introduction
If you ordered a VPS or just want to get Linux, You can use this tutorial to change OS. An OS, (or Operating system) is "software" wich runs... Almost everything on your computer. The most popular OS's are Windows, Mac OS (x) and Linux. Linux is a free OS. Most VPS'es run on Linux, But if you want a windows OS you have to pay a little more money. This takes a few steps wich can be very easy or very difficult
Note: This tutorial is for windows 8, I'm not sure it will work with the previous version of windows.
Table of contents•
Getting the OS and other necessary software•
Installing OS •
Setting up boot screen •
Making flashdrive 'bootable' •
Updating BIOS •
Installing OS•
Getting started [WIP]
Getting the OS and other necessary software
Depending on OS (Operating System) you ordered for a VPS or just want to download, You have many version of Linux OS, I will list some here;
Ubuntu,
CentOS,
Debian and many more. You obviously want to pick the OS you ordered for your VPS, I recommend Ubuntu.
Now... You obviously download the operating system you want to use. If you downloaded the OS, Drag it somewhere on your desktop.
Other then the operating system you also need
Universal USB installer This is not necessary if you know how to work with .iso files but I recommend this. This needs no installation so you have to place it on your desktop too (preferably close to the downloaded OS)
You also need a USB stick or a hard drive or a DVD-R or anything you can store files on that is not attached to your computer (Maybe even your phone) now that we have all the necessary software, time to move to the next step!
Installing OS
Setting up boot screen
This is very easy, sometimes it is enabled by default. Simply restart your computer and if you go to the
splash screen you can see
Press <DEL> to enter setup.
You obvious press the DEL (Or delete) key and you are brought to the setup. Go to the boot tab and enable 'Boot menu' by simply pressing enter and enabling it.
Then you go to the exit tab and select 'Save and exit setup' You will be prompted with a screen asking 'yes or no'. Ofcourse you choose 'Yes'
After that you will go the the flash screen and instead of 'press <DEL> to enter setup.' You will see this.
Press <DEL> to enter setup, <F12> to display boot menu.
DO NOT PRESS F12! Just let it load.
Making flash drive bootable.
If you just enter to boot menu without a bootable flash drive, You ain't going to get far. First of all, Enter your CD, USB stick, external hard drive etc... into your computer,
BE SURE TO BACK IT UP!Now go to your search thingy and type 'cmd' and run it as administrator by right clicking it and select 'run as administrator'
Once its opened type
'diskpart' after that
'list disk'
then type
'select disk #' Replace '#' with the disk number ofcourse. For now I will choose my 16 GB (for some reason 14) USB stick, wich is disk number 1.
Now type
'clean'. That was the reason why to back up your files. If you cleaned your files you will get a message 'Succeed in cleaning files'. This may take a while depending on how many files are stored on your disk.
Now create a bootable partition simply by typing
'create partition primary'. Again you will see a message it was succesfull.
Now format the disk by typing
'format fs=fat32' Depending on how much storage it can carry it can take a while (e.g. a 36GB will take much longer then a 16GB) It will show the percent of progress
After that type
'assign' and
'exit'Note: If
'format fs=fat32' didn't work try '
format fs=quick'
Updating BIOS (or motherboard)
Note: This step is not necessary if your BIOS is up-to-date
If your bios, Or your motherboard, is out of date it can be the BIOS can't find the flash drive in the boot menu. To do so, first of all, go to the search thing and type
'msinfo32'. All your BIOS information is right beneath the processor information.
The only thing importand is the model and the manufacturer.
You probarly can find a bios update if you go to your manufacturer's website and go to support or something. I had to use live chat to get a download. You will probarly get a folder with a .exe and a .bat somewhere. Place the folder into your stack and restart the computer. Once you go to the flash screen, Press
'F12' and select your USB stick you made bootable. Then select the .bat file and your BIOS will update.
Note: If your USB stick does not show up in the boot menu, Press
DEL (or delete) and go to the authentication tab and disable
'secure boot'
After that go to the boot options and set launch CSM to
'always'
Installing OS
Now that we have everything ready (finally) we can start installing our OS. I picked the Ubuntu OS. for this you need the Operating system iso file and Universal USB installer wich is shown at the '
Getting the OS and other necessary software' section.
Open up your Universal USB installer. Then select the Linux distribution from the drop down menu, I picked Ubuntu. Then you have to browse and select your OS iso file.
Then select your flash drive. If it doesn't show up, enable the
'Show all drives (USE WITH CAUTION)' checkbox. You do not have to format it and step 4 is optional.
It should all look like this;
Then press the create button. You will be prompted by a warning screen (or whatever it is.) Just click yes. it will now copy files from the .iso file into the USB stick. This may take a while.
Once the files are copy'd to the stick (double check!) Restart your computer (again) and launch the boot menu by pressing
F12 at the splash screen then Select your USB stick or whatever you use and the OS should load up.
Note: Keep the stick into your computer, Also do not open
ANY file from the stick, just leave it.
Look, It worked :D
Now you can choose to install or try it. If you choose 'install ubuntu' you can choose between OS after starting up your PC. if you choose 'try ubuntu' Your os will change back to windows after restarting your computer.
