Installing Gentoo on a Notebook in 2011

“The first time I installed Gentoo, back in late 2004, I used an
at-the-time brand-new Dell Inspiron (5150 if I recall) notebook as
the victim. At that time, Gentoo was a new world to me, and a
confusing one. It took me about a half-week’s worth of actual work
to get it installed, but it happened, and it was one of the most
satisfying experiences I’ve ever had with a PC.

There was a problem, though. As Gentoo is hugely a
do-it-yourself Linux distribution, there are many things that are
just not done for you without your explicit consent. Things have
become a little easier over the years, especially with the very
informative guides and major improvements made to Gentoo’s own
software, but even today it’s still an amazing challenge to get it
installed onto a PC and configured correctly (the latter being the
more difficult part).

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