Distro for aging laptop -- bootable CD?

[Jonathan Hutchins]

On Sunday 14 December 2003 03:45 pm, Bradley Miller wrote:

> I've got a P233 Toshiba with 96Mb in it.  I found the new Mandrake "Move"
> that allows you to boot from CD and access a USB storage device.  It works
> pretty slick ...

> I've got a 4 gig drive in the laptop, so I could theoretically
> install two OS systems . . . but I'm still torn on that prospect.  I do
> need to do a new install on that box because of a virus on it . . . but I'm
> not energetic enough to try it.  I still need Windows capability on it.

Having run Mandrake for a while, and having just installed SuSE 9 on a laptop, 
I would go with SuSE instead of Mandrake at this point.  The main reason is 
that the SuSE install/update/additions from the Novell FTP server have been 
smooth as silk, whereas package management on Mandrake has been nothing but a 
pain in the rear.  

I've also found newer versions of several programs (including KDE and all it's 
components) for SuSE, and I've found more binaries like drivers that are 
built for SuSE than for Mandrake.

SuSE's installer offers to shrink your Windows partition, but on my Winbook 
with WinMe, I had to use Partition Magic first, after which SuSE set up a 
nice dual-boot.

SuSE does offer a bootable trial CD, but for a full install of the current 
version you must either purchase CD's or do an FTP install.  Mine took about 
2.5 hrs from ftp.novell.com.