Burning .iso of Linux Mint?

[Telkwa]

Let me see if I can clear up the md5 questions a little bit. The .iso download is one huge file. If you're on a Windows PC you can Explore the .iso and see what I mean. One honkin' file means one md5 will be generated. That's why you can go back to your download site, look for the md5, and compare the two very easily. You can do it by hand if you want by carefully writing down the md5 from the website, then using a Windows-based md5 utility to generate an md5 checksum from your download, then comparing the two.

It's a whole different story once you've converted the .iso into a bootable CD. Now you have hundreds of files, and hundreds of md5 checksums.

There are parts of this that I don't understand, because I've run CD's thru md5Summer and gotten a few dozen md5's, not hundreds. Maybe Summer makes one md5 for each folder, I don't know. But it can be used to check CD's. Here's how.

I believe the simplest solution is to get ahold of a known-good CD. Ask your utility to scan that CD and create md5's. I imagine it's the same with any popular utility, but the only one I'm familiar with is Summer. You can ask Summer to save the results as a text file. Then you can scan a second CD and ask Summer to verify, not create, md5's. It'll ask you which numbers to verify against, you point it to the previously created file, and it'll compare the md5's from the second CD against the md5's generated from the first CD.

It would be a simple thing for a couple of folks to coordinate their efforts via this forum. One, who has a known-good CD, can generate the text file of md5's from a CD, then attach it to a post. Anyone else can then borrow that list and use it to compare the md5's generated from their CD's. You might have to use the same md5 utility, I don't know about that. I don't have a copy of Bea yet, but if I did I'd be happy to run it thru Summer and post the results. I'll have a copy in a few days and will check back here.

[900i]

Thanks very much Telkwa.

[Cluttermagnet]

Thanks! Some good info. I will try that Summer utility.

Regarding my slow computer, it is an old IBM Aptiva E46. Runs an AMD K6-II at 266MHz. I have it jazzed up with 256M of RAM, but it still just crawls. I now plan to try a lightweight distro like Puppy or DSL with that one. It's a dog with Windows. Heh!

Meanwhile, I do own about 8 desktops; 5 out of 8 I built myself using P4 processors at 1.6-1.8 GHz with 'plenty' of RAM, usually 512M. I will make at least one of them a dedicated Linux box to learn on. Although it is 'easier' to try Live CD distros, I will need an installed OS, as I want to dig in and learn file management as I have in the Windows environment. OTOH I really don't know yet if I'm a KDE or a Gnome type (or other) until I try a few popular distros. That will come in time. I'm not afraid of learning to work with command lines. I'll just let Win98SE continue to be my 'real' OS a while longer and do the 'heavy lifting' while I'm learning Linux.

BTW I plan to keep it simple by avoiding multi-booting for now. I have read enough about that to know that it can be a real pain when it's misbehaving.

[Telkwa]

Clutter -
just a coupla days ago I spent several hours on my first attempt at writing a step-by-step how-to with pictures and everything. There are 2 parts - one involves setting up a HDD for an all-Linux dual (or triple) boot, the second part is a step-by-step install of PCLinuxOS but could be modified for just about anything.
Since I'm not signed up with an image-hosting site and don't have broadband, I just attached the guides as .pdf's in this thread.

http://www.techsupportforum.com/alterna ... ux-os.html

posts #9 and #12

I'm a newb, so I tried real hard not to zoom past anything. You might feel better about a Linux dual-boot at least. Not as helpful for a Windows dualboot.

[Cluttermagnet]

Cluttermagnet try this for checksum verification, it's a windows GUI app

http://www.nullriver.com/index/products/winmd5sum

Thanks, 900i-
Yesterday I was at my friend's house where the broadband ISP connection is available and my .iso distro images are stored. I installed and used this program. It did a great job computing and comparing the md5sum on one of the distros. I will now use it in the future before burning any more CD's. BTW I was getting a copy of Vector Linux 5.8 to try on that slow machine I have. I will use a faster machine for LinuxMint, which did not play too well on the slow machine as a Live CD OS.