I'm having a lot of trouble getting Eclipse to recognise PyDev when using the PyDev zip file. (I need to use the zip file as the Dev machine does not have internet access).
I have Eclipse installed and have downloaded the PyDev zip. I've Googled a fair bit and tried the following based on suggestions I found:-

Unzipped the .zip into ECLIPSE/helios/dropins and restarted eclipse.
Unzipped the .zip into ECLIPSE/helios/plugins and restarted eclipse.

Neither makes Python appear as a selection in the Eclipse, Window, Preferences.
Helios contains the executable eclipse file I use to load eclipse.
I'm using eclipse in Redhat linux.
One suggestion was to extract the zip over the eclipse plugins and features folders, but I don't see how that would work as the zip just produces a heap of files and no folders.
Any help to get this working would be great.
I just did this today and a far easier way to do it is to use the built-in installer. Go to Help -> Install New Software and then type pydev in the software filter. Since you already have the zip, if you extract it in the dropins folder, you'll skip the download portion and go straight to installing it.
I have been able to use the zip to install it manually before. I would extract its contents in the eclipse folder overwriting the features and plugins folder. I suggested this to a coworker earlier today and it didn't work for her. She had to download the newest version of eclipse for this method to work. She downloaded the classic version.
Adding PyDev to Eclipse using the PyDev zip