ok i have a toshiba 1905-s301 satellite laptop, and i have tried mandrake 9 its very unstable, redhat 8 doesn't run correctly without a floppy disk to boot it and i'm sick of it, yes i have installed the boot loader and stuff its just not set as primary and that will mess up windows partition. i tried slackware it crashed, and i kind of want to run gentoo but thats way to pro for me. anyone know what linux i should try to run?

if you install a bootloader in the MBR, it will clear the old one (ie. window's bootloader). But if you set it up correctly, it will be able to boot windows (the linux bootloader). The bootloader does not edit the window's partition- so there should be no problem.

I run Debian. I can't recommend it b/c I don't know your needs. Instead go to www.debian.org and see if you like what you see.

There are many different , distros. out there. I had installed and uninstalled alot of the distros. before I found one that I liked . Everyone has different needs , and wants. And of course there's ease of use. I finally , ended up with mandrake. There are certain distros. that have more support than others. So, you might look at that too, besides your needs, and requirements.

Which version of Windows?
If it's one that still uses real DOS you could check into Loadlin to boot your Linux partition, maybe?

I run windows xp home edition on my laptop, and I am trying to figure out which linux to use... debian is a lot of cds to download i'm not really looking for that. I am looking for a linux were I can program in different languages compile stuff, talk to people online with gaim, and go wireless, create websites, host websites etc...

personally i want to try linux gentoo but it seems very hard =)

Well, All I know is that there are many distros. out there. Finding the one that suits your needs, and has all the requirements you need. Is the task. If you need iso's then try this site http://www.linuxiso.org/ Because I did run, XP Pro on my laptop, and have had went to mandrake 9.0 totally. Well, what works for me , may not work for you. Just trying to help.

Hey guys if I run mandrake 9 which I tried before were is the kernel's C header files its not in /usr/src/linux because I wanted to use vmware in mandrake 9 so i can just run mandrake and delete windows, and run windows with virtual space in mandrake...

Knoppix 3.0, run Linux from a CD

Gentoo isn't that hard. It has a good install guide, if you follow that, it's hard to go wrong. And if you run into problems, they have a good forum too. You say you're into programming, so I don't think you'll have a problem with Gentoo. And it's a good way to learn more about your system.

On the other hand Debian is a good one too and you definitely don't need to download all the cd-images. You have enough with the first to set up your basic system. Any other programs you need/want, you can install from the net. That's the strength of Debian: it has loads of software and apt-get is a very good package manager.

I DID pick up all the CDs from Linux Central. If you have a dial up connection I would suggest getting the set. I like being able to load most of what I want quickly. If you have cable or DSL you are more free to download what you want.
You do not NEED to download them all in any case.

If you do have a bootable CD, running Knoppix for a while is a good idea.

Just be aware that you do not want to write to any NTFS partitions from Linux.

I don't know how much the cd's cost at linux central, but here's another dirt-cheap site:

http://www.edmunds-enterprises.com/l...tl/product/174

Will Linux Gentoo 1.4rc2 x86 run on a 166mhz pentium 1, 64mb ram, 8 gig hard drive with some bad sectors about 500mb in them... because I tried installing some linux's and I get a segment fault. I don't know what that is but thats the errors I get in slackware trying to install and gentoo..