I'm new to Linux but have a degree in MIS which was focused on MS products (of course). I'd like to know which distro would be the best to learn on. Here is my machine

P4 2.53 533FSB
1Gb PC3200
Albatron 865PEII-PRO MB
WD 120GB IDE
ATI AIW 9600
8x Nec DVD+-R

I have FC3 installed now and it is ok. seems a bit slow though. any suggestions?

Slow with that system?
Did you do an "Install everything" ?

If you are using it to learn and really want to install everything you will have to live with the slowness in whatever distribution. You must have a ton of services compeeting for resources.

What I did when I started with FC (It was my first distro in many years, so it was like starting again) was:

I did an "everything" install first, to see what was there. And it was slow. I then did a reasonable install and I have no complaints.

If you really want to learn the intricacies of linux:

A) Install a distro like Fedora to learn how to move around linux and to do actual work. Only use a portion of your HDD. (a 10 GB partition should be more than enough) And I say "Like fedora" meaning that I recommend to try the main distros and stay with the one that recognizes your hardware the best. Choose one that has a package manager, that will save you the frustration of dealing with dependencies. I stayed with Fedora as 99% of my hardware was easy to configure, except the scanner, but that one does not work with any distribution as it is part of a multifuntion lexmark printer.

B) Install another distro that requires more manual involvement: Linux from scratch if you really have time to experiment. Gentoo if you like to thinker around and have the patience to compile. I do like the Gentoo concept, I did it for a while, but I did not have enough patience to use it as my main distro. I learned a lot from the installation documents, though. Some people say that you could come directly to Gentoo, but I found that previos exposure to another distro helps, specially when you have to choose between options. Again, you only need enough HDD to play around. (5 to 10 GB more than enough)

Leave enough space to install and play with other distros. I found that by doing that I learned to differenciate between "linux features" and "distribution specific features".

Oh, and also create another partition for shared data. Data that you really want to keep even if you completely wipe the distros partitions.
Also I assume that, having a degree in MIS, people around you consider you the 'computers' guy. It is nice that when they ask for a recommendation for a linux to use, you can recommend the most approrpiate match to their needs.

I have installed a few,

from Linspire: Commercial linux that I would recommend to a completely computer iliterate novice.
to Puppy: Great blazingly fast and versatil Minimalist distribution (it's the other one besides FC3 that I still use every day). Good for novices with older computers that would go to the landfill instead.
to Gentoo: You build your system following instructions and compiling every package according to your preferred optimizations.

and many inbetween: Ubuntu, Vidalinux, Mandrake, Vector, etc etc etc.

I have not tried Linux from scratch as I haven't had the time.

Good luck in yor quest.

thanks for your response. That clears up a lot of things. I am trying SuSE 9.3Pro now but have problems with the install. Also, you were right, I installed everything oh well, I'll learn. I'll download some other distros and check them out. Thanks again!

he he,

I just edited my post.

I added that I would recommend to stay with the one that recognizes your hardware the best during the installation process. Then continue trying the rest in extra partitions.

There is no comparison.

FC3 is a generation behind Suse 9.3


FC4 is closer .. I think Suse 9.3 put together much better, clean and works out of box.
FC/x for me has always been slow and whacky ..

I'm running a near FULL install of Suse 9.3 and yes if you dont change some things it will bog down to 486 speeds ... however if you go through yast, especialy the services bit, and take out everything you dont need it realy helps a lot.. also you might want to read about hdparm and all the various little tweaks... years ago someone wrote an excelent tweak faq but it doesnt seem to be around anymore...

have fun,
doc

Actually with FC3 you can get as actual as you want.

I am using GNOME 2.10 and KDE 3.4 since sometime ago for example.

Of course, after installing out of the box you will have to download about more than 600 MB.

Again, Different people have different experiences with different distros, It usually comes down to how smooth the installation process went.

Both ran well out of the box for me. So I learned on Linux, working from command line, etc on Fedora 3 and trashed it several times, meanwhile learning a whole lot.

Then I installed SuSE 9.3 Pro which is where my life now resides and I do no risky moves in it. Any changes I tend to review with people in the forums before doing anything.

Now, I installed Fedora Core 4 for continued learning. The most important thing is I can live and work out of my linux OS and have fun at the same time. I love the world of computing now. As I learn, I hope to graduate to tougher linux OS's.

Good Luck.