770z & operating systems. What works?

[Grench]

I have two 770z units and 3 HDDs and a pile of nifty bits for them. Advanced Dock, DVD, Floppy, 802.11g PCMCIA, etc...

I have tried a few OSs on them, but haven't been 100% thrilled with any of them.

Windows 2000. Actually works pretty decent, but doesn't get updates anymore.

Windows XP. Works. Pretty much everything recognized. SLOW.

Oracle Unbreakable Linux. Sorta works. Oracle updater doesn't want to work.

Novel Linux. No sound.

Ubuntu. Won't load for me. Has anyone had better luck with this?

I'm thinking of installing OS/2 on one for giggles.

I would like to run Ubuntu on it, but can't seem to get beyond the 1st flash screen of the loader.

What works for the rest of you?

[whizkid]

http://thinkwiki.org/wiki/Installation_ ... inkPad_770

That has some links for 770 family installation stories, but nothing specifically for the 770Z. ThinkWiki has a lot of good information.

Ubuntu should work fine on that machine, and I even managed to get a version running on my 750P, but I'm still no expert. Check out the #ubuntu IRC channel. It's full of helpful people.

Then go back to ThinkWiki and make a page or two for the other owners.

Here's one thing that might work: Try Ubuntu 6.06 LTS if you haven't yet. I had trouble getting newer versions to work on my oldest machines.

Lastly, I would not recommend anything but a recent OS if you will be connecting to the Internet, especially for sensitive matters like e-mail or banking. That would put anything older than Windows XP, OS/2 and a few others off my list.

You could see how Haiku or ReactOS work!

[pianowizard]

Windows 2000. Actually works pretty decent, but doesn't get updates anymore.

It still does. It's Windows 98 that doesn't.

Windows XP. Works. Pretty much everything recognized. SLOW.

How much RAM do you have and what's the speed of the hard drive? For several months, I ran XP on my first 600E with the same CPU as your 770Z and 224MB RAM and I was quite happy with the performance. The 770Z can take up to 320MB RAM.

[Grench]

Thank you for your replies. I realize from reading posts in this subject area that the emphasis is on the 600 models and this is a bit of a deviation.

How much RAM do you have and what's the speed of the hard drive? For several months, I ran XP on my first 600E with the same CPU as your 770Z and 224MB RAM and I was quite happy with the performance. The 770Z can take up to 320MB RAM.

I have the stock system board plus two 128MB cards in each one. It shows up as just under 300 on the post scans. I also have 802.11g PCMCIA cards for both of them, the big III dock unit with built in SCSI and IDE and 3 PCI slots, etc.

Both machines have the AV MPEG2 adapters, etc... DVD playback was never perfect on them though. I also have the TV out adapter. Although fun to play with, it wasn't a practical application.

They are fun machines to play around with. I've retired them from serious work at this point. The engineering that went into them is pretty amazing.

XP takes about 10 minutes to boot through to usability. Thats why I'm trying so many versions of Linux on them. Having three HDDs and two machines to experiment on makes the process more enjoyable.

I'll have to give the older Ubuntu a shot.

[thinkpad adrian]

you can still get updates fro windows 98, but the secret is to first update internet explorer BEFORE you try windws update.
if you dont, windows update will FAIL. soooooooo, just download
internet explorer 6 sp 1, when finished, go to microsoft and get the rest of the updates offered. they have been no new updates in 18 monthes, but the old ones are still there. adrian

[pianowizard]

they have been no new updates in 18 monthes, but the old ones are still there. adrian

Yeah, that's what I meant. No more new updates.

[pkiff]

I'm limiting my comments to Windows OSes as that's all I know.

Windows 2000. Actually works pretty decent, but doesn't get updates anymore.

I found that Windows 2000 SP4 worked great with the 770Z (at least as far as Windows can EVER work "great"). What is it that you think needs to be updated in Win 2000? I think you'll find that you can update pretty much everything that needs to be updated. And as long as you don't run Microsoft Internet Explorer, then most security holes can be plugged. In fact, I suspect that fewer and fewer viruses/worms specifically target Win2000 since the install base is continually shrinking, whereas XP and Vista still offer juicy targets. And Microsoft still periodically releases "critical" security fixes. The last one was released in Jan 2008: Security Update for Windows 2000 (KB941644). I'm still running Win2000 on my 770E with a PII 400 and it is a good fit for that CPU.

Windows XP. Works. Pretty much everything recognized. SLOW.

I'm currently running XP on my 770Z but I've upgraded the CPU to a PIII 500MHz. A cleaned up/slimmed down install of XP runs great on such an upgraded machine, especially with memory maxed out, and I would wager that XP is probably the preferred Windows OS for people who have upgraded the CPU.

I've also got Windows 98SE running on my 770Z (dual boot), and it works great for me on the 770Z as well, though it has the same problems that Win98 has on any other machine (i.e. memory leaks, periodic crashes, bluescreens, etc.). And as for updates, if you are set on running win98, there are various sources for updates to that as well.

Phil.

[Grench]

I was able to get Ubuntu 7.10 to install from the Alternate CD last weekend. Still no sound, but it found my 802.11g PCMCIA card nicely.

Does anyone have tips on getting sound on a 770Z under Linux?

[whizkid]

Does anyone have tips on getting sound on a 770Z under Linux?

No direct experience from me, but these might get you somewhere helpful:
http://thinkwiki.org/wiki/CS4239
http://thinkwiki.org/wiki/CS4610
http://thinkwiki.org/wiki/Installation_ ... inkPad_770