Long story here... or at least I'm trying to give you some background...

I've got some issues here. Maybe a simple fix, maybe not. First let me say that I'm running an older setup. I mostly use Windows XP, but I have redhat (I _think_ 6) as well. I have Linux setup on a partition and am running the dual boot program that came with Linux, so that I can boot XP (the default) or linux.

Obviously my linux distribution is outdated as my computer friend keeps remind me, and my system is getting pretty old as well. I'm running an old AMD 1200 T-bird, with 512mbs of RAM.

Now I would like to do more things with linux, but I don't even understand basic things, like installing most programs. Mainly I use Linux as a server to run my MUD code, that I tinker with as a hobby. I do a little programming and that's about it.

My system was pretty stable for a long time, but my problem started with my video card. I was running a Voodoo 3, but it's been unsupported for years and didn't have any built-in video RAM, so I couldn't run a lot of newer software, particularly games. I don't have money for a new system right now, so I opted to upgrade my video card, and went with a cheap $30 Chaintech Volari V3 card, which has 128mb DDR, and is 64 bit (I think the voodoo was 32). I read some reviews on the Chaintech card before I bought it, and it seemed to be a decent card, so I went with it.

However, while the Volari V3 works with XP (although it has a lower resolution than my old Voodoo ), I can't seem to find a driver for it in Linux. My buddy and I tinkered with it for about 4 hours, and couldn't get XWindows to work with the card. It ran in a basic Vesa mode, that gave me some horrid rainbow colors and was barely readable.

So knowing that my setup was so old, he felt my best option would be to backup my software on the linux drive (which we did) and start fresh with a newer version.

My buddy thinks that there is no way to "upgrade" redhat 6, and I'll have to start with a fresh install. But I have concerns because I'm using the dual boot program, and there is a concern for me that I'll have to start over on my XP partition as well.

I have close to a combined 100Gigs of information on my XP partitions. I'm sure probably close to half of that is stuff I'd like to keep. But I do have two drives, and the majority of that is on my 75 gig slave drive.

Adding to the equation is the fact that when we ran a test, we found that my master drive is failing. I have another drive to put in, but again I have concerns. Can I just do a copy of the whole drive? My friend said that doesn't usually work very well and I'll have to install XP again. Can I at least save the information on the slave drive and simply re-install on the master?

Is it possible in the first place to simply upgrade redhat? My understanding is it is replaced with Fedora, and in fact when I checked at Red Hat's site, I couldn't find any free distributions like they used to have.

Is it possible that there is a way to get my chaintech to work with my current linux version and push this whole mess back a year or so?

If you got through all this text, I could use a bit of advice and help.

Thanks in advance,

Mathius

This is where some smart-aleck asks you to repeat the question...
seriously--it is better to have a little more focus and one question at a time.
I'm grabbing first the thing about the hard drive failing and all the data you want to keep. Before you do anything else, get it all backed up.
Other (possibly useful) things:
No, you cannot upgrade redhat 6--if you like redhat, then get the just-released Fedora Core 6.
Installing a new Linux distro will not screw up the dual-boot. The install process will give you a new bootloader--probably including the configuration to have Windows show on the menu.
"Possible" to get the video card working with Redhat 6? Maybe--but installing a more modern distro might be easier--and bring other benefits as well.

I'd say. "Listen to your friend."

Usually when I attempt to keep it brief, someone will inevitably pop in and ask about my setup, or tell me to do something that I can't do because they don't know the whole story. I thought it would be better to give the whole picture.

I want to find out exactly where he checked it out, when it said it was failing. Because he gave me that diagnosis like 4-6 monthes ago and so far no problems. But I plan to backup stuff anyways. I think I'm going to move anything crucial to me to my slave drive so that it'll make it easier when I do a re-install anyways. I may just have to reinstall a few prog's to get the dll's back where they go and things like that, but I'll be able to save the bulk of it. I remember the days, especially when the internet was new, when the rule of thumb was to backup everything. I remember not saving much of anything to the hard drive and using floppies to run everything. But stuff's gotten so big that it's getting harder and harder to backup, and also you become lax after so many years of not having a crash that you couldn't fix.

I talked to my buddy last night after posting this and he said that Fedora is scheduled for a new version every 6 monthes. Is this true?

He said there's a different version of Redhat, that's only updated every two years... "Enterprise" ? And that I'd be better off getting that because I wouldn't constantly have to change things.

Are you saying you believe that if my hard drive wasn't an issue, then I could get away with _not_ reinstalling XP?

Possibly. I wanted to put a multimedia player on Linux at one time, and my friend said he couldn't get it to install because my version was too old. So I can see the benefits.

But I can't say I'm not a little leary about recompiling my current programs under a new dist, because libraries are typically in different locations between distro's and versions and it can be a real headache trying to re adapt everything.

Thanks, and just for the record (not that anyone was accusing me) I'm not computer illiterate, it's just that I don't know that much about linux, and also it's been a few years since I've really kept up on things. Mostly these days I just browse the web, do a little programming, play a game, or download stuff and if you don't keep up on technology, and how things work, and how you can fix things, and what tools you have, you tend to get lost in this industry.

Mathius

If XP is working---and the hard drive is not failing---then why would you want/need to reinstall XP? My only point is that the bootloader can be installed/configured without affecting the XP install.

Fedora is the free version of Redhat, and has more unproven stuff in it. Yes, it comes out every 6 months or so. Redhat enterprise costs $ and is intended for corporate environments where reliability is the key issue.
If you are going to upgrade, there are LOTS of choices that are equal to, or better than, Redhat or Fedora.

What programs are you concerned about re-compiling? A modern distro is going to have all the common stuff in packages (on the CD/DVD or in the repository.)

I don't _want_ to reinstall XP, but as I said, the tests we ran indicated that my hard drive was failing. Again, I have to research this some more. At the time I wasn't particularly worried about it as this was even before I swapped video cards.

If it's true that my hard drive is failing, then I will want to swap hard drive's as soon as possible so I don't loose anything. If I can just do a simple hard drive copy I would do that. I don't know if XP will allow it.

If my hard drive is not failing, and I can make changes to my linux partition without effecting XP, then that would be easiest, and that's what I want to do.

Sorry if there was confusion.

Well, in the main I'm worried about my MUD code. That's the only thing that I've mainly used Linux for, is a server for my MUD's. I have a few of them, several of them I only run for testing, but there is one that is completely mine and original.

In previous years before I settled on Red hat 6, I had run into problems compiling the MUD code, because libraries weren't in the same locations between versions.

It's not something that isn't fixable, but it can be a major headache trying to rewrite things because the original MUD code was designed before these newer Linux distro's.

I wanted to stay with Red Hat moreso because I thought that this would give me the most similar setup to what I was using now, but in the past I've used Slackware (that's what I learned on), and I think my buddy has used several different types.

He even tried to talk me into something called CGIWin (I _think_ that's the name) that kind of emulates (actually it's an interpreter, not an emulator) Linux, in XP, so that I wouldn't have to really have Linux at all, and could run my MUD on that.

But I'd really rather have a full Linux install as I'd like to learn how to use it. I'm not all that fond of Windows XP, it's just the age old story of most software being developed for Microsoft product.

And again, thank you, you've been really patient with me, and I think you've been rather helpful.

Mathius

I'd agree you prob want to stick to a RedHat derived system for familiarity, probably Fedora.
Note that RH6 is so old that any other distro will be just be an even bigger jump.
They've all moved on a lot since that era.
If you want RH, but with less leading edge and less frequent updates, try Centos.
This is basically a free re-badged version of RedHat Enterprise.