Hi everyone. This is my first post to this or any linux forum. I am a techie wannabe. But with little kids running around it's hard to find the time.

I have read a few things about Linux and would like to try it out. I am currently running winxp home and win2000.

I have a home network and was wondering how Linux would affect my network.

Also, can you run Mac software on Linux?

Which Linux is reliable, easy to use and loaded with options, tools etc... I am considering running Linux instead of winxp on my system if I like it. I am tired of MS. Really tired of them.

Also, why are there so many versions? and how do I know the one I download isn't virus ladden?

Thanks in advance,

Lenore

For a home network between Linux and Windows there will be no problem as Linux uses a system called Samba which enables to be seen as Windows machine to Windows systems.

I'm not aware of Mac software to run on Linux to be honest but you will be able to run Windows software on Linux by using another program, Wine for example.

Each Linux distribution offers you something different in the way of using and learning. If you want a kind of easy beginning then I would suggest Ubuntu or Suse. You could download a Live CD of a distribution in order to take a taste of how is it. A Live CD just runs to your computer without installing the OS to the hard drive. You should also be aware that you can have both operating systems, Linux and Windows, on your computer and choosing which to use when you boot your computer.

There are many distributions and not versions of Linux. Each distribution has different versions. As for viruses, don't worry at all. Not even in a distribution but either when you surf on Internet.

Well, I have found Mandriva 2006 to be very nice in all respects. I am basically using this instead of XP myself.
With your concern on Viruses, well Linux doesn't suffer from these sorts of things like Windows does. No distribution you download should come with any viruses or major problems at all, as they are usually tested extensively before release (unless you want to go for one of the development versions).

I suggest sticking to windows because without knowing what you are going to install - you will be disillusioned.
If you are really serious - try couple of major distro's like suse, fedora, others - initially use it for recreation purpose and then learning while you make things work. minute steps will eventually build up your knowledge as to how linux works and can be customized.

In less you're really lucky, it'll take some trial and error to find a distribution (or distributions) that you like. Ask 10 Linux users which is best, you'll likely get 10 answers. Just be forewarned that there is a learning curve, you will hose up the system, and you will reinstall more than once. But, that's what LQ is for, so if you choose to try Linux, I'm sure we'll see you around again.

As far as which distribution to choose, look around this forum and see what people are saying about this and that. For example, Fedora Core 5 is a new release. There's been alot of posts lately from people trying to get it working. Probably wouldn't want to try that your first time around. But the previous release is pretty stable. I use Fedora Core 4 on one of my PC's. It installs well and the only time it doesn't work is when I've hosed it up. You could look here to review a grunch of distros.

The live CD (e.g., Knoppix) is another good idea if you don't want to jump in with both feet. Just download the .iso, burn it to CD, and reboot your machine. You can see what you're potentially getting yourself into without alot of effort.

Regardless of what you choose to do, if you don't succeed at first (and you won't) try, try again. Never seen a real techie give up just 'cause something didn't work the first time. What a backwards world we'd live in if that were the case!

Number one, www.google.com/linux is your friend.

I highly reccomend kanotix, it's a live cd you can try out. download the image, burn the image to a cd. put the cd in your cd drive and reboot the computer.
the computer will reboot using your cd instead of your harddrive, Try it out to see if it reccognizes all the hardware in your computer. Sometimes people will have oddball video or sound cards, and it won't get off the ground. Kanotix livecd is pretty good at recognizing most hardware. If it works well and if you like it, come back to linuxquestions.org to research installing a dual boot setup.
Before installing you must understand (at least in theory) what harddrive partitions are, the difference between a partition and an extended partition, and the master boot record, it's not rocket science but you can think of it as rearranging the bookshelves so you have room for linux.

Before fooling around with this, backup any data you are not willing to loose in case you do something foolish (you should be doing this anyway).

Generally speaking, a distro you download will never contain viruses, I have never heard of this happening, Linux tends to police its own, most likely, the worst thing that might happen is that you get a corrupt image and something doesn't run properly or it won't bootup. If you do want to check you can do an md5 check on the cd image, but then again you are getting the md5 number from the place you downloaded it from.

I just installed kanotix on my son's pc and he loves it. It uses KDE instead of Gnome (there are ideological wars about these two desktop environments, ignore the zealots on both sides and stick with kde for starters, in my opinion it is more user friendly). If you want to see what Gnome is like, try an Ubuntu livecd. Sameconcepts apply for install, but with Ubuntu, the install cd is seperate from the livecd.

Remember, that the install won't do anything you don't tell it to do, and that you won't break the hardware, the worst thing you'll do is erase critical info on the harddrive, nothing a fresh install cannot fix.

Welcome to Linux.

Go to distrowatch.com and select one of the top 5 ranking distros. Suse and Ubuntu are both newbie friendly. On top of that, they are both heavily supported by a large community. Fedora Core is good as well, yet the new Fedora Core 5 is optimized mainly for pentium 4 processors. If you don't have a pentium 4 pc, then you may see less performance than what you're used to when using windows. Other than that, Fedora Core is supported by a large community as well.

If your kids are going to be using the computer as well, why not try Edubuntu. It's customized for use in the classroom and it's based off of Ubuntu. If you want to use another distro, here's a site with information on software for kids, http://www.childrenslinux.com/.

For Mac software on Linux, I heard it can be done yet it's not easy. I think Basilisk II can do this. http://basilisk.cebix.net/.

I recommend Suse. I'm sure you're going to ask "why" so here's why.

It has a very easy to use installer. In case you want to dual boot, Suse makes it easy to do this as well. Even if you go with all default in the installer, it's easy to go back and make changes. It has an easy to use package management system, and it preloads by default everything that you would need to be productive and/or entertained. For your options, Suse's package manager, which is YaST by the way, makes it easy to load and unload packages and resolve dependencies. If you want more, yast can be easily set up to use online yast repositories to check for new packages and for package updates.

For a side note, two main desktop environments that are commonly used are KDE and Gnome. These desktop environments is what makes it easy on users to do their work. My advice to you is when you're installing a distro, enable both KDE and Gnome and try out both to see which one you like. I tried both and I personally prefer KDE over Gnome.

If you're worried about viruses, go to http://linuxtracker.org/ to download the torrent files. Or you can go straight to each distros website and download there torrents or their isos that way.

v/r,
ceros

I recommend you start with a Live cd version such as puppy which doesn't actually install anything on to your computer but gives you an idea of linux , so that you can get the feel of the system first. then when you are satisfied that Linux is for You go for the bigger versions that install on your Computer.

I myself have heard that Mandrake is easy, and once I tried it, I began to love it. It's quite true about trying to get a linux system to run, then having to reformat and try it again.
I know where you're coming from though. I am sick to death of Windows, any of those OS's just make me sick now.
So what I did, was try mandrake 10.1 for a while, kept windows at hand just in case, and gradually tried that mandrake system.
It seems to be a great system for me anyway. Mandriva is a nice little update from mandrake.

I heard from someone in a forum, "It may be hell to get Linux working, but once you do, it's worth it."

My piece of advice, the best way to learn a system and get it going, is to stay on it! Don't just close out when you're done trying to figure out some problem or feel one is solved.
Just stay on it, from day to night, unless of course, you have to get something done on a PC very soon or asap, and you can't figure out how to on linux at the time.
So in other words, if you have the time, just stay on that linux system.

Take what you have heard so far, and pick on of the recommended distros at random---and dive in. You have nothing to lose.

Make sure important data is backed up before you start installing.

Post your machine configuration--ie # and size of drives and partitions. We can then give more help on installation.

1 drive, 2 partitions -c:50000m, d:8600 mb

zebragirl,
The live cd is your best option. I personally like Kanotix as it has the best hardware detection of any I've looked at. You'll like nearly ALL distributions as far as looks etc. Ubuntu is pretty user friendly,unless you want to play mp3s or movies without a hitch! The forums are definately your friend at ALL dist. web sites!! Do some research,,,, find what suits you,,, maybe more that one,,, I use Kanotix and Ubuntu,,, and HAVE FUN!!

There is a book at Barnes and noble called linux for the non- geeks. It has Fedora 4 full install on it with excelent instructions that are easy to use.

Hi Lenore:

I would start with something simple and free. Go to distrowatch and download something like mepis and or pclinuxos. Both are easy, you put the cd, reboot and see if it recognizes your hardware.

Both should. If you like it, you will find an icon to install it into the harddrive. I picked both because they have apt-get, whiuch makes your life easy regarding installing software.

Ex:

apt-get update
apt-get install some_software

I to am a Newbie to Linux. So I purchased a book at Chapters "Linux Made Easy" it came with a free CD of Xandros Desktop 3. Great book, takes you through complete setup of the distro. It was effortless and simple. I dual boot with Windows XP which I am slowly weening myself from. Xandros does all I need plus with CrossOver it runs quiet a few Windows programs. (CrossOver is not in the free distro). I'll keep my Windows for games but that's it, Linus is works great and doesn't give me grief.