it’s been a stressful couple days trying to get the laptop running the way i want it to. i’ve never ran into so many problems dealing with a laptop before, but don’t think that’s hp’s fault. it’s all because of me and wanting to run three impossible operating systems on a laptop meant to run xp or linux, and i’m an idiot to not create a proper bootable usb stick. here’s how it all went down:
first off, the package arrived monday morning. i was so excited to get the laptop that i didn’t even bother putting on a shirt when signing for it. i just let the ups guy see me in all of my naked glory.
everything came nicely packaged. battery came with a good charge too. booted up the thing and tried to get the crappy suse linux novell 10 installed, but the thing would constantly restart after initializing a lot of the components and hardware. i had no idea why. the question of the day was “is it a bad operating system, harddrive or motherboard?”
during the entire installation, i started admiring how really small the hp mini note was. pictures don’t do it justice. i get comments on this thing everywhere i bring it: school, starbucks, the apple store, work, everywhere. the thing is tiny, but the keyboard is super easy to type with at the same time. if it wasn’t, i definitely would not be typing up this long blog.
the one thing i would definitely appreciate in the next model would be another usb port. there are two right now, one per side, but if i have my wireless mouse connected and my external harddrive, i’m pretty much stuck. a smaller trackpad would be nice too. it’s hard using both the left-click and right-click at the same time. and definitely a much more matte (less-glossy) screen. this thing is pretty much a mirror out in broad daylight.
by this time, the suse linux novell 10 wasn’t compiling or configuring for some reason and just kept restarting, so i opened up the freaking thing to see try and install the operating system from my other computer directly onto the harddrive.
here’s where the nightmare begins: the internal harddrive is a serial ata harddrive. it’s not an ide, it’s a sata. i have nothing in any of my computers for sata. i just don’t use it. nothing against sata, i’ve just always bought ide without giving it any thought. so i pulled out my sata cable and realized i had to take apart my other computer just so i can freaking install this cable in the one sata port on my motherboard i have. doesn’t work. i’m missing a sata-to-molex power cable. so i had to go to fry’s before school that day and i purchased a usb-to-sata including a sata power cable. much better choice for me so that i didn’t have to take apart my computer.
so for the next few days from this point on, i’ve done nothing but remove harddrives, format harddrives, modify boot.ini files, create bootable usb sticks, run 8 different operating system install files from bartPE, xp, ubuntu, kubuntu, suse, osx86, leopard, etc. the ones that worked were the portable ones made to boot from a usb stick like bartpe. the ones that didn’t work, xp/leopard, were the ones i needed to work. if i wasn’t at school, i was at home installing an operating system on my freaking sata harddrive. if i wasn’t doing that, i was probably somewhere else thinking about what i can do to make this all work.
the first goal was to get xp working, getting that setup, and hacking the leopard kernel files from there. fortunately, i had an extracted dmg of all of the install files and had those kernel files handy from my external. i’ve never had to install the xp install files on a usb and make it bootable. usually i’d just run an iso on the computer and install it that way, but how do you do that on a laptop with no cd drive or no operating system in the first place? install it from the bootup with a bootable usb, right?
well i probably spent hours and hours figuring out why my usb sticks weren’t booting up. i even copied the xp install files on the sata harddrive and that wouldn’t boot up. i was starting to think that it wasn’t a faulty usb drive or sata drive or operating system, but something more serious was going on: the computer hardware was trashed. so i tested it out. i ran bartPE (customized bootable xp from usb) and it ran perfect. so it wasn’t the hardware, it was me. the usb stick i setup wasn’t truly bootable. there were no boot.ini files or anything. that’s why it hasn’t been working for the past few days. so i used this tutorial to find out what software can compile a bootable xp install on a usb stick without needing a cdrom drive or operating system.
after that, everything was fine.
here’s josh twittering from the laptop. this is just to show you a size comparison.
and here are some shots giving knoppix (bootable usb stick linux) a try:
and here’s a screenshot of me doing some fun:
man now you got me rethinking whether i should buy the dell e or the mini note.
btw, when i get my dell e, im pretty sure i going to need your help with installing windows xp. i hate vista.
Did you really get Leopard installed? I’d love to know how you achieved it.
saltire, i have some tutorials posted up on the blog. just do a search for “osx” or “leopard”. they are for the eee but the process is essentially the same.
What build of Leopard did you use? I’ve tried just about every build I can find, with no success. Did you need the paperclip trick to make it work?
saltire, the paperclip method is ONLY for the eee pc. do not do this with your mininote as it could potentially damage your laptop.
Excellent,how can u did this so easily,i am going to buy the acer aspire one,i am wondering weather i could install a leopard os on it
Really, you can install Leopard or Tiger in the MiniNote?? I try anything, and i can’t. The installation never starts.
Can you explain how you made to install? thx.
Yah, would like to know also how u did install leopard!!
So Whats up?
I’d also like to know how u got leopard running on the2133
It is a little unclear if you got leopard running on your mini note or not. If you have, is there any way you could provide me with some assistant.
it´s imposible to install leopard in hp2133, i tried anything.
the installation never starts
NOWDAY IS IMPOSSIBLE TO RUN OSX ON MININOTE. THE INTERNET VIDEOS AVAILABLE WERE BEING DONE WITH REMOTE DESKTOP PROGRAMS!
and with tiger ???
ah this is where you are all wrong, there is a mod version of leopard that just simply runs on almost anything with powerful enought hardware (not like thats much, pfff). got it of a mate. just whack in the dvd and it does pretty much the rest