OS installation help

[TravisAlan]

I recently got a new laptop and was going to load the Ubuntu OS onto it. Unfortunately, the laptop did not come with an OS loaded onto it. I really don't know how to load an OS onto a computer that will not open the file and do it for me.
If someone could help that would be great.
Also, I heard that Ubuntu won't really give me a hang of *nix systems. If this is true I probably should choose a different OS so any input on that would be appreciated as well.
Thanks in advance for any help I may receive.

[Bren2010]

You have to get a live cd to install/run it. You can download the os and burn it to a cd, but I've never had much luck with that so I buy them from places like OSDisc.com.

[faazshift]

Also, for those not that familiar with linux, I would actually recommend Ubuntu. I personally use and advocate Gentoo, but it requires a higher learning-curve. If this is the beginnings of your linux experience, Ubuntu is great.

You can find the cd image here and it should be fairly easy to install.

Good luck!

[TravisAlan]

Will this work even though I don't have an OS on the system to run the installation?
Oh and thanks you guys

[faazshift]

Will this work even though I don't have an OS on the system to run the installation?
Oh and thanks you guys

Thats how any OS is installed.

Brief overview: The firmware provided with your motherboard (aka. BIOS) has the ability to run a CD. Install CDs are built to run without something already being installed. You boot the install CD and install an operating system onto your hard disk. You don't need an OS to install one.

[TravisAlan]

Thanks a lot!

[insomaniacal]

Ubuntu is a great place to start. It drops you into a graphical interface that's pretty and straightforward. You should be able to set up your system without even touching the command line if you don't want to. However, it also doesn't have any ridiculous restrictions that make it a locked up OS, so after you've configured the basics, you can easily tweak the system. If you want to force yourself to use Linux, a barebones distro like Arch might be for you, but you might get really discouraged really quickly if something goes south with a distro meant for more advanced users.

Good luck!!

[TravisAlan]

Ok you guys.
I burned my disc and tryed to run it on my laptop, but it says it has a I/O error and is unable to read the disc.
Any ideas? I could re-burn the disc but the graphical interface is loading so I don't think that is the problem...
Well im gonna re-burn in the meantime I would really appreciate more help.

[faazshift]

Ok you guys.
I burned my disc and tryed to run it on my laptop, but it says it has a I/O error and is unable to read the disc.
Any ideas? I could re-burn the disc but the graphical interface is loading so I don't think that is the problem...
Well im gonna re-burn in the meantime I would really appreciate more help.

Is the error something like this? If so, you can safely ignore it. As long as the CD booted properly, you should be fine.

[insomaniacal]

I'd say keep going with the installation, it's most likely some small error. The link Faazshift provided is a good place to look as well. Worst case scenario, you need to burn another disk and try again. If you do burn another disk, try to burn at low speeds.