Fedora 4 Running on my PC

My Fedora Core 3 was wiped off when I ran full Compaq system recovery on my PC. I didn't touch Linux for quite a long time. Recently, I have a desire to explore Linux again. So I download Fedora Core 4 to install it on my PC.

Kernel Parameters

Kernel parameters for Compaq Presario is "linux acpi=off". Otherwise, I cannot even run Linux installation CD. I found that issue when I installed Fedora Core 3 last year. Normally, I prefer to assemble my own PC but I received this Compaq PC as a gift after I had signed up two years contract with my Cable ISP.

Partitioning Hard Disk

It took a few days for me to figure out as I couldn't think of a way to do partitioning on my hard drive. FIPS cannot run anymore since my system is Windows XP which is based on NTFS. FIPS only support FAT32 file system. I don't have Partition Magic either. I found Ranish Partition Manager on Internet but my PC do not have floppy drive to boot up. Then, I found a great software to manage my partition. Knoppix !!!

Knoppix Live Linux CD

Knoppix is a CD based Linux system based on Debian Distribution. 2 Gigabytes of software are compressed on CD which include GNU "parted" utility. I used "parted" to resize my NTFS partition and I had got 5 Gigabytes of free space on my hard drive. Creating linux partition from free space is a piece of cake. However,this is the first time I installed Linux with automatic partition system. So I didn't quite understand with it. I need to create Linux swap partition and Linux Ext3 partition with Disk Durid in previous version. Now automatic partition create Ext3 partition and LVM partition. Perhaps, I will find out about Linux file system later.

Compaq System Recovery

Compaq Presario is too smart to install Linux. After Grub boot manager, it automatically went into recovery console when I restarted the system for the first time. The system asked me with so many annoying message boxes. Finally, I clicked wrong choice and I cannot stop the recovery process. All my software which copied files to "system32" and "system" folders in Windows could no longer work after the recovery process. I need to reinstall everything again. However, FireFox and some software did survive after system recovery. Besides, they wiped of my Grub boot manager too!!

GAG

Gag is a boot manager I found out when I installed Fedora for the very first time. During that installation, I accidentally lost my Windows boot information and I cannot boot up the PC. I used GAG to recreate Master Boot Record. It can help to boot up to 9 operating system at the same time. I ran GAG to recreate my MBR. However, I found some weak point in GAG. It can only support Linux system with LILO boot manager. But I couldn't find any boot manager after Compaq system recovery. However, compaq boot system which always forced me to do recovery disappeared after I had installed and erase the GAG. Since I didn't know how to install GRUB again, I took another 45 minutes to reinstall my FC 4.

After I restarted my PC, my Linux system was ready to use. However, I need to take some time to reinstall all software in my Windows.