eric,

This news sounds encouraging. Let me know how your Plop floppy works in PlopK mode.
It may yet save your new-found computer.

Julianloui

I've tried various methods to access the BIOS to no avail. The dvd drive seems flaky and replacing it requires too much tiresome manual work. Even with the help of Plop, I failed to boot it with a live Linux USB. After I got it from as a dead WinXP machine from my daughter in 2009, I fixed it and ha...

According to PCWorld, the E512 was Dell's least expensive computer with a minimal capability. Regardless, had the machine not been mistreated before you discovered it, it might still have been usable. Good luck to your revival work. I'm interested in your idea of using an SATA card with this Dell ma...

I agree with you that we stand to learn something in any situation. Even my 2002 Dell Dimension 2400 desktop is still faring all right. I just wonder why Dell wasted its resources to market such a low-end product.

Julianloui

Eric, I assume that your USB stick works on other machines. Have your tried another USB port? I'm sure https://www.plop.a t would be interested in hearing and analyzing your problem. I think you can download the Dell E521's BIOS from www.dell.com. Have you read Cnet and PCworld's reviews of the E521...

2015-12-11 Hi, Everyone, After I swapped RAMs and installed matched RAMs, my problem's symptoms did not change. Today I discovered and verified that Plopkexec, one of several boot options available in Plop Boot Manager, is an ideal workaround for me. It enables me to boot any live Linux disk or live...

2015-12-11 Flash, Ted Dog and gcmartin, I offer my sincere apology for my belated response. I didn't notice my negligence until today as I visit this site infrequently. Early this year I came across an identical problem with a 2013 Dell laptop I acquired on Craigslist. Otherwise, I found the machine...

Eric,

I've just received the following advice from Elmar Hanlhofer and tried out PlopKexec Boot Manager on my HP desktop. It booted a live USB there instantly. It's a miracle. Please let me hear whether it works for you.

use PlopKexec https://www.plop.at/en/plopkexec.html#download

Julian

FYI, Julian - Plop works great on everything I have except that Dell e521. It will find and boot the DVD-ROM, but no dice on any USB drive. I guess that's why Dell replaced MB's for this model. The BIOS is OK, it seems; the hardware has a hurdle it can't jump. USB drives read/write fine from any OS...

Eric, You're most welcome. Once in a while we do discover a gem. I'm finally selling a hopeless Toshiba laptop I revived for my daughter in 2009. It lasted for 3 years before its hardware started misbehaving, most likely a bad dvd drive or cpu. Today I advertised it for sale as a source of computer ...

when I booted with the live BL CD in either the CD drive or DVD drive while the HD was disabled in the BIOS boot list, I got the same "Attempted to kill init" error. However, when I replaced the BL disk with the Plop Linux live DVD, everything worked fine whether the HD was disabled in the...

eric52, Alternatively. reset memory settings in BIOS to defaults and disable any caching of video and BIOS to RAM. You're right, there's nothing wrong with the optical disk drive. I hadn't realized you were getting anywhere in booting from it. MemTest is quite rigorous but geared to normal RAM use. ...

eric52, Although my desktop is a 2004 machine, its cd and dvd drives are only two years oldThe HD and RAM modules have repeatedly passed various memory tests. None of my live Linux disks except one known as Sugar Desktop can boot up the computer, on either the cd drive or dvd drive. Recently I burne...

eric52, I keep a number of Linux distributions around including Browser Linux, Puppy, Ubuntu, Linux Mint, and DSL for various reasons. Although I use Browser Linux (BL) infrequently , I consider it a helpful troubleshooting and educational tool. Precisely because of its utter simplicity, I've been r...

eric52,

Thanks for your feedback. I wrote John Murga a PM a few weeks ago and wonder if there's any way I can get his attention. I think he'll find my topic of interest. As a matter of fact I posted it as a thread before I wrote him.

Julianloui

eric52, I've just fixed my problem by deleting my-documents/lupusave.2fs from the hard drive as you suggested. Once again, BL asked whether I wanted to remove a shortcut when I clicked on the Firefox icon. So I answered 'No' in order not to get trapped again as before. Now I can browse the Internet ...

eric52, Thanks for the valuable clue. This is the first time I ran into such a problem since I discovered Browser Linux many years ago. Firefox was always there. I guess BL must have done something to the HD since the live cd is read-only. Do you mean that I should delete lupusave.2fs from the my-do...

2015-12-02 Since I answered a seemingly simple shortcut question from Browser Linux yesterday, I can no longer open Firefox even though its name is listed in the right-click menu. My machine is connected to the Internet according to Simple Network Setup and yet I can't access it. The Firefox icon is...

Hi, Everyone, I've just restored the computer's original 1.5Gb RAM configuration without any visible system improvement or degradation, but the BIOS still resists to boot up any Linux live disks ( Browser Linux, Puppy Linux Ubuntu or Linux Mint). All boot-up failure symptoms remain unchanged. As I w...

Hi, Everyone, Thank you very much for your thoughtful advice. Last time I forgot to mention that in spite of my desktop's vintage, most of the major parts are fairly new. I bought the machine from a thrift shop in 2011 as a semi-donation. I have since fixed it and replaced the HDD with an 80Gb one, ...