Linux Mint Forums

Hi everyone, please forgive me for my complete ignorance as I am useless with computers. I have read the reviews on Linux and want to try it without doing anything to my computer Windows 7, which I believe you can do by downloading and putting on a CD, then putting the CD into the computer and restarting it. This will autoboot the CD and starts Linux. My problem is this, I have downloaded Linux Mint and uncompressed it. I then went to copy it to CD, but when I drag over the files to be copied onto CD, it says that the files are too big for the CD that I have. The CDs I have are 700mb, 80min. My question is simply how do I copy onto CD, or install onto my computer, without changing anything on my computer ie Windows 7 as I am a bit thick when it comes to computers, or should I just leave it as I don't know what I am doing. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

The file you downloaded should have been an ISO file. Don't try to uncompress the file, and don't try to burn it to the cd by dragging and dropping, you have to do it another way called burning a disc image. Windows 7 can do this. Right click on the iso file and there should be an option to burn a disc image. HOWEVER, the current version of Linux Mint no longer fits on a cd, you have to use a dvd. If you don't have a dvd burner and blank dvd, there is another option to install the iso to a USB thumb drive.

Or else, you can just mount the downloaded iso file using Daemon Tools (http://www.daemon-tools.cc/eng/products/dtLite) or any other software which can mount ISO files.
Then double click your newly mounted drive by going to 'My Computer'. There wil be an option to 'Install inside Windows'. It will install Linux Mint inside windows (by creating a virtual partition). Then restart your computer & complete the installation process by booting into Mint. The nice part is if you are not satisfied with it; you can easily remove it through 'Add/Remove Programs' in Control panel. It is very easy & will eliminate the need for partitioning and/or formatting the hard disk.
Considering you are a beginner I guess it is the best option.