iamthesargent wrote:

I was thinking about something more heavier... Like Absolute Linux or OpenSUSE.

Will these be like a Hit and Miss? I am about to burn Absolute Linux in a little while and see if I can't load it onto the harddrive

A lot depends upon their memory requirements. OpenSuse probably needs more RAM than your system has. Much of this issue is related to the desktop GUI you install. If you just install a command-line interface, such as for a server machine, then you need a lot less RAM to run, and most any distribution will do.

1. Have you thought about checking for an updating BIOS?

2. Are you sure your CD is "bootable" (tested it on another box)?

3. I would go with Fedora. Don't be afraid of the bloat. Just use Fluxbox instead of Gnome/KDE for your desktop environ.

What I typically do in this scenario is boot the box with a PXE-enabled floppy (from www.rom-o-matic.org), if my NIC is supported. that means i have a TFTP/DHCP server on the local network that is sharing the install media somehow (NFS/WEB/FTP,etc.), and this may be more than you're willing to do...

As long as you are command line savvy, you can install most any system, because it seems that you have enough disk space, if 40 GB is really accessible. A full desktop environment, such as KDE or GNOME, if it runs at all, will be so slow that it will be non-functional. A moderate desktop, such as XFCE, may run, but it is not likely to do well either. You may have a chance getting LXDE or Enlightenment to work, those are about the "heaviest" environments likely to work with so little memory and processor capability. But any distribution that offers fvwm, IceWM, JWM, Openbox, or Fluxbox ought to work well enough to give you a window manager display environment. That would include any Debian derived system that uses Debian repositories, that would likely include a Ubuntu based system, adding in one or more of those window managers, that would include Crunch Bang #! Linux, which IS a Ubuntu derivative.

Absolute Linux, Vector Linux, and Slackware would be possibilities, again as long as you replace any heavy default desktop with one of the five or so lightweight window manager environments. Any other distribution where it either comes equipped that way or you can download such environments, would also work with a modest amount of research and work on your part.

I like antiX; you may be able to get that one to work great right from the installation.

you could try slackware
either an old version (slackware 11.*) or if it's
slackware12.*, use a light x-window environment such
as xfce (but definitely not kde)

I suppose you could install debian (without X for starters) if, as previous posters already mentioned, you are commandline savvy. Minimal debian installation is rather tiny. Then you could try expanding it with X and with some light-weight window manager.

Good luck,

Vlad

Backtrack is a pretty good live CD distro I use at work alot. Has a ton of network features...including some that are a tad sketchy, but can help regardless.

Otherwise OpenSuse was fun, alot of features, but a fairly large install from what I remember. Knoppix was always a favorite for something quick and easy though.