OS install advice on old P3 win98

[smartkid95]

Right now I'm in one of those OUCH! double whammy situations, I found an old P3 dell and since I liked The case design I decided I would do something with it to have a nice little something for experimentation but things have gone wrong. The graphics card doesn't have any supporting drivers for win 98 I don't know how, and also he cd drive doesn't work properly. I'm trying everything I can to get it to work. the cd drive thing isn't a big deal to me if it doesn't work do to modern flash drive solutions so I don't want to go the route of replacing it. Usb flash drives aren't yet supported, and I can't download drivers because the Ie version doesn't work with half of the necessary plugins the floppy disks are the only option, and all the ones I have currently are to small. If anyone can shed some light I would appreciate it. I want to install linux but no installer will work so could some one tell me what to do I would greatly appreciate it.

 

[False_Dmitry_II]

On that I'd go for puppy linux or xubuntu. Xubuntu should have a USB install option, though you may have to "prepare" it. You'd have to use the live CD run it, and find the USB thing in the system menu. I'd recommend version 9.04 for the time being. If it doesn't support USB booting, you should be able to find a floppy boot such that the floppy boots first and just points to the USB stick.

Or if I were you I'd just pull an optical drive out of another system just long enough to install it and move it back.

 

[thently]

Well pop the cd drive out of your current PC unless it's Sata just till you get it loaded. I would recomend XP I had a P3 laptop was a fast one 1333 but it ran great I loved it for internet and documents. If not go get a drive 30 bucks on new egg sometimes cheaper. I never used the USB it was usb 1.1 LOL 11 mb yay not worth anything but maybe wireless..

T

 

[smartkid95]

Well pop the cd drive out of your current PC unless it's Sata just till you get it loaded. I would recomend XP I had a P3 laptop was a fast one 1333 but it ran great I loved it for internet and documents. If not go get a drive 30 bucks on new egg sometimes cheaper. I never used the USB it was usb 1.1 LOL 11 mb yay not worth anything but maybe wireless..

T

I'm definately going to try a diffrent cd drive but do you know where I could find drivers to set it up It always comes up as an unknown device

 

[False_Dmitry_II]

Uh, drivers? For linux for a CD drive? You're joking right?

If you mean in the BIOS, you may have to tell it that its an optical drive. Or set it to auto. My own limited experience with stuff from that era says that setting it to auto always works.

 

[smartkid95]

Uh, drivers? For linux for a CD drive? You're joking right?

If you mean in the BIOS, you may have to tell it that its an optical drive. Or set it to auto. My own limited experience with stuff from that era says that setting it to auto always works.

I me for win 98 It keeps telling me to it's unknown so setting it up from bios doesn't work even on auto I'm gonna mess around with it and se what happens though

 

[False_Dmitry_II]

I have limited experience with drivers on that OS (read: none) I don't know if it should just work or not for that.