Installing Linux for the first time (& dual boot)

So did you follow this bit of the instructions:

where hde3 was your / partition, and then you copied the bootsect.lin file from /tmp to your xp partition's root dir...

You must copy the bootsect.lin file to c:\

and the last line of c:\boot.ini must read:

C:\bootsect.lin="Red Hat Linux 7.2"

you wrote lilo to the bootsector of / and then took an image of that sector's binary as a file.

Then XP's bootloader executes the contents of this file.

SCORE!

Now, I want to bump my question for Mictlantecuhtli incase it gets missed:

It only appeared after the first reboot after the driver install. Its gone now....

Alright, this text thing is really killing me. My internet is very ugly. I downloaded Opera, I used Mozilla and I have used Netscape and all of them look the same. Everything else looks perfect. This is just a a sore spot with me and I really want to get it fixed.

try this out this page here it worked for me and now websites look 100% better. :grinthumb

Very good info..Thanks for the link. I'll try some of it out tonight and post back to let you know how they look.

dual boot

I found that using a partition manager to preset my FAT32, NTFS, and Linux Ext2 partitions really helped. I had Partition Magic 4SE.
Then I finished partitioning all the separate partitions for family members in FAT32 (I did this so this partitions would be available to them in either Win98 or XP).

I set for c:\ drive as active and then installed Win98. Then I set the NTfs as active and installed XP. Then I set the Linux partition active and installed Mandrake 8.1.

When this was installed I went to Linuxconf and set the boot to Windows by default for the family. When the computers is booted, it goes to LILO screen and waits for 3 seconds and then defaults to Windows. The XP dual boot then kicks in and gives a choice of XP or Win98 with a 15 second default to Win98.

The most help was the partition manager.

Some people like to do what you describe and have LILO call the NT boot loader.... I like it the other way round. I can post how to change this if anyone likes.

bump

how should the "updatedb" command perform?
the story's like this...
since the official drivers for the KYROII are out (.rpm), i decided to give that Red Hat 7.2 CD under my bed another shot.
installation is fine, but i still have the same problem configuring X windows as i've stated before. i guess it's because there's no driver for the KYROII listed, so i tried installing the drivers.
now, i've already d/led the .rpm driver for my KYROII. since i'm not sure what the floppy drive is called (like harddisks are "hdX" - therefore i can't mount it), i copied the files on to my C drive (win2k). i mounted the drive fine. but i can't install the .rpm files. correct me if i'm wrong, but the command to do this is:
rpm -i /mnt/win2k/kyro.rpm
right? (i've renamed the .rpm file to sth shorter through windows) anyway, it says it can't find the .rpm file or the path is wrong. so i tried the find .rpm command (can't remember what the command was, but i have it noted down back home).
anyway, when i used that command, it told me to run "updatedb" first. so i ran the command.
the problem is that when i typed:
updatedb
then press [enter], nothing happens. my screen'll look sth liek this:

[BASH]updatedb
_

where the underscore is a blinking cursor. i can type anything into it, but nothing happens. if i press [enter] again, it'll come down one line. i'm not sure if it's crashed or anything, but i could still press ctrl-alt-del to reboot.
my question is, is this how the updatedb command should behave? i've waited for about 10 mins, but it just stays there blinking.
or am i doing sth wrong?

the updatedb command catalogues all files on your mounted drivers, and puts them into a locate database.

even on a powerful machine, this can take time....

the purpose of this is that you can say

locate file

where file is something you'd like to know the full path of.

I have never renamed an .rpm and I'd do all your linux downloading, untarring, file operations in Linux if I was you.

the prob is that i can't even get linux up and running

did you manage to get a graphical install or was it text based??