réjean Posted November 7, 2015 Share Posted November 7, 2015 (edited) Hi all! Hope this is the right place to post the following if not please move it to the right one. I took a bunch of computer parts to our local dump where they have a small building for electronics. I saw a computer tower which I took home so that i could at least salvage the power supply fan and maybe save a RAM stick or 2. When I got home I tried it for the fun of it and lo and behold it is working. It has 2 GB of DDR2 RAM, a 500 GB hard drive and is running an Intel Penthium Dual E2200 @ 2.20 Ghz. and is running Microsoft Vista. Now obviously I am not interested in the data that is on board. What I would like to do is format the hard drive, install a Linux distro and use it mostly as a backup. I have never used a preloaded manufactured machine before and I see that beside the HP (C:) partition with 339 GB free of 456 GB there is also a Factory Image (D:) with 1.27 GB free of 9.25 GB. So my main concerns are; 1. Can I just go and format the whole drive 2. Then install a Linux distro 3. Should I be concern about the Factory Image drive Any suggestion will be appreciated. P.S. I forgot one thing. According to this site http://support.hp.com/lv-en/document/c01390590. I can use up to 8 Gb of RAM with a 64 bit PC but only 4 with a 32 bit and even so it cannot address the full 4 GB. Could I install a 64 bit distro then with more RAM? Edited November 7, 2015 by réjean Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
securitybreach Posted November 7, 2015 Share Posted November 7, 2015 The Factory image is only useful if you plan on restoring the default Vista install. Personally, I always wipe out the factory image partition as I do not plan on using windows on any machine (outside of virtualbox). So yeah, you are perfectly safe to format the whole drive including the factory image partition. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
réjean Posted November 7, 2015 Author Share Posted November 7, 2015 thanks Josh! That's what was worrying me, and if it had something to do with a password allowing me or preventing me from gettion into the BIOS. Like I said I don't want anything to do with the previous owner ( which it turned out I know, and is a good guy but whatever is private to him should remain. I'll install something tomorrow ( hey that would me a good opportunity to install ARCH since I would have a backup fixing the install via my own computer. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
securitybreach Posted November 7, 2015 Share Posted November 7, 2015 thanks Josh! That's what was worrying me, and if it had something to do with a password allowing me or preventing me from gettion into the BIOS. Like I said I don't want anything to do with the previous owner ( which it turned out I know, and is a good guy but whatever is private to him should remain. I'll install something tomorrow ( hey that would me a good opportunity to install ARCH since I would have a backup fixing the install via my own computer. Yeah, that has absolutely nothing to do with the bios. The bios settings are stored on a rom chip soldered onto the motherboard, not in the harddrive. You can usually just pull the cmos battery for few seconds and it will reset the bios. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
réjean Posted November 7, 2015 Author Share Posted November 7, 2015 Thanks again Josh! 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
securitybreach Posted November 7, 2015 Share Posted November 7, 2015 Thanks again Josh! Not a problem, anytime Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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