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Topic: Up and running :O), Next step required

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groeswenphil Offline

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Posts: 12
Joined: Oct. 2005

Posted: July 20 2007,18:54

O.K. I've got DSL running on my ancient Compaq Armada 15920DT laptop.

The trick was downloading a boot floppy to direct the computer to load the CD.
Now, DSL runs, but its awfully slow.

Initially I thought I'd try to wipe the hard-drive and install DSL.
The hard drive currently holds a Win 95 instalation.
Thing is though, I suppose that I could install DSL onto the hard drive as it is now........but I suppose I'd need another boot disk to point the startup routine to the DSL instalation?

I've learned that you can't alter the startup routine in this vintage of machine

Am I moving in the right direction?
Phil

^thehatsrule^ Offline

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Posts: 3275
Joined: July 2006

Posted: July 20 2007,21:01

You could boot with "fromhd="
See wiki page on cheatcodes for more info.

u2musicmike Offline

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Posts: 149
Joined: April 2006

Posted: July 21 2007,02:55

Phil,

I have DSL 3.4 running on a Compaq Armada 7400 and it runs good. I guess your Armada is older but the speed will improve by making a swap partition. If you have room on your harddrive it might be possible to keep your Windows 95 and install DSL too. DSL has two boot loaders to chose from: lilo and grub. I like grub and it installs into the boot section of the hard drive. My compaq has a small bios part on the hard drive that has the compaq utilities and by using grub I can pick it from the menu when booting up. You might want to use a program called parted to make the partitions for your hard drive. There is lots more about this in the wiki.

curaga

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Posts: 2163
Joined: Feb. 2007

Posted: July 21 2007,06:38

DSL installs a bootloader so you don't need another boot disk to boot it..

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There's no such thing as life. Those mean little jocks invented it ;)
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Windows is not a virus. A virus does something!

3 replies since July 20 2007,18:54

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