I'm a Red Hat user. When I started trying to move to Linux from windows, I really didn't even know what a partition is. I got some help and a copy of partition magic. After I made some free space on my hard drive, Red Hat's installer did everything all by itself. I didn't really even have to customize the packages that got installed. It did all that for me and I was happy with the end result.

So why are people so careful to defend linux when it comes to installing it? Red Hat is easier to install than any version of Windows. You click next a bunch of times and have to type in a root password rather than a CD Key.

The only difference is that I had to do some partitioning because I wanted to duel boot. If my computer would have come with Linux and I was installing Windows as the second OS, I would have had to do it for Windows too.

If you got installation issues, download Red Hat Linux 9.

And now the part that will strike anger into the hearts of all:

Now all we have to do is make software installation easier! All ya have to do is double-click on the installer in Windows and click next buttons. In Linux, I often have to read a document that tells me how to go though the compile process!

Why can't all installers be like the ones Sun Microsystems uses? Bin files that work as easy as installers under Windows.

}=-)

it is easy.... how hard is it to type "apt-get install gaim".... certainly beats any possibly windows equivalent. if you don't want to install from source.... don't.

There's a lot more linux os's than red hat that do require a bit more experience.

...and newbies shouldn't use systems that are hard to install. Just use Red Hat. It's really that easy.

I don't agree versaulis. When I was new to linux i started out with Red Hat which imho did all the work for me rendering me not having a clue about how the system worked or how i could alter it. Then I tried slackware, first i was worried If I would be able to handle such a "complicated" and "hard to learn" distribution. How totally wrong I was. Sure there have been some times where I didn't know what to do. But the net and friends has always sorted me out and I have learned and understand the system in a way that RedHat never would have let me.

I dare you, try a "hard" dist. You won't regret it!

No Linux installs (at least the ones I've tried) were hard. Debian and Slackware way "boring" but not necessarily hard. Jamd was pretty neat and fast

the only thing that could possibly be hard, if you even want to consider it that, is distros that you have to manually partition...
other than that, you are a complete idiot for saying its hard, cause its the exact same as windows and you click your little mouse button on the little thing that says "next"...
so if you at least know what a partition is, and you read for five minutes about paritioning a disk, that is if you never did it before, then it will be a breeze....
so with 5 minutes of effort (if you have to partition manually having little knowledge) you will have no problems installing...and if you do piss and complain about it being hard, then you are just trying to find something to vent about cause you got nothing else better to do.... my

Yeah, I couldn't believe how easy slackware was to install when I actually tried. I mean, once you understand the terminology, it's E-A-S-Y.

Also..it helps if you have a partition gui like diskdrake

Try out the Debian/sarge installers and then tell me its easy J/K.

Easy if it all works....

I just got started with debian and it was pretty easy on the first computer I installed it on, the other was not so easy. I learned a whole lot doing it though and I don't think it was a bad thing to start with debian for that reason.

But as someone new to linux I had no idea what would be an easier or harder install.

People probably 'piss and moan' because their install didn't go so smoothly. ie) x doesn't start, video card driver problems etc. If you're brand new to linux that can be pretty difficult to sort out.

It's not hard at all to type apt-get install anything but if you don't know that's what you need to type...

this is why my first distro was Slackware, I did not want something easy, if I wanted easy I would have stayed with windows. I wanted to Learn Linux, not just use Linux.

My concern isn't for people like you and I who know a whole lot about computers... it's for the guys who said to the tech support, "I know I typed it in good... right-click."

I really think Linux is ready for the general public's use. The guy who pointed out how easy apt-get is to use was right. All I really need to do is install apt-get and the Synaptic gui for it and any computer user will be thrilled with Linux! I can't wait to set it up on some people's computers and see what they think. (I'm at college, so I'll call it an experiment .

I think the reason it is hard is that manufacturers do not make drivers for linux and if they do they do not always have the same QA as the WQHL does.
My Abit KD7-S install with Gentoo is fine except the sound driver from abits site does not work.
with windows a double click on the sound driver gets me sound.
That is why I think linux installs are harder
thank you for your time and have a good day

Nah the installs are pretty easy.
Sure you still get people who think windows is hard - lots and lots of them every bleed'in day.

My install went like silk. The only problem I had was a good few years back [before I was a tech] I tried to install a really early version of red hat - it did not have a nic driver and I would have had to alter the tulip driver. Well that would have been ok I would have slogged it out the hard way - I had no sense to check up places like this, plus I had no friends at all who were into Linux [which helps]. So anyway I went back to windows after I could not determine the horizontal and vertical frequencies of the cheapo old monitor [manufacture long out of business] and found nothing after scouring the net and all these monitor speciality sites etc. All these monitor specialists emailed me back saying they had'nt a clue. Boo. Nowadaze it's really really so simple.

Linux itself (or better most of its distributions ) is not hard to install.

But have you ever tried to get a seldom piece of hardware working under it?

I have tried a couple of seldom WLAN cards and I'm still puzzled. But the rest of the software works perfectly.

The configuration in general is not that easy. Though that varies from distro to distro.