop?

I'm thinking it's the master/slave config. When I previously had a laptop hd that didn't get recognized, it was because it defaulted to slave and the another laptop wanted a master. The usb-to-ide-2.5" adapters also want master, so I guess your drive is slave by default too..
Yes - as long as it is the only hd in both cases then it will have the same drive letter (hda1 or whatever) in the two machines. If there is more than one hd (or partition for that matter, I guess) then there could be an issue of grub/lilo looking for the wrong drive designation.

And, yes, I got distracted whist making this post and Curaga jumped in first.
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