Cent OS:
The first thing that you are going to want to do it put the disk in the drive, and boot up from the boot loader. To do this you will want to press the ESC key or another key a lot until the bootloader starts. Then choose the drive that you put the cd into to load first.
The first screen that you will see is the Cent OS opening screen. On it there are the options to: Install or Upgrade in Graphical mode, press the <enter> key, To install or upgrade in text mode, type: Linux text <enter>, and Use the function keys below for more options. You are going to want to choose the first one. The next screen is just asking you if you want to check and make sure that everything is one the disk that is needed. You can choose to do this or skip this step it is up to you.
Now the Cent OS install wizard starts up. This is the starting screen, there are the release notes in the bottom left corner, that you can read if you want. Then click next. This next screen asks you what language you would like to see this installer in. Once you have chosen then you can click next. The third step here is choosing what layout you want for your keyboard. Then click next.
This screen is for your partitioning of your hard drive. You have the options at the top to choose how you want it done. There are the options to: Remove all partitions and create a default layout. This would remove your windows partition as well, if you have one, so be careful if you choose this. Second is: Remove Linux partitions on selected drive and create a default partition. This is pretty self explanatory. Third is: Use free space on selected drive, and last is: Create custom layout. I would recommend that if this is your first install that you choose the second, or third choice. Once you have chosen, go ahead and click next.
This next screen is for setting up your network devices. This is where you choose your NIC or Network Interface Card, or your modem, if you have one and still use it. The box underneath Network Device, you have listed all your network devices. Most people will only have one device, so go a head and put a check mark in the box next to that one. The device header you will see “etho0” this is your default Ethernet card. The header IPV4/Netmask should be set to DHCP. The rest of the headers you don’ need to worry about. Were it says Hostname, and you have to set the host name, you should have it set to DHCP, which allows your ISP to change your IP dynamically. However, if you have a static Ip, or have a host name that you connect through then you can set it to manual and input that information. Then click next.
This next screen has you choose what part of the world you are from, and what the time zone you are in. You can either click on the interactive map, or choose from the menu. There is a spot for you to click use UTC. If you have another operating i.e. Windows. The reason for this is that it will change the internal clock with the change to and from daylight savings time. Then click next.
This next screen has you input your root password. It is recommended that you not use something easy to remember like names of family members or pets. Also, don’t use whole names like this: George. Use something like this: g30rg3. That way it is harder for people to gain access to your computer. Then click next.
This next screen asks you what predefined packages you want to have installed. They have options like what Graphical Interface you want, Gnome or KDE, Server packages and so on. Also you have the option to install packages from Cent OS Extras. If you choose to do that a pop-up window will open asking for your network setting, if you have already set them just click OK.
As long as you don’t choose to custom install your packages, you will be brought to the final page before you start to install. If you are all set and ready to install, go ahead and click next. Then you will see a pop-up in the middle of the install window that says Formatting/file system…. Then it will change to Transferring install image to hard drive. Next will be Starting install process. This could take several minutes. That is followed by Preparing transaction for installation source. That is the last pop-up window, now the installation begins. Once it finishes click next. Then click reboot on the next screen, and you are all set.
To see a graphical walk through go to:
http://www.howtoforge.com/installati...tos5.1-desktop