Linux saves the day: why every good toolkit should have Linux

David M Williams
Monday, 09 March 2009 06:45

Opinion and Analysis

Had there been an Internet connection I might have downloaded WinZip and Windows '98 service packs and USB hotfixes. Even if I did it on the other machine I could burn them to CD, but alas, we were working offline - heaven forfend, it was like a different millennium. Shades of late 20th century computing! The lack of signal on my mobile phone told me that my 3G modem wouldn't be any use either.

By this time, the helpful storeman told me he had a box of 3.5" floppy disks. Although the packet was dusty the floppies inside had remained pristine.

While calculating in my head how many 1.44Mb floppy disks I would need to transfer 32Mb of data I inserted the first disk - just to have Windows report it required formatting.

Although the box had said "pre-formatted" I didn't think anything of it and opted to format. Bzzt. The format failed. I attempted again as a regular (not quick) format, as a 720Kb disk, and swapped for some other floppies. All with no success.

My storeman friend told me he had never actually used the floppy drive so he couldn't confirm it had ever worked. The blackness of the once-beige component did make me question just what its internals looked like.

At this point your mind begins running through the options. Remove the hard disk? Insert it in the other computer? Leave and come back with Windows '98 drivers on CD?

Or, boot from a Linux Live CD.

One problem, the CD tray wouldn't open. Thankfully, a piece of nearby wire helped persuade it to eject and, sure enough, this ancient Windows '98 computer was soon showing the tasteful decor of Ubuntu 8.04, Hardy Heron.

I was in a fully live, functional - and importantly, modern - operating system environment.

Ubuntu copied the needed files from the hard drive onto my USB memory stick in its stride.

This time I had success. The important history of purchase orders going back to 1997 were transferred (and backed up for the first time ever, onto my USB stck!) and the storeman had his new computer up and running, promising to put a dust cover on it.

Linux saved the day. If you're involved in PC repair in any shape or form and you don't have a Linux live CD then you're doing yourself a disservice; it's something Microsoft just can't do!