On 2016-04-01 21:07, Yasha Karant wrote:
> My spouse's laptop appears to be failing in hardware -- there are repeated errors coming from the SL 6 boot screen including what appears to be a failing hard drive (but this could also be the mother board disk controller).
> 
> As we cannot afford a linux certified laptop, and I plan to upgrade her to a machine that is provisioned for 64 bit operation, we will need to find a commodity laptop at a big box merchandiser (typically under $500).  However, all of these machines will have MS Win preinstalled.  In the past, if we are considering the purchase of such a machine, I have inserted a bootable standalone with Xwindows and network SL DVD -- if all of the hardware is recognized (that is, drivers exist), we will consider the machine.  If the machine has proprietary MS Win hardware (drivers not part of the "stock" SL distribution), we look elsewhere.
> 
> Is SL-72-x86_64-2016-02-03-LiveDVDkde.iso <http://ftp1.scientificlinux.org/linux/scientific/7x/x86_64/iso/SL-72-x86_64-2016-02-03-LiveDVDkde.iso> the correct image to burn to a DVD to be able to perform the above test (bootable, runs, but does not install anything on the existing hard drive)?  I prefer KDE to Gnome 3, but could burn the gnome variant (SL-72-x86_64-2016-02-03-LiveDVDgnome.iso <http://ftp1.scientificlinux.org/linux/scientific/7x/x86_64/iso/SL-72-x86_64-2016-02-03-LiveDVDgnome.iso>). Will this test the WNIC as well as the video and audio cards in the machine?  Are there any predefined login/password accounts on the above ISO images, and if so, what account and password?  Typically, there were none.
> 
> Yasha Karant
> 

I read there is a linux edition from the 'Inspiron 15 3000', but I haven't had it in my own hands.
Maybe you can find some dedicated linux report.

-- 
olli