I've recently opted to try a dual boot with the ultimate intention of
totally migrating. For me to do this i need to be able to do all those
things i do in MS.

I've only been playing with it for a few days, but as i've been with ms
since dos 6.22 and Win 3.11, i've got a bit ms-ified and i need
pointing in the right direction to work out how to do things in linux.

So far i've mounted my ntfs drive and surfed the net. i've replaced
trillian with kopete and i've got almost all my hardware set up.
There seem to be so many programs available, i'm not sure which to try, and I would appreciate recommendations of programs to use for the following:
receiving mail
Listening to mp3s
Watching DVDs
downloading (from a camera via usb) and editing digital photos
Calendar programs which i can import from outlook to.

In all, i'm just after advice from a linux user on what pitfalls i should look out for as a hardened Microsofty

Thanks for any help in advance

check out:

-Mozilla Mail
-xmms for MP3 (but you need the libraries!)
-mplayer or xine for video playback
-evolution for mail and calendar (similar as outlook)

This is simple and I must begin with the most famous mantra around: To each his own. But I will try to recommend some programs although you should let yourself try several until you find something that ... well, suits you.

Music: xmms
Video (of almost any kind...files, DVDs, etc): Mplayer (Pre4...latest I think)
Receiving mail: Thunderbird (Mozilla)
Fun little something: MrPostman (this allows you to retrieve your hotmail or yahoo mail...from your free
accounts!! I love that So it will act as the go between for Thunderbird and hotmail/yahoo. You never will
run out of space again as each email is downloaded to your computer. )

Webbrowser: Firefox (Mozilla) Get Flash blocking
Digital Photos (usb downloading): Gphoto2
Editing Photos: hmm... Gimp2 ? Though that might be overkill. I do use it.

What else (gotta love the "Thinking to myself" commentary)

For fun

Gkrellm http://www.muhri.net/gkrellm/
Fluxbox (window manager...not a full environment like Gnome/KDE, which may mean its too difficult, but if you
can handle the command line, then this should be no problem. And your start up time is reduced!)

And some day in the future after you are comfortable with your system...say MythTV. Your very own TV time shifter. Yummy.