[RealWingsFan]

Not sure if this is the correct message board to put this so please let me know. A family member gave me an old refurbished pc that had XP Home on it but couldn't get it to start-up or even get a start-up screen. The only Microsoft installation disks I have are from OEM computers ( Dell and Emachine ) and of course they aren't of any help. I've been wanting to learn about Linux so I thought I could use this pc and I'm able to get the live cd's of Ubuntu, Xubuntu, Linux Mint 10... to load from the cd's but can't install any of them. The optical drive (NEC DVD_RW ND-1300A )I'm using is from my old E-machine ( T2865) that also had XP home and since each of the Linux installs I've tried say that the problem may be a disk read error I'm thinking I need to install drivers for the cd-rom but don't know how to install drivers without an O.S. I have a few diagnostic tools I've found online such as Knoppix6.4 , Bit Defender rescue cd , Kaspersky Recovery cd, and the Ultimate Boot CD which has a ton of diagnostic tools from live cd. I've G-Parted the hard drives several times to unallocated, EXT3 , EXT4, NTFS... but that didn't help either. Here is a System summary: Processor is Intel Pentium 4 CPU 1.70 GHZ , 1030mbs ram, no O.S. of course , Audio adapter ICH - Intel 82801BA-ICH2, it had a Maxtor 6L100P0 100gb hard drive that I had no luck with so I'm trying my old emachine Western Digital 1600AB-22D 160 gb hard drive out with same results. I'm way out of my league to all this as I'm a basic pc user and will only be able to respond about once a day so please be patient. If I'm unable to get this pc running I will just recycle it so it's just a learning toy for me as like I've said I just want to learn about Linux. Thanks in advance for any guidence. I work afternoons and am about to get ready for work now so I'll check in on this thread tomorrow.

Edited by RealWingsFan, 14 February 2011 - 11:28 AM.

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You don't need to install a driver for cd-drive as Windows XP Setup and other bootable utility discs automatically support cd-drives natively.
The need to install a DOS driver for cd-rom drives has long gone thankfully, ever since DOS ceased to be a vital platform for Windows.

The two old hard drives you've tried so far may have failed and you can test them by making a bootable CD containing "Seagate SeaTools for DOS" from here:
http://www.tacktech....tid=287#seagate

It will test any brand of hard drive, not just Seagate ones.

The download is an ISO file, so you'll need to use "Nero Burning ROM" or something similar to make a CD from it.
Then boot the old PC from it.

[phillipcorcoran]

You don't need to install a driver for cd-drive as Windows XP Setup and other bootable utility discs automatically support cd-drives natively.
The need to install a DOS driver for cd-rom drives has long gone thankfully, ever since DOS ceased to be a vital platform for Windows.

The two old hard drives you've tried so far may have failed and you can test them by making a bootable CD containing "Seagate SeaTools for DOS" from here:
http://www.tacktech....tid=287#seagate

It will test any brand of hard drive, not just Seagate ones.

The download is an ISO file, so you'll need to use "Nero Burning ROM" or something similar to make a CD from it.
Then boot the old PC from it.

[RealWingsFan]

Thankyou I will try this and let you know how things go. OK I got it running the long test and it looks like it'll be awhile but it did give me the following info; Device 0 is ATA Device WDCWD1600AB-22DYAO WD-WMAEK1073810 on Generic PCI ATA Device is 48 bit... This drive supports Security Features. Smart is supported and enabled. Smart has not been tripped. DST is supported. Logging feature set is not supported. POH 3581

Edited by RealWingsFan, 15 February 2011 - 10:47 AM.

[RealWingsFan]

Ok after the long test ran it automatically ran the short test. Long test passed and short test DST also passed. So if the hard drive is good and the cd-rom is good my next guess would be to somehow test the ram. It is pc133 ram and have 3 slots, the first has 512mbs and the other two slots have 256mbs each. p.s. I'm about to get ready for work so will check this thread tomorrow.

Edited by RealWingsFan, 15 February 2011 - 12:11 PM.

[shuggans]

Realwingsfan-
Here is a link to an ISO image of the ultimate conglomeration of software tools available- the Ultimate Boot CD (UBCD)!
This has Seatools(the Hard drive tool you used earlier) as well as several other utilities to test components. It ALSO includes my favorite Memory testing utility- Memtest86+, it will be found under the "memory" menu after booting from the UBCD.

You will have to burn this file to the disc the same way you did seatools.

[shuggans]

actually giving you the link would have helped i guess
Here ya go:
http://ubcd.mirror.fusa.be/ubcd511.iso