Installing the pintos operating system

I'd first install PintOS on some old hardware to get use to the installation process + any problems that might arise.

Then switch over to using Andrew's directions.

Aside: Depending on what you're trying to learn, you might prefer using a Distro like Ubuntu.

Suggestion: If helpful, open another question along the lines of "What's the best Linux Distro to learn __________?" then fill in whatever learning your targeting.

You might research Alpine Linux, if you require some sort of light weight Linux, as Alpine will work more like Linux than PintOS.

"[W]e will run Pintos projects in a system simulator, that is, a program that simulates an 80x86 CPU and its peripheral devices accurately enough that unmodified operating systems and software can run under it. In class we will use the Bochs and QEMU simulators. Pintos has also been tested with VMware Player."

I think the mention of Linux is because you use a Linux machine to build the Pintos OS.

You need linux build environment to create the pintos binary, maybe cygwin will do ....  (a quick one to try).

For emulation pintos uses the bochs emulator from the package itself, it can probably work on any other x86 emulator.