Category Archives: Live CD

Repair GRUB on IBM Thinkpad – The best Linux solution

When you decide to add another OS to the usual OS on your PC you can potentially damage your grub package. The Grub (GNU GRand Unified Bootloader) is the “soul” of you hardware, the program which allows your PC to find the OS during the boot-up.

Today we will not discuss about the old and new malware that are able to influence the GRUB but we will focus our attention on how repairing your computer when you see grub rescue> on your black screen…

The first solution you can find on internet is a detailed command solution but it was unfortunately usefulness in my case because my PC was not able to correctly accept the insmod command. Consequently I decided to use a portable rescue CD-USB to fix the matter.

Normally, if you use an Ubuntu derived OS, you can use Boot-Repair and it will semi-automatically fix your Grub problem in just few minutes. In any case, it is moderately easy but you have to be 100% sure about what HD partition you want to repair. As usual, this wasn’t my case. I had to find something more generic -in term of serviced OS- but effective.

At the end I bumped into the Boot Repair Disk. I had just to burn the free iso on a RW DVD and I could start to test it on my “out of service” laptop. The Boot Repair live CD is a wonderful tool! As soon as you boot up the live CD, Boot Repair guides you to the best possible solution. You have just to follow the suggestion on the screen and, in few minutes, the Boot Repair Disk is able to fix the Grub and to perfectly restore your computer.

Easy, Fast, Effective!!

How to recover your accounts and password on Windows using a Linux Live CD: Ophcrack

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Today, in our Linux Page (in Spanish) we posted a post about Ophcrack: a Linux Live CD which allows you to recover your Windows password when you forgot them. Sincerely, the described above situation is not common but it could really happen especially when you do not use a PC for some time or if you want to help a friend who is not so skilled with its own computer. Ophcrack is easy to use, sufficiently fast and effective. I tested it to recover some passwords on an old laptop and the results were very interesting; in fact I was able to recover password from accounts I totally forgot to own. Useful! This post has been written just for informative purpose! Please, remind that you are directly responsible for any law violation you commit in case of misuse of the information contained above.

Ext2fsd: an useful freeware to manage Linux partitions when running Windows

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Nowadays it is common to find PCs with more than one OS installed. Normally, when on a Linux OS, it is very simple to access Windows partitions and copy, create, delete or transfer files. Rarely, it could be also necessary to access Linux partitions (ext2 or ext3) from Windows OS but this operation it is not simple to manage. After some web-searches we have found a light and simple program which instantly allows to use Linux partitions as local disks: Ext2Fsd. In our Freeware Page we have posted a brief review about this freeware which is very simple to install (as usual we suggest to reboot your computer after the installation) and in just few clicks you will be ready to manage your Linux hard disks. We tested Ext2Fsd for a couple of weeks and we actually were satisfied from the results; in fact we have never registered any bug and all the writing – copying – deleting tasks were executed in a 100% proper way. Obviously, if you need to access a Linux partition, you are a purist and you do not want to use a Windows OS you can use a Linux Live CD. Potentially useful.

How to install Easy Peasy (in dual boot mode) on a SDHC card (eee pc 900)

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This week in our Linux Page (in Spanish) , we added a brief "manual" about installing Easy Peasy as secondary OS, on an eee pc 900. Before, we tried the installation of eeebuntu but the installation failed because the Install feature is not able to recognize the SDHC card. First of all you have to create a live USB with Easy Peasy using Unetbootin . Then you have to change the bootup BIOS on your PC. In this way, eee pc will boot up Easy Peasy directly. Once running, Easy Peasy will automatically run the "Install it" feature. Easy Peasy was the only OS which was able to read the SDHC and to offer the opportunity to install it directly on the card. You will need about 30-40 minutes to complete the installation. After that it is better to restart the system. Then, we suggest to update Easy Peasy using "Update Manager"; in fact you will discover more than 140 updates ready to be installed. Unfortunately, after updating the OS our Easy Peasy does not recognize the camera and we hope to be able to add some more information about possible solutions during the next days. Last but not least, we also suggest to deselect Ubiquity from the boot up using Preferences – Sessions – Startup Programs and you will not be annoyed by the Install feature each time you boot up your eee pc. Enjoy!

Save your money! Install DeLi Linux on your old (or “ancient”) PCs!

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Today, in our Linux Page (in Spanish) we added a post about DeLi Linux, an interesting distribution which allows you to use your old PCs and save money. The first time we tested DeLi we sincerely did not believe to obtain so interesting results. In fact we were able to install DeLi on very old PCs and laptops (486) with at least 64MB of RAM. About the RAM, we found some screenshots on the DeLi website where it runs on laptops with just 16MB of RAM. Moreover, DeLi is very light, 251.1MB for the ISO and 750MB of hard disk when installed. This particular version of DeLi Linux, the 0.8, is very flexible and complete if we think that it contains all the main programs that a medium user can ask. When we try to install it on the PCs, we have not found particular matters: the installation was easy and enough fast. When used, DeLi is fast and stable; in few words we could affirm that DeLi represents a strong reality for all that people which are looking for a PC or laptop and do want to spend just few bucks… Recommended!!

MobaLiveCD: how to test Linux distros directly from Windows

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Today, in our Linux Page (in Spanish) we posted a brief review about MobaLiveCD: a freeware which allows you to freely test new Linux Distro using Windows. MobaLiveCd uses Qemu to work; personally, I think that Qemu is one of the best and lightest open source processor emulator and virtualizer you can find today. Qemu is easy to use and, also more important, it “achieves near native performances by executing the guest code directly on the host CPU” so the results you can obtain using MobaLiveCD are very impressive and I believe that the performances are really comparable to a complete installation. MobaLiveCd allows you to spare your time because all the new Linux distros can be tested with just few clicks running the .iso through it. I personally recommend this freeware also because it light and it can be directly used from a USB key. Something really interesting!

Ex Falso: the best audio file metadata editor for Linux!

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Today, in our Linux Page (in Spanish) we posted some brief notes about Ex Falso: a very useful software which allows you to manage your mp3 collections with just few clicks. When saving my CDs on my hard disk, I convert them into mp3 files and then I change their metadata order (or simply I add some more information) using Ex Falso. This software is very simple to install (in Ubuntu, for example, you can add it directly from the “Add/Remove” function contained in the Application menu) and very easy to use. Ex Falso is graphically divided in three main areas: Folders, Songs and a menu area where you directly decide what and how to change your metadatas. After few tests you will able to rapidly use Ex Falso and (we hope) enjoy all its features. Strongly recommended for all that people who have big mp3 collections!

Clonezilla-SysRescCD 1.3.0: the best free rescue and backup/restore system for ext2, ext3, reiserfs, xfs, jfs, fat and ntfs!

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Clonezilla-SysRescCD is something we have been looking for since months. In our Linux Page (in Spanish) we have posted a brief (full of links) review about this rescue Cd in its 1.3.0 version. Clonezilla-SysRescCD is a very interesting merge (multi boot CD) between Clonezilla and SystemRescueCD which allows you to solve many (better quite all, for what we read) “disasters”; that can be made by everyday pc users like us. Just to sum up the features contained in Clonezilla-SysRescCD we add some brief notes about the two different “parts”; contained in it. Clonezilla is a fast and reliable OpenSource clone system (OCS) which supports ext2, ext3, reiserfs, xfs, jfs, fat and ntfs partitions. On the other hand SystemRescueCD, based on a bootable Linux OS, allows you to repair your system and/or recover your data after a crash. We simulated some “disasters”; on an old Pentium4 (running Windows XP) and the results we obtained were substantially very positive.

PCLinuxOS 2007 Test 2: the new live CD to try!

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This week in our Linux page we have posted a review about the “test 2” version of the new PCLinux 2007. This distro is well built and we weren’t able to find any bugs. PCLinux 2007 is built on the Kernel 2.6.18.6-dev5 and has a good 3D graphics support. Moreover it contains more features than the previous one and it’s very easy to use and personalize. For these reasons we think that it really is one of the most complete and stable distribution we have recently found on the net!

An alternative and more effective way to kill a locked program in Kubuntu: using the PID

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We use Linux because the possibility of crashes is lower than in other OS but sometimes some programs decide to lock themselves causing different problems to our PC usability.. When it happens we usually decide to use ksysguard but it doesn’t end our program. Today, in our Linux Page we have added a post about another way to solve these kind of matters using the PID. The post is short but we think it could be very useful for many Linux users. In fact, using the PID to kill a program is less time waster than restart the pc. See you soon and thanks for your comments!