How can I reinstall OS

[davemalaysia]

Hi, I am new to this forum and very new to linux, some time ago I purchased an Asus 701. I made the mistake of saving to much to the computers memory and not to the flash drive (so I have been told by others) as a result when I turned the machine on one day I had an error message relating to lack of memory, from thaqt point I was not able to get the machine to boot up.

I googled the error message and found a thread that explained the steps to follow to resolve the issue - the problem is that the next time I turned on the machine to try and solve the problem the machine would not boot at all, now when I turn on I get the eepc screen followed by the starting up screen from there the screen just flashes as if it is trying to start up (this just keeps looping)

The information that was on the machine is not vital so I can start over, but I need pointing in the right direction.

Any help would be greatly appreciated,

Many thanks

[waterhead]

I have a EeePC 900, and I think they are similar. A 4GB SSD (solid state drive) and 512 GB RAM memory.

Your assumption that you used up the memory cannot be correct. The memory is not saved after the system is shut down. Regular systems also have a swap partition to act as additional memory, but a SSD should not have a swap partition, as it will help shorten the life of it. You also should not have a journaling file system like ext3, ext4, xfs or jfs. Ext2 or FAT is usually used.

Did it have the original operating system on it? Or was something else installed.

[davemalaysia]

Thank you for taking the trouble to look at my problem, you will be right in what you say (I really do not have a clue with this)
To answer your question the machine was being run with the original OS (I only had it for about 3 weeks before I managed to bugger it) just to give you an idea of my skill level

Thanks for the help

[waterhead]

What was it running? Was it Xandros?

I ask, because if it was running a different operating system, and it wasn't properly installed and set up, it could have worn out the SSD.

[davemalaysia]

Hi Paul,

yes it was running Xandros, there were no problems at all until the initial memory error.

Thanks

[waterhead]

It is possible that the memory has gone bad. It could also be a bad or dirty connection. Try removing it and then re-installing it.

If you have access to a USB CD drive, I suggest booting from a Linux LiveCD. They usually have a memory check option, which is what you need. Fedora and Ubuntu are two that come to mind.

[davemalaysia]

Thanks, I will give that a try.

Cheers