Total Newb
 

Well, I'm a total newb to Linux. I have been a Windows zhombie now for like 20 years. I'm a pretty deep Windows user, but don't find myself editing the registry and similar too often. . .And that is the problem. . .Windows requires this or regular reinstalls for stability. XP is batter, but Vista is like 10 steps back.

So enters my Linux excursion. I want to get a small 6 - 12" laptop for personal computing. 70% internet browser use, 10% office soft use, 10%photo management and maybe 10% music management. Maybe gaming/DVD's, internet video could take another 10% away from internet use. The plan is use as is on the go, but hook up to a real mouse, keyboard and moniter at home.

The key is these small laptops, in general have small processors and RAM. Other than HP, most run Vista. They also tend to have lots of built in gadgets like GPS, broadband modem, SD card reader. Will Linus have drivers for things like built in GPS?

I've been looking at distributions, etc and while not really a distribution, gOS looks like a good match. Still, I think I need to know more about the construction of a Linux OS like gOS so i can make the right decision.

So, any support you can offer would be appreciated.

Welcome to LQ, nksmfamjp. We were all newbs once. :)

Anyway, take a look around the "Linux - Laptop and Netbook" sub-forum for ideas. As you can guess, questions like yours get asked (and answered) a lot.

Linux can work with all of these things. Google Earth and Garmin GPS units work great for me. I've heard people have had good luck with USB broadband modems - you just might need to do some googling to find out what works the easiest. Pretty much every SD card reader I've tried mounts memory cards as drives with no issue.

I've seen this quote around a couple times and I can attest to it's accuracy: "Linux is easy after the first 500 hours". Just put your google cap on and you'll get through it and have a lot of fun in the process.

As for distros, I recommend Fedora and/or Ubuntu for a Linux N00bz first choice.

I'm talking about a laptop with a GPS built into it. It is a 6 x 6 Fujitsu over at newegg. Interesting laptop, but I would like the GPS to work.

Yea, I too am thinking Ubuntu.

try these commands to see if the system recognizes the gps device:

'lsusb -v | grep -i gps'
and
'lspci -v | grep -i gps'

to see if something interesting shows up... If you dont see anything, then take a closer look by just using 'lsusb -v' and 'lspci -v'

If you see something then identify the device ID (looks like xxxx:xxxx) and post the output of

lsusb -v -d xxxx:xxxx
or
lspci -v -d xxxx:xxxx