When you're ready to
install Windows 2000 (any flavor) on your
computer, there are several things you should consider, such as
You sure you don't want SUSE Linux installed on this box?
In all seriousness, Win2K will ask you several questions during the install process, and you should verify you can install the OS on your box.
- Does your hardware meet the minimum hardware requirements for installing Windows 2000? If it needs RAM, you may crash it during the install. If the CPU is slow, you'll just suffer.
- Verify your hardware is on the Hardware Compatibility List (HCL). Traipse on over to Microsoft.Com and make sure your stuff is on their list. If it isn't, that just means the hardware was not tested and certified. If you experience problems, Microsoft will not help you; instead, they will send you to the offending vendor's site.
- Verify there is sufficient space in an existing partition on the hard disk you intend on installing Win2K on.
- Choose a file system for the installation partition. Your choices are the old FAT or the much-improved NTFS.
- Determining whether the computer will join a workgroup or a domain. This gets me all the time, I have to stop and find out what the job and connectivity will be for the box I'm working on.
- If you are dual-booting, install Microsoft products first. They assume that you only want Microsoft stuff, so you cannot boot to another OS. Install the other OS last and use their boodload program, like Linux's LILO.
Making sure these pre-installation steps are accomplished will help make your installation go smoothly.