Making the switch [AKA: Killing windows/moving to Linux]

[XpYtZ]

The title pretty much says it all.
I\'m tired as hell of dealing with the constant problems and the like and I don\'t have the cash to move to a MAC.
That said, it should be obvious that I am biased and anybody that wants to blab about how much they love Windows or how crappy anything is (or is not) should not post in this thread.
If on the other hand you have some suggestions for me while I make the switch (IE Like how to learn this new OS or what programs are just \'have to have\') than by all means, please help me.
My Windows system ain\'t going for a swim or anything, I just want something stable to run my MUD clients and other OpenSource stuff on. Ever since the Service Pack 2 thing was loaded I haven\'t been able to do anything of real importance on this peice.
So, yep. I don\'t know up from down in Linux and any tutorials, GUI suggestions, Compilers, etc. etc. etc...

[FESFES]

Well why dont you put windows on one hd and linux on the other?
It will automaticly ask which you wanna run on start up.
Im not sure if you can do this with one hd and if you could I wouldnt reccomend it.

Proud windows user here ---> me

[kbilik]

Not a suggestion or anything, but something encouraging (if they truly make it work as they claim):

A Silicon Valley startup claims to have cracked one of most elusive goals of the software industry: a near-universal emulator that allows software developed for one platform to run on any other, with almost no performance hit.

Transitive Corp. of Los Gatos, California, claims its QuickTransit software allows applications to run \"transparently\" on multiple hardware platforms, including Macs, PCs, and numerous servers and mainframes.

The company claimed QuickTransit eliminates the need to port software from one platform to another. Software applications written for one platform will run on almost any other, without any modifications to the underlying program.

In demonstrations to press and analysts, the company has shown a graphically demanding game -- a Linux version of Quake III -- running on an Apple PowerBook.

http://wired.com/news/technology/0,1282,64914,00.html?tw=wn_tophead_2

Something to look forward to if you like a stable platform but don\'t want to use Windows to run a favorite incompatible program. Also no need to use multiple HDs or partitions hopefully.

[Icefalcon]

Well congratz for making the better choice. Its too bad Im stuck with Microsnot for... well, for a while.

[Elkindel]

I was setting up Debian Stable, then Windows decided to have a fit and I had to reinstall it (It\'s on its own partition so it doesn\'t eat everything else) And I haven\'t reinstalled LILO yet... so I have a halfway functional Debian Stable sitting on a 10GB partition :P

[Zorium]

There are a few ways to do this but here we go.....

Ok first you need to decide if your going to use two harddrives or one partitioned harddrive (or if your going to use a completely different computer altogether).  There arn\'t many advantages in doing this one way over or another its pure economics and personal preference.  

N.B. DO NOT I repeat DO NOT partition your harddrive under Windows.

Now your going to need a distro, here are a few examples:

Mandrake
Red Hat/Fedora
Gentoo
Yoper
Debian

Of course you could use BSD but thats a different matter all together.

I personally recomend Madrake because its easy to setup and manage , though any are better than Windows

Once you get your distro you\'ll want to install it (of course).   The installers are quiet different so I wont go into detail on this.  A quick note, if you have two harddrives the first harddrive is hda the second hdb and so on.

Packages: How many and what packages you install really depend on how much harddrive space you have though I\'ll make a couple of recomendations.

If you have a lot of harddrive space (120 gig plus) install as many libraries as are available because this will save time and hassle later on.

Install several enviroments for now so you can choose which one you prefer.

In general make sure you have all the default packages as well.

Now with any luck linux should be running pefectly!

You should probably explore the linux enviroment and try to learn things by yourself having said this a good resource for linux knowledge is the linux cookbook.

Need to know anything else?

-Zorium

[XpYtZ]

While I am glad that you took the time to write it and am sure that someone will get some good information out of it. I am not really quite that lost on creating a partition or the like. I have like five computers so I am just switching one to Linux for the things I want to run on it -which is everything for now.
I just wondered about the best things to load on it. I don\'t know if any of the various distributions have drivers, or if I need to find them and I don\'t know about programs (like a Webb browser, how much stuff I have to \'build (whatever that is) and the like.)
I assume that it is not like Windows or Mac OS which comes with a GUI (I\'m just guessing from what a friends server cluster looks like.) and some nifty softare to make it all work. Seems to me (again from the friends cluster) that it works a lot like DOS with commands and the like.
I should really look all this up.
I am just looking for program suggestions and rescources. Like \"Oh, go to www.blablahere.com/ and download this great program.\" Or \"This is better than that for it.\" Or \"Hey be sure to go here and learn about doing this.\" You know, techy suggestions about stuff. I know that in the Windows world, that happens very little (or it does in my experience) but every Mac guy I know shares everything he can get his hands on with fellow users. I just assumed that the UNIX/Linux folks did the same.

[lynx_lupo]

Searching theweb for software si obsolete!
Get mandrake, a great distro for starting(and a really easy setup), with many users, much support and i bet the rpm package system would make you jump from joy if you started with something source based.

If you have the space, most things you need will get installed in the setup procedure.

But, I recommend you wait a bit - 10.1 community was released - you wait for the official one, which will fix any serious malfunctions, soon.

And no, it\'s a command prompt thing as much as you want it to be. When you try it, you will see how the feel is similar to the one of windows. You have nothing to be afraid of.

[Draageos]

If you want something userfriendly and solid I recommend Suse 9.1 (/me wonders why anyone have not mentioned this before ?()... In my oppinion it\'s the best distro out now (I\'m no linux shark so distro\'s like Debian and Slackware does not really appeal to me)

Other than that Linuxquestions.org is a good place to take a look

[fireofsoul]

i have windows on my big HDD
and linux on my iddiebiddieeeeeeee HDD... im moving from mandrake 9.2 -Debian Stable or Gentoo.. (which looks like a pain to install)

[lynx_lupo]

Go for gentoo! You can have a stage3 install, which should take some half an hour. You can recompile stuff and get optimized whenever you have the time...

[leinir]

About Suse 9.1, if you want KDE go with them, they actually employ people to work on that desktop environment The only problem with it is that either you buy it, or you have to do an FTP install (which is not so much of a problem, IF you have a great big pipe sucking the life out of the internet).

About Mandrake, that\'s what I use and of course I\'ll be biased and say that it\'s absolutely wonderful The URPMI system is really your friend, and the amount of alternative repositories out there, with interesting collections of software is very, very extensive. I should probably add that Mandrake has been my distro of choice since two years ago, when I installed 8.2. Haven\'t looked back since Currently on 10 Official, waiting for 10.1 Community Edition to be released to the public.

About Gentoo, that system is quite simply not a beginner\'s system... Very powerful yes, but not exactly simple... Also, it has gotten quite a bad reputation due to it\'s apparent l337 status. It has even spawned this site: http://funroll-loops.org/ that rips the p*ss out of the sadly large part of Gentoo users that have little clue about just what makes Gentoo good. Please understand that I\'ve nothing against Gentoo as such, it\'s just not the optimal beginner\'s distribution

So, in essence, my suggestion for a distribution if you just want to use it is to go for Mandrake, and suggest that you use KDE, since that\'s what I know and have grown to love muchly (it is no longer the nightmare of usability it once was, I should add). As for some ideas for what to do in KDE, try this on for size: http://wiki.kde.org/tiki-index.php?page=Fun+Things+To+Do+in+KDE

[Draageos]

Originally posted by leinir
About Suse 9.1, if you want KDE go with them, they actually employ people to work on that desktop environment The only problem with it is that either you buy it, or you have to do an FTP install (which is not so much of a problem, IF you have a great big pipe sucking the life out of the internet).

Heh.. That is a thing of the past my friend - Novell has made an ISO of the Personal Edition public with the newest release of Suse. You can download it from a  mirror near you

The old FTP install was a pain if you didn\'t know how to deal with it.. I had a friend with a 2Mbit ADSL download the server files and I then installed my comp at his place and used him as a server over LAN.. Quick install - painless

[RussianVodka]

Yay! More people are deserting the capitalist machine of doom and going to good ol\' Linux.

[Watcher]

I would go to Linux but most games I like dont have a port over to it and Capitalists rule jk.