A week or so ago I said I’d write a short tutorial on installing a couple of Linux distros on your computer and I’ve decided I’d just show you the various ways for Ubuntu, because the other distros are very similar to install and there’s tons of tutorials out there. Anyway on with the how-to. There are a couple of ways to install Ubuntu:

• Live CD from Canonical (or the manufacturer of your chosen distro. This option uses a Live CD made by Canonical, the makers of Ubuntu. This is by far the easiest way to install a distro.
• Live CD created by you. Slightly more difficult than option 1, with more room for error but not that hard.

Option 1 is by the easiest of them all. You just send off for a disk from Canonical (for Ubuntu), shove it in your CD drive on your computer/laptop, boot up and some options will come up. But before the options come up you must press F-, one of the F- keys along the top of your keyboard. This will depend on your machine, mine if F9. The computer will say, usually in the left hand bottom corner, something like ‘Boot options F5′ and you press that key, select the boot device (the CD) and away you go. You can choose to install the distro straight to your hard drive, or, and this is a very nifty, little idea, you can ‘try before you buy’. This involves booting up the disk and checking out the distro to make sure that everything works with your machine and that sort of stuff.

Option 2 is marginally harder than the above. What you will need is a blank CD, a CD creator drive, a CD burner program and of course the distro ISO. An ISO is basically the file that contains everything needed to run the OS on your computer. It is called an image and is usually around 650MB. You can find it by typing the distributions name into Google, bringing up their site and clicking on download. Right on to the creation. Start you CD burner program, such as Nero and click ‘create CD-ROM ISO’ or something along these lines. Then browse through to where you you saved the .iso file, for example Computer>Documents>Downloads, select it and click create. This will burn the disk and you just do the same as in option 1. It also gives you the option to test before you install it.

So good luck with the installation, and have fun with Linux.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linux

distrowatch.com/

Disclaimer: I accept no responsibility for any part of this process going wrong or damaging your computers hardware or software. You use this tutorial at your own risk.

Visit my site http://alexworld12.blogspot.com for more information on this and many other related topics.

Author: Alex Davies
Article Source: EzineArticles.com
Provided by: Latest trends in mobile phone

The Linux operating system has experienced huge growth in the past few years. With excellent stability. flexibility and the free price tag. People are realizing that Linux is a great alternative. Just like Windows, users would have to learn how to use Linux. Linux developers have taken note, and have come up with several ways to allow people to try Linux without getting rid of your Windows installation. Here are a couple of ways you can get a taste of what Linux has to offer.

Live CD
Linux distributions like Ubuntu offer a feature called Live CD. Live CD allows you to boot off of the install CD instead of your hard drive. All you have to do is burn the CD, keep it in your CD drive when booting your computer and press the option to boot from CD. Now each computer is different so consult your PC manufacture for instructions to boot from CD. Once booted you will be able to use almost all of the functionality of the Linux distribution that you have on CD without impacting your Windows installation. There are two drawbacks: You cannot save your settings once you turn off your computer and the operating system tends to run slow because CD drives access data slower than hard drives. If you like what you see you can install to your hard drive from the live CD. Get more on Ubuntu’s website.

Wubi
Wubi is great. What Wubi does is creates a virtual hard drive in one folder stored on your Windows partition. Then Wubi gives you the option to boot into Windows or Linux upon booting by changing your boot record. Installation is easy. Just download the install file. Select the install path and what install of Ubuntu you would like. That’s it. Once complete you will have the option to boot into Linux or Windows. If you want to remove Linux just go to add/remove programs and uninstall Wubi. That’s it. No mess. There is a small risk of damage to your boot record but I have never seen it. Check out Wubi by doing a Google search.

Virtualbox
Virtualbox is really cool. Virtualbox is a piece of software that you can install in Windows and Linux that will allow you to emulate another operating system while running another. For example, if you use Windows you can install Virtualbox and install Ubuntu then run Ubuntu in a small window or full screen while being able to use everything in Windows. I hope that makes sense. The only drawback Virtualbox has is it runs slow because it has to share system resources with your host operating system. So you won’t be playing any games while running Virtualbox. If you want just learn this is a great solution. Once you are done you can close up Virtualbox to free up system resources. For more information check out VirtualBox’s website.

That’s it! You have three free ways to get your feet wet with Linux. If you like Linux give it an install as your main operating system. There are too many things to explore with Linux to fit in one article. I recommend trying out Ubuntu.

Author: Mike Man
Article Source: EzineArticles.com
Provided by: Canada duty rate

When it comes to the environment do you want to be part of the solution and not part of the problem? If you don’t want to be part of the problem avoid tossing that supposedly outdated computer onto a landfill. Did you know that your outcast computer remains will take decades to biodegrade and leach scads of poisonous chemicals into the environment during the process?

Several years ago the Utah Department of Environmental Quality estimated that by 2004 more than 300 million computers would be considered obsolete, generating well over 1 billion pounds of lead, 2 million pounds of cadmium, 1 million pounds of chromium, and 400,000 pounds of mercury. Municipal incineration is the largest point source of dioxins into the US and Canadian environments and among the largest sources of heavy metal contamination of the atmosphere. Of course the year 2004 is long gone, and these horrible numbers have undoubtedly been far surpassed in spite of efforts such as corporate trade-in programs.

Why do people toss their computers? That’s simple; given the computer industry’s unending performance advances there is a widespread perception that you can no longer DO anything worthwhile with your old computers. This dangerous assumption is simply not true.

Do you really need Giga-everythings to get your work done and have your fun? Microsoft seems to think so. I remember when 128 Megabytes was a lot of memory. Of course I also remember when “Why would anyone ever need more than 640 Kilobytes of memory?” was the official party line expressed by none other than William Gates III himself.

I’m told that Damn Small Linux requires only 50 Megabytes of disk space, a 486 processor (do you remember what that is?) and 8 Megabytes of RAM. If you want to browse the Internet, you’ll have to move up to 16 Megabytes of RAM and use the Dillo browser. The popular Firefox browser requires additional memory. Frankly, I wouldn’t use such an underpowered computer for moderate or heavy Internet usage. But you can run Linux commands and learn how operating systems work on such computers. And you can play a multitude of games.

For every individual trying to resuscitate a 486 computer there are dozens trying to know what to do with an old Pentium such as my Pentium III 450 Megahertz computers with 128 Megabytes of memory purchased in 1999 or more powerful computers purchased several years later. Without extensive upgrades many of these computers won’t run Windows Vista and may not run Windows XP. But they will run Damn Small Linux or other Linux versions alongside a full range of today’s applications. Let’s put them to work, learn Linux, and do our bit saving the environment.

We next see how Linux lets you control the computer, “obsolete” or not.

Author: Levi Reiss
Article Source: EzineArticles.com
Provided by: Programmable Pressure Cooker

A week or so ago I said I’d write a short tutorial on installing a couple of Linux distros on your computer and I’ve decided I’d just show you the various ways for Ubuntu, because the other distros are very similar to install and there’s tons of tutorials out there. Anyway on with the how-to. There are a couple of ways to install Ubuntu:

Option 1 is by the easiest of them all. You just send off for a disk from Canonical (for Ubuntu), shove it in your CD drive on your computer/laptop, boot up and some options will come up. But before the options come up you must press F-, one of the F- keys along the top of your keyboard. This will depend on your machine, mine if F9. The computer will say, usually in the left hand bottom corner, something like ‘Boot options F5′ and you press that key, select the boot device (the CD) and away you go. You can choose to install the distro straight to your hard drive, or, and this is a very nifty, little idea, you can ‘try before you buy’. This involves booting up the disk and checking out the distro to make sure that everything works with your machine and that sort of stuff.

Option 2 is marginally harder than the above. What you will need is a blank CD, a CD creator drive, a CD burner program and of course the distro ISO. An ISO is basically the file that contains everything needed to run the OS on your computer. It is called an image and is usually around 650MB. You can find it by typing the distributions name into Google, bringing up their site and clicking on download. Right on to the creation. Start you CD burner program, such as Nero and click ‘create CD-ROM ISO’ or something along these lines. Then browse through to where you you saved the .iso file, for example Computer>Documents>Downloads, select it and click create. This will burn the disk and you just do the same as in option 1. It also gives you the option to test before you install it.

So good luck with the installation, and have fun with Linux.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linux

distrowatch.com/

Disclaimer: I accept no responsibility for any part of this process going wrong or damaging your computers hardware or software. You use this tutorial at your own risk.