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I am new here, found your forum via Google. Very nice !
After expending much energy and time trying to avoid, thwart and otherwise get around WGA in order to continue to use my legally purchased WinXP Home (Upgrade) PID on a copy of WinXP downloaded via P2P, I am considering simply abandoning the entire O/S and running Linux, which I understand is Freeware, developed by the worldwide programming community. (Please feel free to correct my word choices to more accurately reflect what I am trying to say...)
I have heard much about Linux from diverse sources for years, yet I have always created this image of drab, black & white DOS-style interface that requires some sick understanding of advanced calculus in order to use. But I am bravely trying to overcome these fears, and also of the learning curve I assume will need to be navigated in order to begin to transition away from WinXP, Microsoft, and all that goes with the both of them.
Could someone please help me with the "first step" ? I assume the first thing does is download Linux from somewhere. Where does one find it ?
Also, I have a recently installed 250 Gbyte SATA HD that is unpartitioned at the moment. What I would like to do is (figure out how to) partition the SATA, install Linux on one partition and run a multi=boot system.
Hi and welcome to LQ too. Many modern distros already help you partition (some do so in an automatic manner) your drive (yes, you do not need a sick understanding of advanced calculus) during installation. If you have bittorrent, this is yet another way of obtaining one of the numerous distributions that are available.
After expending much energy and time trying to avoid, thwart and otherwise get around WGA in order to continue to use my legally purchased WinXP Home (Upgrade) PID on a copy of WinXP downloaded via P2P, I am considering simply abandoning the entire O/S and running Linux, which I understand is Freeware, developed by the worldwide programming community. (Please feel free to correct my word choices to more accurately reflect what I am trying to say...)
since XavierP has provided you with pretty much everything you need to get started (and since you asked... ), i'll jump in on the last part about terminology. when referring to linux, open source, etc. "free software" is the more correct term than "freeware." while linux can indeed be "freeware" (and probably usually is for most people) the idea of it being free of cost is not primarily what's meant by "free software." i'll leave you to google for the differences if you're interested, but in brief they're most often summed up in the phrase "free as in free speech, not as in free beer."
Quote:
Originally Posted by Johnny Faster
I have heard much about Linux from diverse sources for years, yet I have always created this image of drab, black & white DOS-style interface that requires some sick understanding of advanced calculus in order to use.
just the opposite, actually. even a stock installation of the 2 major interfaces -- kde and gnome -- are very windows/mac like without much configuration. and the custom interefaces most people use with linux are very often more colorful, vibrant, useful, intuitive, and configurable than anything you could remotely dream of in windows. it just takes a little bit of effort to get up to speed and start tweaking. how much or how little is totally up to you.
gl, and i hope you stick with linux. it's worth it in the end to break free (no pun intended ) of the claw grip of death microsoft has on your computer (and your wallet ).
I have always created this image of drab, black & white DOS-style interface that requires some sick understanding of advanced calculus in order to use.
And the command line of most linux flavors is hardly black and white and is quite easy to use (more so that DOS ever dreamt of being). Now the command line can PERFORM advanced calculus...
Looking through Distros can be a daughtning task, but here are my personal recommendations:
Proprietary Linux such as Red Hat, SuSe (I have personal experience with this. Its pretty good, but a bit of a hog), and maybe some others for one simple reason: Printed Documentation. With SuSe, you also get free 90day installation support, plus the documentation is pretty good, but it doesn't go REALLY in depth, but it covers the basics.
If you don't want to shell out money, look at Ubuntu and its derivatives (Kubuntu and another I think. Both you can get to from the Ubuntu site). From what I've heard, its very user-friendly (BTW, unless I'm mistaken, so is Mandrake), and install has been called a "Return-smashing session", so to speak.
That said, Red Hat and SuSe do have free versions out (Fedora Core and OpenSuSe, respectively), but I don't know much about them.
You might have to go do some hunting on the SATA driver, though. I think, (Correct me someone if I'm wrong), but you may have to recompile the kernel with support for it, but I may be wrong, depending on the distro you get.
Also, I suggest books as you go along. O'Reilly manuals, The Linux Cookbook I've heard is good, and others will help.
Also, Debian Stable is supposed to be about as stable an OS as you could ever DREAM of having, though it is a bit out-of-date, but the Debian team does extensive testing and configuring to make things as stable as they are. They have 2 other versions (Unstable and Experimental if I remember), which are newer, with Experimental being fairly up-to-date, but not NEAR as stable.
I hope this helps and didn't go too far. Enjoy your conversion, and remember to bookmark this forum, as it'll help you ALOT with what you're doing when you get started. Just don't get discouraged and go off and shell out 150.00 US for WinXP because Linux doesn't work "flawlessly" when you first start it up.
This may be going a far into the future, but to give you some idea on what you may be looking at in the future, when you boot, there isn't a splash screen like in XP: You see the Boot Log, and when you start (if you changed the runlevel, which you'll learn about later) and you start the G[raphic] U[user] I[nterface], you'll see more logs. These are not a bad thing, but its another way you'll find out that you actually will know when something has messed up.
Anyways, if it confused you, ignore the last paragraph. I like to warn people a bit to help with transitions, and people all take it differently. I wish you the best of luck, and happy hunting (for a distro)
Another method for obtaining a Linux distro is to check your local news-stand for a copy of Liunux Format or Linux Magazine. for $9.00 I got one issue that came with Suse 10.0 the full version, exactly what you would get if you bought the distro (minus the printed manual and phone support of course) .. not a bad deal.
Alternately Ubuntu will Mail you CD's for their distro for Free.. including a LIVE CD so you can boot from teh CD and try it out before you decide to install.. https://shipit.ubuntu.com/
try out several versions of linux, each has it's own quirks and ways of doing things, one of them is sure to suit you. For me it was Debian, for you it may be Suse.. who knows ?
Another method for obtaining a Linux distro is to check your local news-stand for a copy of Liunux Format or Linux Magazine. for $9.00 I got one issue that came with Suse 10.0 the full version, exactly what you would get if you bought the distro (minus the printed manual and phone support of course) .. not a bad deal.
Alternately Ubuntu will Mail you CD's for their distro for Free.. including a LIVE CD so you can boot from teh CD and try it out before you decide to install.. https://shipit.ubuntu.com/
try out several versions of linux, each has it's own quirks and ways of doing things, one of them is sure to suit you. For me it was Debian, for you it may be Suse.. who knows ?
Enjoy !!
...I did not know Ubuntu mailed a free LiveCD. Thats some nice info.
...also, I didn't know SuSe came with a mag, either. Was it the full version (all the CDs), or just the basic system?
Suse was the full version on DVD, it was not the OpenSuse edition. I should also specify I was refering to the UK edition of Linux Magazine not the US publication of Linux Magazine.. same name but quite different content.. and I live in the US so it is avail here
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