I was just in your situation a couple months ago.  I have the Dell
version of that basically.  I chose SuSE 6.1 (my very first distro)
after attempting all my others (working backwards in time) because A, it
works. B, I can easily recompile.  I use it (will. just a working
battery today) use it for network diagnostics, note-taking, information
starage, a souped up PDA basically.  I went to eBay and bought for about
$10.00 a 2.5"->3.5" adaptor.  Then I used a PC computer w/cdrom and
installed the laptop's HD in it.  I also just tried on a new HD, a
network install and it went fine.  I'm working on a HOWTO for
linux-laptop that I have so-far at http://www.bryceco.net/dell.html.

Good Luck,
Bryce

P.S. Feel free to contact me on or off list.  I have extensive
experience with linux on laptops.

On Tue, 2002-07-02 at 14:24, tickticker wrote:
> I just got my hands on an OLD notebook.  it's an acer model, here's the rough specs from the tertiary site supporting such old machines.
> 
> System Info
> PN: 91.AA201.017
> MB: AN760I
> Ext: 786
> Model: AN760i
> RAM: 8 MB
> Video: 512 KB
> Cache: 0 KB
> 
> AN760I, w/ IDX4/75, 8MB RAM 
> 1.44 MB, 3.5" AcerNote
> 540 MB, DBOA-2540 2.5 IBM
> 8 MB Memory on-board
> Chips & Technology 65535 (Onboard)
> 
> Keyboard, 18511-NSK
> LCD, AN735/760 Color Sharp LM64C142
> 
> Ah! no cd you say? 540 mg HDD? 8 mg RAM? could it have the original win95 install?  why YES!!!
> 
> the question is, can I do anything with this?  test virii? if I could get it to play nethack or preferably falcon's eye then 20 hours of labor would be worth sitting in bed wasting brainpower on a good character.  yes, i have no other notebooks.
> 
> if it was win 3.1 or 95 i needed, no problems.  but how to put linux on this thing and what flavor would fit and run, preferably with a gooey?
> 
> yes i know falcons eye and nethack run on win95, but i would rather go to the ends of the earth than run those.  I could learn alot from this install.
> 
> thanks for you future input,
> 
> anthony
> 
> 
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> 
-- 
Bryce Chidester
Network Administrator
CoBryce Communications
Bryce AT BryceCo DOT Net
http://www.bryceco.net