How to install linux on an external hard drive?

[Debby]

Hi! How should I go about installing linux on an external hard drive? I've seen a number of sites that explain how to do it, bt it's hard to understand fully, for me. And I'm afraid to adversely affect this laptop computer in my attempts to do it. One site I felt seemed to explain an easier way to do it compared to some, is this one: How to Install Linux OS on USB Drive and Run it On Any PC. This laptop computer I'm using, has windows 7 installed on it. What do you think of these instructions I found? I downloaded linux from the recommended link on their page, but couldn't figure out how to open it (have had trouble figuring out what to do about that in previous attempts in the past, too). There are 2 options to choose for opening it: I remember one of them is to do it from a network. I can't remember what I tried on that - but in any case, I don't see it's icon on my desktop, so it must not be installed yet. Is there a way to just download an operating system to the empty flash drive, and then to avoid risk of adversely affecting computer I downloaded it from - just put the hard drive (which I formatted) into the other laptop computer that I want the linux system to be installed on? If so, how would I do that process? Thanks!

By the way, I had formatted the hard drive from that computer, by using an external hard drive case for the purpose. I'm not home at the moment, so can't tell you the name of it, just now.

 

[samuria]

The simplest way is to use it in a FREE virutal pc no danger with that