jack6
Fri Apr 06, 2012 12:45:32 am
I just tried installing Zorin Lite 6 along side Windows XP Pro and I wanted to report my experiences.
Windows XP Pro SP3 was up and running to begin with (on an old HP Compaq D530, Pentium 4 3GHz, 1G RAM, 16G drive partitioned into 11G for Windows XP and 5G un-partitioned space for Zorin). I first tried the Zorin live version and it seemed to work fine, so I started the installation into the 5GB of un-used space - everything seemed fine until the very end when Zorin was rebooting - it couldn't shut down all remaining processes and just hung (I waited an hour just to be sure). So I cut power and booted up into the menu which showed both Zorin and Windows. Windows worked fine, Zorin would not boot - it got to the screen with the concentric counter rotating "wait" symbol over a slashed blue background but hung there.
Power down/up. Booted into Windows, ok. Re-booted into Zorin, still hanging. Re-booted into Easeus free partition tool and erased the two Linux partitions. Re-installed Zorin into un-used space, hung in the same place - couldn't shut down all processes after it finished installing.
This time though, during the installation of Zorin, there were several blue horizontal bars that blocked the installation windows (the bars were in the foreground) and I had to keep dragging the window around so I could read and click buttons (the bars occupy about 1/4 of the screen in the middle).
To continue, after re-installed Zorin into un-used space, it hung in the same place - couldn't shut down all processes after finishing installing BUT this time when I re-booted (power down/up) into Zorin, it WORKED, HUH??!! Go figure...
Haven't tested thoroughly but seems like all is working.
Then I went to reboot back to XP and it got stuck. So I tried again in safe mode - got stuck at MUP.SYS. Tried last known good configuration, no good either. Tried it a few more times in both normal mode, safe mode, and last known good just to be sure, yep, still won't boot into windows (never makes it into graphical mode). Zorin still works however but this is not acceptable to me because XP is still my primary OS, I'm just playing with Zorin...
So I re-installed XP on top of the old XP, now XP is working again and that's where I am, at the moment. I'm thinking of putting in GAG 4.10 to allow me to multiboot into either XP or Zorin (I've used GAG before but only with multiple versions of Windows, never with any Linux).
The main reason I tried Zorin was because I wanted to see if it could play 720p/1080p videos without skips and lags (XP will skip and lag). Haven't tried 1080p yet but 720p performance seems to be the same as XP, plays smoothly most of the time with occaisional skips and lags during sequences with a lot of motion. While Zoring feels snappier than XP, it doesn't seem to help 720p playback noticeably - it seems to skip and lag in the same places that XP would. (I'm only using integrated video, no dedicated video card, pretty old graphics at that).
Windows XP Pro SP3 was up and running to begin with (on an old HP Compaq D530, Pentium 4 3GHz, 1G RAM, 16G drive partitioned into 11G for Windows XP and 5G un-partitioned space for Zorin). I first tried the Zorin live version and it seemed to work fine, so I started the installation into the 5GB of un-used space - everything seemed fine until the very end when Zorin was rebooting - it couldn't shut down all remaining processes and just hung (I waited an hour just to be sure). So I cut power and booted up into the menu which showed both Zorin and Windows. Windows worked fine, Zorin would not boot - it got to the screen with the concentric counter rotating "wait" symbol over a slashed blue background but hung there.
Power down/up. Booted into Windows, ok. Re-booted into Zorin, still hanging. Re-booted into Easeus free partition tool and erased the two Linux partitions. Re-installed Zorin into un-used space, hung in the same place - couldn't shut down all processes after it finished installing.
This time though, during the installation of Zorin, there were several blue horizontal bars that blocked the installation windows (the bars were in the foreground) and I had to keep dragging the window around so I could read and click buttons (the bars occupy about 1/4 of the screen in the middle).
To continue, after re-installed Zorin into un-used space, it hung in the same place - couldn't shut down all processes after finishing installing BUT this time when I re-booted (power down/up) into Zorin, it WORKED, HUH??!! Go figure...
Haven't tested thoroughly but seems like all is working.
Then I went to reboot back to XP and it got stuck. So I tried again in safe mode - got stuck at MUP.SYS. Tried last known good configuration, no good either. Tried it a few more times in both normal mode, safe mode, and last known good just to be sure, yep, still won't boot into windows (never makes it into graphical mode). Zorin still works however but this is not acceptable to me because XP is still my primary OS, I'm just playing with Zorin...
So I re-installed XP on top of the old XP, now XP is working again and that's where I am, at the moment. I'm thinking of putting in GAG 4.10 to allow me to multiboot into either XP or Zorin (I've used GAG before but only with multiple versions of Windows, never with any Linux).
The main reason I tried Zorin was because I wanted to see if it could play 720p/1080p videos without skips and lags (XP will skip and lag). Haven't tried 1080p yet but 720p performance seems to be the same as XP, plays smoothly most of the time with occaisional skips and lags during sequences with a lot of motion. While Zoring feels snappier than XP, it doesn't seem to help 720p playback noticeably - it seems to skip and lag in the same places that XP would. (I'm only using integrated video, no dedicated video card, pretty old graphics at that).
