I need all of your help converting from MS to Linux!
 

hi, my name is H0mer, I've been a microsoftaholic for 10 years now and finally am past my denial stage. There were days when I had thoughts all day long that MS software *gulp* was good to have around <ashamed>...

A little history- I have actually been a closet linux supporter for years that hasn't turned FROM the dark side for one, very stupid reason- I enjoy first person shooters and nearly all the one's I love only work on windows *gasp*. So, one day about 2 years ago I said to myself "ok, I'll put linux on my laptop then, because I don't play games on that right?" So I did install mandrake or something like that and in the middle of writing my paper I incorrectly saved my 6 page neuroscience final paper and lost it. I let that extremely terrifying experience scare me away from even attempting linux on my desktop systems and removed it from my laptop to stick to what I knew.

ANYWAY, I am mid-semester medical school and can not stand the spyware infections, trojan's and e-mail virus's on my LAPTOP (which I use in class EVERY DAY) anymore. All my efforts to rid my computer of py.exe and associates have failed so I guess it's time to scrap everything and move on to something better.

The problem being mid-semester is that time is EXTREMELY sparse. I'm looking for a forum of extremely intelligent, helpful people who are willing to work with a fairly knowledgable MS sufferer.

Let's start with the first big question and go from there:

1.) which LINUX OS would get nearly all of my laptop hardware working with the least stress. Obviously video, ethernet/wireless are the most important.

MY LAPTOP HARDWARE:

Computer Model Latitude D600
BIOS Vendor Dell Computer Corporation
BIOS Version A06
BIOS Date 08-19-03
Memory Slot 1 Description [DIMM_A]: 256Mb
Memory Slot 2 Description [DIMM_B]: 256Mb

Network Card = Adapters Broadcom 570x Gigabit Integrated Controller - Packet Scheduler Miniport
Dell TrueMobile 1300 WLAN Mini-PCI Card - Packet Scheduler Miniport

DVD/CD-ROM Drives SAMSUNG CDRW/DVD SN-324B
Disk Drives HITACHI_DK23EB-40 37.26Gb
Display Adapters MOBILITY RADEON 9000 32Mb
IDE ATA/ATAPI Controllers Intel(R) 82801DBM Ultra ATA Storage Controller - 24CA
Primary IDE Channel
Secondary IDE Channel
Keyboards Standard 101/102-Key or Microsoft Natural PS/2 Keyboard
Mice and Other Pointing Devices USB Human Interface Device
Alps Touch Pad
Monitors Default Monitor - (Standard monitor types)
Sound Devices SigmaTel C-Major Audio
USB Controllers Intel(R) 82801DB/DBM USB Universal Host Controller - 24C2
Intel(R) 82801DB/DBM USB Universal Host Controller - 24C4
Intel(R) 82801DB/DBM USB Universal Host Controller - 24C7
Intel(r) 82801DB/DBM USB 2.0 Enhanced Host Controller - 24CD

FINALLY A very deep thank you to anyone who is willing to take me under their wing, I'm going to continue doing research but as it looks right now I'll be using Mandrake dual boot with windows on this laptop. When I get files transferred and working ok in LINUX then I'll wipe out the windows partition.

P.S. I am well versed in partitions, formatting and setting that stuff up for install. I have many tools and loaders to get me going

Thanks again everyone!

I have no idea if there are issues with any of that hardware, but in about the time it would take someone to research it, you could try out Mepis (download mirrors) or Knoppix (download). Personally I wouldn't look down on you if you reboot to play certain FPS but on the other hand it might not be a good idea to switch to Linux at all if you mind horribly to have to learn a bunch of new stuff.

Thanks Snacky, doing some research on KNOPPIX because I had a friend of mine suggest strongly I start there too...

I know the learning curve for linux is really steep but if you guys can start pointing me to good things to read to learn and test that would be super.

What I might do is install virtual PC on my desktop and play around with linux for a week or two before putting it on my laptop. We'll see, that's a distant thought, if you all think I can get thise stuff up and running soon then I'd forgo practice/testing.

Aside from hardware, I need a free program that will run MS powerpoint's because that's where all of our lectures come as.

Thanks again

OpenOffice.org can open and save as powerpoint files. I haven't experimented with this in really great detail, though, so for all I know there's some feature somewhere it doesn't support -- I don't use it enough to be sure.

I think very highly of Knoppix myself. It is a great way to try out Linux risk-free. The reason I mentioned Mepis is because I keep hearing people say in their particular case, it supported their hardware but Knoppix didn't. Personally though I'd probably try Knoppix first then Mepis if that isn't satisfactory. Just a mattery of taste, mostly...

In a sense, trying out different distros is a crude way to get hardware support since hardware support actually resides in the kernel. However, popping a new CD in the drive is so easy anyone can do it, so people very commonly switch distros due to hardware detection and support.

If you REALLY want to be good with Linux, you should eventually read this, but it's probably way too much for you right at the moment. Bookmark it, read a page or so every week until it starts making sense. If you master a significant fraction of it, you will not only not be a newbie anymore, you'll be a wizard compared to most people on this site!

Hi,

If your laptop is not too new maybe this adress "www.linux-laptop.net/"will help to see friends fidlings with their hardware. There's also "www.tldp.org" for general information and howto's.

Knoppix is a great advice tio see if everything works and how.
You can already use good software over your OS like mozilla project (thunderbird and firefox) even use openoffice right now.

Welcome to freedom ; ) Marc A

THANKS marc- checking those out now!

I agree - give Knoppix a try. its pretty amazing really. and if you like it you can do a very easy HD install from it as well.

You can also check out www.linux-on-laptops.com
A lot of good information there.

Martin

Wow snacky... that site is... awesome to say the least!

I bet if the first few pages were put up as a READ BEFORE POSTING (and people actually did read it) there would be less people posting duplicate problem threads, lol.

download the stand alone bootable CD from Mandrake, its graphical and nice.

Or DemoLinux

Hey guys, another question for you...

Seeing as how I bring and use my laptop to school everyday and print from my desktop at home I have a problem with using linux on my laptop.

How I have it setup now is: I use "offline files" in windows so that everytime I bring my laptop home it synchronizes the files on my laptop with the files on my desktop so that I can print from my desktop...

Is there anyway to setup something similar to that between a linux and windows machine or how does file sharing work between linux machines even?

Thanks as always for your help!

P.S. is that bootable Mandrake version like the Knoppix version where I can run it off the CD and try it? I looked at the mandrake download section and didn't see anything about "live" versions of Mandrake. Could someone point me toward the version I want where I can just load it off the CD without HD install..

Thanks!

I found the bootable Mandrake, I'll try it later today or tomorrow...

Hey STU! got another question for ya...

What do linux users do for anti-virus programs and such. Don't laugh at me, remember I'm still new to this stuff. Is it FACT or MYTH that linux virus's are almost unheard of due to the constantly updated Kernels and such?

I'm going to start reading through that thread to see if maybe the other thread on my wireless ethernet card wrapper (what the hell is a wrapper?) to install and work correctly...

Thanks

offline files
 

Just stumbled across this thread, and it's pretty interesting.

I never used the offline files thing in Windows, but in Linux you can use rsync to synchronize between folders. I use it to backup my home directory on my stealth Linux install on my work laptop to a couple of other machines automatically.

I'm not sure about any newbie friendly gui tools, but it's not hard to use. Just to make up an example, if I wanted to update homer's home directory from a laptop called cat to a desktop called dog, I'd open a shell window on cat and do this:

rsync -avz -e ssh /home/homer/ homer@dog:/home/homer

Enter homer's password on dog when prompted, and rsync does the rest. Among other things the trailing slash in the first "/home/homer/" is very important. If left off homer's home on dog would be deleted and recreated rather than just being updated with new files from cat.

Rsync can be found at the Samba site http://rsync.samba.org/ but you will likely already have it with any Linux that you install.

Note that it does not sync both ways and does not remove any files from the target unless you give it an option to specify this.

For something two way, you might check out unison at http://www.cis.upenn.edu/~bcpierce/unison/ .
I think it uses the rsync protocol and IIRC can sync between Windows and Linux. Haven't tried it but it seems to be highly recommended.

As for viruses, there have been concept viruses for *nix but I'm not aware of any in "the wild". As long as you are logged in as a regular user (not root) about all one could do is delete some data from your home directory. I'm much more concerned about security than viruses. Security is an are of concern in any OS, though still typically much better in Linux than Windows.

Hey guys, I was thinking about what would help most converting to linux and if anyone could give me a quick rundown of how "installing" software, drivers (wrappers?), etc works in linux. I know it's extremely important to understand that only wusses use installer exe's that real men "un-tar" their stuff...

How does all that work? Once you tar/untar a installer, where does it go, what do you do with those files? do you need to reboot?

Thanks, this will probably help a lot get me going on getting drivers and software I need running as soon as possible. Thanks

Ugh, I just spent the afternoon trying to get Knoppix to install on my HD. It would stall during boot-up and I frankly don't have the inclination to go chasing the problem. I put MEPIS on instead and no complaints so far.

By that reasoning you could argue that "real men" light a fire by rubbing two sticks together and only "wusses" light a match.

Smart guys don't piss away entire evenings in what we call "dependency hell". Do yourself a favor and don't even consider anything that isn't a Debian-based distro: Debian, Knoppix, MEPIS, Libranet, Xandros, etc. The Debian apt system is the most advanced package management system for Linux and believe you me, you'll need it. You don't want to be running buggy version 0.9 of some program when the rest of the world is up to version 2.4. Some day you're going to want to upgrade to the new version and that's where the fun begins in Linux. The opposite number to Debian is the RPM system. Take it from me, you can fritter away countless hours chasing down package dependencies (one piece of software requires another to install and run) with the RPM system and have nothing to show for it. The Debian distros I'm familiar with come standard with a wonderful program called Synaptic, a GUI for the underlying package management system. Don't be self-conscious about using GUI programs even in Linux. You and the rest of the civilized world use a GUI web browser, right? Last I heard non-GUI web browsers had gone the way of the dinosaur.

Do give MEPIS a look.

I didn't mean to make illogical corelations about doing things "the easy way" vs. doing things "the hard way". The few linux buff's I know spend most of their time at the command prompt doing things not wandering around clicking windows to get to where they want to be. I just figured that the pro's around here (most all of you) would expect me to travel down the path of living my life at the command prompt vs the "double click" installers...

no harm no offense...

Does MEMPIS have a "live" distro I can load off a bootable CD?

THANKS!

Ideally you want to spend more time using a computer for whatever it is you use it for, than futzing around with its internals.

Yes.

I just want to warn you that you ---might---have a problem with a Dell laptop.
Some, but not all, do not release enough video memory on install( or something like that )
There is a patch out for it.
Go to - google-- and type in 855patch ( or is it patch855 ??)

It can be fixed, and again, not all suffer from this defect.
It is a chipset problem, not a linux problem.

As far as anti virus, you can check out Dr. Web
I haven't used it yet, but it is what Mandrake suggests...

There are a couple different firewalls you can get, one is for Gnome called Firestarter that I have used and it is really nice. There is another for KDE which I have not used but looks nice, called Guarddog.

These firewalls are really just frontends for IPTables. Do a search for IP Tables and that would probably give you more info than you really need.

Installing Software
 

Generally, I agree with chris319's comments about tools like apt being preferable to untarring, etc. However, it is useful on occasion, so for future reference if you're trying to install a program called "newprog" it goes something like this:

If you downloaded "newprog.tgz" (tarred and zipped with gzip), then do a tar -zxvf newprog.tgz.
If "newprog.tbz" (zipped with bzip2) then a tar -jxvf newprog.tbz will untar/unzip.
Doing tar -xvf newprog.tar untars a tar file

Typically, then you have a directory called newprog created in the directory where things were untarred that you change to in order to install. Then do "less README" and "less INSTALL" to view any special instructions. If you're lucky (depends on the program and what kind of system you are installing on), you can just do:

./configure
make
make install #this last has to be done as root

All 3 steps above may take a few minutes or longer

Mepis I've only tried briefly, but it didn't run on the laptop I was trying it on--it seems to get very good reviews, though. I've installed Knoppix on a hard drive with no problem. Mandrake and SuSE now have versions that can be run from CD to try them out.

There is one misconception in what chris319 said, though. IIRC the Debian installer is actually "dpkg" and is no better than rpm at managing dependencies. What apt actually is is a program that functions a level above dpkg to manage those dependencies, and yes you definitely want to use something like this.

However, apt has been ported to rpm and can be used with Red Hat and other rpm based distros. Mandrake has something similar called urpmi. There is also something called yum for rpm. Debian has made use of apt longer than the rpm based distros and has a larger and longer-tested group of packages known to work well together.

My advice: try a few of the live CDs and pick one that you like. Then learn what high level package management system it uses and learn to use that, resorting to installing from source only if you need something rare that is only available that way.

lnxconvrt, thank you VERY much for the post. I'm already learning tons about linux (IT'S GREAT!)

I am still confused about what distribution is what by what designations. Could someone table out which distro goes under which category of whatever designation you guys split them up...

Just as an update, KNOPPIX works FLAWLESSLY on my laptop, video, sound, everything is great with one small exception: I'm probably going to have to hop over to the hardware support forum to see how much success people are having with getting a DELL TRUEMOBILE 1300 WLAN card working. If I can get my wireless ethernet working I can port my files over and be done with windows forever. I'll learn the rest as I go.

I just want to get away from windows, I can't stand all the BS anymore...

Thanks again guys!

Vote for SuSE
 

For whatever it's worth, I'd strongly urge you to consider buying a copy of SuSE for your laptop:

1. It practically installs itself (it really puts Windows to shame in the
ease-of-use dept)

2. You can probably save your existing Windows filesystem (and
transparently share it with your new Linux OS).

3. The documentation is great (if you need it - you probably won't!)

4. It comes with OpenOffice (which can read your MS Word .doc files,
.xls Excel spreadsheets and .ppt Powerpoint files without problem)

5. It's freely available - not only online, or from most computer stores,
but you can *also* buy SuSE at your local Borders or Barnes/Noble.

Give it a try!

ANOTHER QUESTION FOR YA!

ok, so I'm confused. I'm using the LIVE version of knoppix. Throw the CD in, and load everything very nicely. great.

I get into hda2 (my C: drive in windows) to find some drivers/wrappers I saved there in a folder. I found out that hda2 is recognized as a "read-only" so I copy the folder of files to the 'tmp' folder on hda1 (because I didn't get errors when making new folders in there/it doesn't seem to be read-only).

The tar.gz file tar's just fine and makes a new folder in the tmp folder, but when I go to do MAKE INSTALL it gives me two errors to the effect that it it doesn't have permission to make the folders or there's some read-only problem and it can't go on. I don't understand or know enough about installing stuff on linux to understand why the freekin thing makes folders no problem one second and has a problem the next MAKE INSTALLing the next.

I would post the error message accept I have no way to save anything while in the LIVE version and no internet access (hence why I'm trying to get my wifi up and running)...

thanks

To install stuff onto knoppix, it has to be mounted rw, and you can't write a cdrom rw

Translation :
Because Knoppix runs off a CD, you can't write to it (Not even if it's in a CD burner). Because you can't write to it, that means that your ability to install programs is extreemly limited, and most programs won't install at all. To install a program, you will need to boot knoppix off something you can write to (say, for example, you HDD)

NOTE: the reason you can write files at all is due to the fact that some sections of the file system are actually not physical devices at all, and are actually writen to ram.

As for being able to write to hda1... Knoppix mounts as read only as far as I know? What's so special about /tmp on hda1? are you sure it's not just /tmp ? (/tmp on hda1 would be found at /mnt/hda1/tmp) If it was just /tmp then chances are you just wrote the files to ram and won't be able to get them back.
Good thing you kept a copy :D

as for installing with debian :
apt-get install tuxracer
(assuming you want to install tuxracer)

as for apt-get vs urpmi :
I have used both, and the urpmi that comes with mandrake 9.1 is not nearly as user-friendly or for that matter, good at picking dependancies.

Convert To Xandros
 

Hi Homer,
Like yourself I am new to Linux, but last June decided to try Linux on my Desknote. I have only tried two versions of Linux - Red Hat Fedora Core and Xandros ( based on Debian). Fedora Core did not install as well as I would have liked, so i Purchased Xandros which installed much better.
I am still running Windows xP as well on this notebook. Before running the install disk i Defragmented the hard drive (essential). Then in Windows xp I used Partition Magic to create a 5 Gig Linux partition on my 20 Gig hard drive. Then I installed by booting to my Linux CD and carefully following the instructions.
my Notebook is an ECS I Buddie 4 with an internal winmodem, which works fine using mozilla & firefox browsers and the Ximian evolution email.
Unlike Windows if you require linux to detect usb devices it is necessary
to have them already connected to make certain they are detected.
Another advantage of Xandros is that you can access files inthe Windows partition from the File manager and copy them across. You can download other programs with deb
or rpm extension and install them from Xandros networks program( must enter as administrator first )
if you like to use a burner i recommend the K3b burner program at ww.k3b.org.- best to download a Debian version
Issues - i am using two printers( Epson810 & HP multifunction psc 2310) now: both work fine most of the time but occasionally they fail to print e.g. printer out of ink. The only way I have found to fix this is to go back into windows and fix the problem there and then they work again in Xandros. Also have not yet had my old Canon scanner work in Linux - not a big deal, but will try to get it working one day
Regards,
kevin

Hi h0mer,

I'm also new to linux, but the learning curve is high and I've become quite efficient at installing stuff and navigating though the filesystem. I doubt you'll have a problem converting. I haven't touched windows in a week and a half now. I'm using SuSE that I installed using ftp from a boot disk. Try the live cd if you want, it's very condusive to windows users and has a great installer (YaST) that makes hardware configuration really simple and will install from rpm's.
It too can read/write on the windows partition (FAT32 is best, so I hear). The defaults are great for learning, and then when you become more comfortable with the inner workings of linux you can customize and tweak at will.
Check it out, that's my two cents.

I have tried both Fedora Core and Suse on my I-Buddie 4 Desknote, but neither of them could detect my winmodem, But Xandros did. So for now I will stay with Xandros. Later on I will try other Linux OSs like
Suse on my PC.
Kevin