Hi from a Linux newbie

[kevbot]

Been using Windows since 3.1 came in 1992 on one of Lord Sugars Amspud 1512s

Obviously got some better hardware now LOL

Discovered Linux Puppy when it was a freebie cd on a mag some years ago - truthfully, I couldn't get the hang of it, so I carried on with Windows XP and I´ve used Android on a few tablets for about 3 years now

Just installed Mint 11 on an ancient low spec laptop and wow! its great (see my other post)

This community seems to have the answer to almost everything Mint flavoured so I will be using it in future!

[The-Wizard]

Welcome to the Mint family forums

wizard

[HughT]

hi kevbot, welcome to Mint. I've been using Mint 11 for some months now, but its support will cease shortly. I tried the latest Mint 13 versions, but found the kde and Cinnamon wouldn't load nor install fully. But the Mate desktop is working fine. Like you, I have a fairly ancient low spec laptop, so that's what I blame for the kde and Cinnamon failures. So when you feel like moving up to the newer release, I'd suggest trying Mate. You might also have the same problem I had with installation media. My laptop has no support for USB booting nor a DVD burner, so I had to wait til I found a Linux magazine with a new Mint on the cover disk. However I found the plop bootloader and that enabled USB booting. So now it's easy for me to download any version and give it a spin from the USB. regards

[xenopeek]

Hi kevbot, welcome to the Linux Mint forums Thanks for joining the forums! As HughT shares, Linux Mint 11 reaches end of support in October this year. After that you won't get security updates or bugfixes for all your installed software anymore, though you can continue to use it if you want. You are probably using Linux Mint 11 with the Gnome 2 desktop? You might give Linux Mint 13 with the MATE desktop a try; MATE is the continuation of Gnome 2.

Be sure also to check out the Community website (tutorials, hardware and software reviews, ideas). You can also chat in real-time with other Linux Mint users. In the Mint Menu, in the Internet section, start the application XChat IRC. You will automatically get connected to #linuxmint-chat for general chat and #linuxmint-help for support with other Linux Mint users.

Have fun with Linux Mint.

[kevbot]

Thanks for your responses guys

I think I will have to stick with Mint 11 cos my dell only has a cd reader and no usb boot support (I burnt the CD on my Windows machine)

Are all the later releases larger than 700mb cd size cos they have DVD in the media column on the downloads page

Thinking outside the box now - can I download and extract to a usb stick, then run mint 11 from cd, mount the stick and install from there?
Considering my ancient hardware, and that everything is working fine, is it really worth upgrading from Mint 11
Cheers
Kev

[xenopeek]

You can't use Linux Mint 11 CD to install Linux Mint 13 from a USB, but you are on the right track You can put Plop Linux on a CD, and that will allow you to boot from a USB device on computers that don't support booting from USB devices. So put Linux Mint 13 on a USB device, and boot from the Plop Linux CD with the USB device attached and Plop Linux will allow you to continue the boot from the USB device with Linux Mint 13. Then you can first try it out, before you install it. Plop is here: http://www.plop.at/en/ploplinux/index.html

[kevbot]

Thanks Vincent
I have downloaded PloP and made a bootable CD
made a bootable USB drive with my windows PC using unetbooitn and the Linux Mint 13 iso
Tested the usb on my main PC after adjusting the bios to pick up the USB first
Bingo! Mint 13 loaded on my PC from the USB stick

Now comes the problem
Connected the bootable USB to my old laptop
Inserted Plop Linux CD and switched on
Plop loads a simple GUI screen with menu options and then proceeds with the default after the countdown
After loads of Dos like lines go scrolling by, (yeah I know its some sort of Unix), I end up with a black screen saying welcome to plop and a command line with a flashing cursor
Have I done something wrong?
Is Plop supposed to have a GUI
Why didnt my USB boot?

Ive had a look on here and the plop site for a howto but no luck

Can anyone help please
Thanks
Kev

[xenopeek]

Ouch. With the recent rehash of the Plop website, I sent you to the wrong download page. Sorry! Go here instead http://www.plop.at/en/bootmanager/download.html. Download the latest Plop Boot Manager zip file at the top. After downloading, extract the plpbt.iso file. Burn this to a CD, and it will show you a menu after booting from it. In the menu select to boot from USB, with your USB device with Linux Mint 13 attached.

And yes, I tested it this time

[kevbot]

Thank you Vincent!

All sorted now with the usb stick - still a bit of a workaround as plop loader would not accept a hub in the single usb port for both a mouse and the install stick. For some bizarre reason I cant get any version of Linux to correctly use the Dells integrated finger trackpad because the pointer just locks itself to the right scrollbar.

Fortunately my Dell is so old it has PS2 ports so I plugged my mouse in with a usb/ps2 converter and the usb memory stick plugged direct into the single usb

It only has 512mb ram and a 1gig Celeron so I installed the slimmer LXDE desktop interface and a few tweaks I found here http://www.upubuntu.com/2012/06/11-tips ... nning.html

After install I plugged in a hub so its now got the usb mouse and a few other bits working too

All working lovely (with the exception of the trackpad) and much much faster than Vista or XP

Thank you so much for all your help!
Kevin

[xenopeek]

Awesome, congrats on getting this done with all the hoops you had to go through Thanks for the link, that is a handy site to bookmark.