Well I installed Suse 9.1 on top of my install of Windows XP, and I must say I am very impressed. I like it, it fits my simple needs very well.

My only beefs are:

1.) Drivers? Hello? Can I get some? Especially Wireless G drivers!

2.) Installing individual programs is completely different than in the Windows environment, but that is more my problem than anything else, and Suse really eases the transistion with a whole host of programs easily downloadable through YaST.

3.) When things go wrong it can be a huge pain to troubleshoot.

4.) USB on the OS selection screen does not exist, so its back to my old keyboard ...

5.) No Suse representation in this forum! What's up with that?

All in all this has been an interesting learning experience, and still continues to be as I struggle to get XMMS to work and all my drivers installed! And no, I wont switch to Debian or Slackware until I know what I am doing, so don't bother even posting that I should!

Adios.

P.S. - If anyone has a Biostar M7VIT Pro motherboard with all the drivers under Linux let me know! I need to find some badly!

1.) Drivers? Hello? Can I get some? Especially Wireless G drivers!

A. And this is Suse's problem, why? It's not their fault that 90% of the hardware manufacturers are money grubbing pieces of sh*t that can't make drivers for more than windows...

3.) When things go wrong it can be a huge pain to troubleshoot.

I have a rare occurance of anything having ever gone wrong... so this one eludes me. My computer, camera, printer, scanner, everything I plug in works just perfectly as well as everything onboard...

4.) USB on the OS selection screen does not exist, so its back to my old keyboard ...

Apparantly you've never heard of a usb keyboard adapter so you can plug it into a normal keyboard port like the rest of us... Why you would want to plug a keyboard anywhere else to begin with is a little strange, as its still just a keyboard. If your keyboard didnt come with an adapter in the box, maybe you should write the manufacturer and tell em to stop being to f'ing cheap and include the 90 cent piece of plastic...

5.) No Suse representation in this forum! What's up with that?

You could look at the 5000 threads stating the reasons for this one....

I suppose all those workaround are all well and good, but they still effect the experience. I totally agree that it is ridiculous how manufacturers do not create Linux drivers, there just aren't enough of us I suppose ... goddamn Biostar/VIA, taiwanese crapola.

But that is the biggest issues facing the Linux community right now, drivers. That and standards. Then again, wtf do I know I am noob!