Need help with Ubuntu

[S Gowtham <sgowtham@xxxxxxx>]

Hey guys,

A friend of mine needs some help with Ubuntu. I am 
forwarding his mail (see below).

Thanks for your help,
Gowtham

--
S Gowtham
Grad Student
Dept of Physics
Michigan Tech Univ
Houghton MI 49931 USA
http://phy.mtu.edu/~sgowtham


---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Wed, 21 Sep 2005 13:07:38 -0400 (EDT)
From: ajwebb@xxxxxxx
To: sgowtham@xxxxxxx
Subject: Linux ??

G,

For the past few days I have been trying to install
Ubuntu on my new HP laptop (AMD64). The installation completes
without any major hitches, but after I type in my user name and password
the system freezes. Additionally, while booting I get an error saying that
the hardware clock can not be accessed by any means. I believe the source
of my troubles originates from one of two places.

First, during installation the network configuration fails. I'm not on any
permanent network and don't even know what DHCP is. The only way I get on
the internet is at the local coffee shop (free wireless). At this stage of
the installation I select "Do not configure network at this time".

Second, I am not confident that I partitioned the hard disk properly. I
have a 40Gb hard drive. The first 10Gb is selected as "primary", formatted
as ntfs, and is currently running windows without any problems. The second
10Gb is selected as "primary", formated as ext3, bootable and is where I
am attempting to load ubuntu. The third is 18Gb, "logical", ext3, and is
the home directory. The remaining 2Gb are swap.  I'm not sure what
"primary" and "logical" mean.  I am also not sure if the partition that
I'm loading ubuntu on should be bootable or not.

Maybe you're not familiar with ubuntu, but I figured I'd give it a shot.
Thanks in advance for any tips you might have.  Hope things are going well
in Houghton.

-Adam