Have Umbuntu up and running dual boot with XP home on daughter's old P4 
machine. Need some time to get Wine up and play with a bit, where if I 
mess up, nothing lost. Want to move in the direction of the Penguin, 
weather will be closing in here (Northern Ohio, USA) in a month, will 
have time then.

Robert Rolf wrote:
> John Chung wrote:
>
>   
>> Yes any Linux Live CD would work. If you have seen the
>> caps on the motherboard bulging then it will be a
>> problem.... Anyway you still have to isolate the
>> problem*mobo, PSU or hard disk*.  PSU just use a meter
>> to test the supplied voltage under load.
>>     
>
> Not good enough. You need a scope to see the 24 kHz ripple.
> It was nearly 2 V p-p, but the average voltage was correct.
>
>   
>> Hard disk
>> just place it into another PC. 
>>     
>
> But ONLY as a slave device for reading.
> If you try to boot on it, you run the risk of really messing up the
> windows registry as it tries to reconfigure the machine for
> the different chip sets it will find.
> Been there, did that, won't do it again.
>
> You can buy an external USB to IDE converter cable for around $40.
> Bytecc BT-200
>
>   
>> mobo is tricky... I
>> would start with LIVE CD first.
>>     
>
> Good way to get him started on the path to Linux ;-).
>
> R
>
>   
-- 
http://www.piclist.com PIC/SX FAQ & list archive
View/change your membership options at
http://mailman.mit.edu/mailman/listinfo/piclist