Hello.

My name is Vegard Kolbeinsen im from Norway and im new here.

Iv been using Windows to loong now and i hate it so much, its unstable and there are to much crap running that i dont like. Im not that new in the PC world, iv build alot of PCs in the past years, and i know how to take out the max from the crapy windows. And i even got an Debian and later FreeBSD server that a old lost friend of my set up for me for a loong time ago, wich i dont have anymore. But my god that was running non stop for months!

But now im ready to try something new on my every day PC. And then i have some critical questions that i need an YES on.

1: I have a big collection of Excel/.xlm files that iv made up in the years everything from smal formulas to my entire budjets up in the years. So is there any program in any Linux based OS that i can use or program to convert those files to use in a simular program/sofware?

2: I listen to lot of music so any recommendations of a good MP3 player for a Linux based OS?

3: I use MSN to communicate with my friends, so is there any software to use?

4: Is VLC player a good player to use or is there any better to use? xvid mpeg compatible and so on...

5: Iv using Fat32 on all my disk do i need to convert them? or can a primary disk "talk" to a fat32 disk if the other is converted?

6: What linux based OS should i use? My PC is set ut with an 37" HDTV and a 5.1 Dali / Pioneer sound system as primary use. So is there any good recommendations? Some Windows Media Center / Front Row look alike?

Mvh
Vegard Kolbeinsen

I will try to answer some of your questions. First off openoffice ( a nice opensource office suite similar to microsoft office) can open/convert .xls files http://www.openoffice.org/ . Next Gaim would be a good choice for a chat client it can use IRC, AIM, MSN, JABBER, ICQ and some other networks. A good .mp3 player would be xmms. If you want somthing really fancy you could try amarok. Im not quite sure what os you should use but maybe ubuntu would be good. Good luck!

Ok thanks. But why ubuntu? iv never heard of it before? what about Red Hat 9.0?
And what Torrent program is good? i like when you can go into a torrent an priority a file...

I've heard that it's an African word meaning, "too dumb to install Debian."

I just need something simple that are easy in use and doesnt need much resurses...

Mostly because Redhat 9 is about 6 years old. Most of your other questions can easily be answered by searching, did you try that?

Azureus is a good BitTorrent program and runs on Windows and linux. Maybe it might be worth you looking for some apps that are cross-platform like Azureus, Firefox, Gaim, OpenOffice and get used to them all under Windows so when you switch it won't be such a huge task.

Hello. Let me see if I can help.

1. OpenOffice.Org, as teckboy said, can open your .xlm files as they are with no conversions. It's just as functional as MS Office - even a little more. I use the Windows version of it on my Windows machine just out of preference.

2. MP3 players seem to me to be about all the same. Just use what comes with the distro you get. If a good portion of your music collection is in wma's however, you will be forced to use the imfamous MPlayer. This is a clone of Windows Media Player that's famous for being hard to install. If you need to use it, search "mplayer install" and your distro.

3. There are any number of programs that emulate MSN, AIM etc. Gaim works well, as does Kopete. One will probably come with your distro.

4. Video players - you should be able to, once again, get by with what comes with the distro. I'm rather fond of Kaffeine myself, but its all personal preference.

5. For a newbie, I'd recommend Mandriva (Although I think the free version still goes under the name Mandrake) That's what I started on, and its excellent if you want to transition gently from Windows. The entire install is simple and graphical. In fact, you won't ever see a text prompt unless you actively go looking for one. It's the ultimate in easy, comes with (I'm pretty sure) one of every program you said you needed, and the no-command-prompt makes you feel like you're in windows (minus the BSD's)

I will say that I found Mandrake to lack the functionality of other distros, and once gaining some familiarity with Linux I moved away - first to OpenSuse, and now to LFS. However, I couldn't have hoped for a better learning tool.

P.S. KTorrent will work as a Bittorrent - type program. Not sure if it comes with Mandrake tho.

About MP3 player, there are lots of free WMA to MP3 converters around. I just went to dowwnload.com and under freeware "category" got some. Straight conversion in DOS BEFORE you install linux.

And yes, since you use FAT32, and simply mount it later on. (Be careful about NTFS though).

End

Take a look at Distrowatch---Ubuntu is the most-often accessed distro there. (Does NOT mean Ubuntu is the most popular distro!!)Rather than RH9, I would suggest Fedora Core 5.

Actually, Ubuntu is a SOUTH-African word meaning:

"I recognize Debian as a really great distro which--unfortunately--is dominated by purists who believe that you should have to think a bit to install an OS. I don't believe that--so I'm going to make it really easy. I'm also going to throw in a few REALLY DUMB things like disabling the root account."

Trust me--I looked it up in Funk and Wagnalls......

This is the only reason for which I use Debian.

Wha'?!? That's too hard?

At least three people use my PC.

XMMS. XMMS supports many audio formats with plugins.
But I think Amarok already in on the way to overtake (or did it overtake XMMS already) the XMMS position as the leading mp3 player on Linux.

VLC is very good player. But mplayer, for me, is better with better support for new video formats.

No. Only Linux partition and swap should be enough. You can mount fat32 nicely in Linux.

Here is my two cents worth,

1: OpenOffice which comes with some distributions should be just fine for your spreadsheet (xls) files. refer to www.openoffice.org

2: I listen to lot of music so any recommendations of a good MP3 player for a Linux based OS?

For MP3's I like XMMS (which is near identical to Winamp) and Rhythmbox which is neat and simple to use and has a good little organiser built into it.

3: I use MSN to communicate with my friends, so is there any software to use? Gaim

4: VLC I have heard is good, I use Xine and I find it does everything I need it to do.

5: Linux can read from and write to Fat32 disks and partitions, no problems.

6: Which distro to use will depend upon your machine spec too. I love Ubuntu Dapper, it is easy to install, looks fantastic, has everything I need to get started and has reliably repositories to get software from and therefore it is easy to add more software to Ubuntu.


I used to use Debian and loved it also, but I found that Ubuntu was just a lot less effort on the installation side of things which leaves me more time to be more productive in other areas.

Regards,
Greenie