Windows Vista *or* Windows 7. Neither OS will be usable on the machine.
And I mean, literally, she would be better off sticking to machines in
computer labs/libraries/etc than trying to use it.
The laptop-license of Windows XP that came with the system became
invalid with the destruction of the install media. The license on the
bottom was only ever valid with both the physical hardware as well as
with the original install media. (This is usually a physical partition.)
You are running in to the same reason that it is impossible for Goodwill
and the Salvation Army to resell modern computers. They can't insure
it has a legal version of Windows so when they can not reject them at
delivery time, they have to throw away the CPU. This is the same
reason pawn shops require the original media -- they've been sued by
Microsoft for selling illegal versions of Windows when it did not
include the original media.
Your best bet is to find someone selling Windows XP online. Some
retaillers may still have it. (Unlikely -- and costly -- as it may be.)
Ideally, you want to just install Linux and Wine. Unlike a VM, Wine does
not require a license to a Windows OS.
My recommendation: Install Linux exclusively. Tell her about Wine and
how it might work, but remind her that the big reason a person needs a
laptop is usually for writing papers, and that Linux will work just as
well for that. Then install Wine and try to get the software she needs
to run on it.
If Linux and Wine won't work for her at all, then she'll have to pay
real money to get a real laptop. There's just no getting around it.
Cheers,
Steven
On Thu, Nov 05, 2009 at 11:50:37AM -0500, Mark Warner wrote:
> It's a 2.0GHz Celeron with 512MB RAM. I got it off of FreeCycle with a
> totally trashed OS and no install media, of course. I was hoping to put
> a more legit version of XP on it, rather than the IU volume licensed OS
> that we all know is available.
>
> My understanding is that she is going into the medical technology
> (transcription, coding, etc.) program. I can only assume she'll be
> working in a Win environment. In these types of situations, what I like
> to do is offer a dual boot Lin/Win setup, and encourage the user to
> spend as much time as possible in the Lin environment.
>
> My personal playtoy laptop is a Dell C600 700MHz/512MB/20G machine, that
> has a "just in case" load of XP (never has been needed), a default of
> MEPIS 8, and a partition that I use to install and play around with new
> stuff. That last currently has a load of Karmic. Yes, it runs well, but
> it doesn't have the "snap" that the MEPIS install does.
>
>
> Mark Krenz wrote:
> > If its not going to have enough horsepower to run a VM on top of the
> > OS, then its probably not enough to run Vista or Win7 then. Right?
> >
> > I recently install Ubuntu on an old Dell 600 series laptop and was
> > rather surprised by how fast it was and all the stuff I could run
> > normally. It may seem risky to try to get them to try using a different
> > OS, but we took that risk in the 90s a lot and got through it. 10 years
> > later its much safer to do and you're much more likely to be successful
> > in converting a user.
> >
> > I think one thing that the Linux advocates forgot to do is to teach a
> > new generation of Linux advocates how to promote Linux. An OS can't
> > promote itself, it needs users to do that.
> >
> >
> > On Thu, Nov 05, 2009 at 02:34:22PM GMT, Mark Warner [markwarner1954@att.net] said the following:
> >> Of course. Except for the facts that
> >>
> >> 1) the machine I'm cobbling together isn't going to have much
> >> horsepower, at least not enough to run a VM with decent performance
> >>
> >> 2) you still need an OS and software for the VM. We all know the IU
> >> stuff is easily obtained, but I was hoping to be more legit.
> >>
> >>
> >> Mark Krenz wrote:
> >>> As if it has to be said.
> >>>
> >>> Sounds like a great opportunity to spring Ubuntu and Wine or
> >>> Virtualbox on them.
> >>>
> >>>
> >>> On Wed, Nov 04, 2009 at 09:55:16PM GMT, Mark Warner [markwarner1954@att.net] said the following:
> >>>> I have been asked to rebuild a computer for a new Ivy Tech student, and
> >>>> was wondering if they have access to Microsoft operating systems and
> >>>> software similar to the arrangement that IU students, faculty, and staff
> >>>> enjoy. The student didn't know herself.
> >>
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