converting to linux

mdb99jh

Yes thats right I'm thinking of turning my back on the dark side of the force and walking into the light of linux. Does anyone have any information / links to how I would go about making the switch, downloading the software, tips for installing etc...? Anyone done this themselves or have any good linux advice?

Mr_Skint_2

http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.html?t=96157&highlight=linux

Has already been discussed here.....

mdb99jh

Oooops - sorry! Didn't spot that one. Thanx.

culpepper

Once you know which distribution you want,check up on drivers for your peripherals.Ive got mine as a dual boot but found I couldn't get my camera to recognise on Linux so still have to use MS windows to access that.My scanner is also not recognised or my mobile phone.All my optical drives are recognised automatically and the internet which we have networked was available immediately.Other than that,it is an excellent operating system.I've got redhat on mine from a magazine distribution.
Mine is on a seperate drive to the windows OS and I found that while I can see my windows drive from Linux and copy files from it,I cant write to it.I cant see the linux drive from windows at all. Apparently if they were both on the same drive this would have been less of a problem so that might be worth remembering.

mrnomoneybags

I think its worth giving it a try ....... i found debian pretty good ....... plus you can use "apt-get" to auto download and install aplications

wolfman

Run it in dual boot with Windows for a while before completely switching across. Apart from that you shouldn't encounter many problems. Fedora Core 4 is what I currently use, nice, easy to use distribution.

frak

debian isnt linux. Its linux like but it is not linux.
Fedora core 4 is fine as wolfman says, my favourite is mandrake now known as mandriva. For a beginner user look at ubuntu its very very good

dan

irnbru_2

culpepper wrote:

Mine is on a seperate drive to the windows OS and I found that while I can see my windows drive from Linux and copy files from it,I cant write to it.

Is your windows partition using NTFS?

irnbru_2

mdb99jh wrote:

Yes thats right I'm thinking of turning my back on the dark side of the force and walking into the light of linux. Does anyone have any information / links to how I would go about making the switch, downloading the software, tips for installing etc...? Anyone done this themselves or have any good linux advice?

What does your current system not do that you think GNU/Linux will solve?

Switching for the hell-of-it isn't advisable.

As others recommend, get some live CDs and see if they work first.

culpepper

irnbru wrote:

Is your windows partition using NTFS?

Yes it is.I upped to NTFS when I was converting my video's to VCD because there was a limit to how much you could store in fat 32.Im running XP.
Today I had a look at Knoppix4 on live dvd which came with the current Linux Magazine.It looks quite nice but this has the same problem of reading NTFS but not writing to it.It could not see my Installed (seperate)linux drive at all which suprised me.I might have another play with it tomorrow.I managed to crash it by trying to change the US English setting to UK English.

irnbru_2

culpepper wrote:

Yes it is.I upped to NTFS when I was converting my video's to VCD because there was a limit to how much you could store in fat 32.Im running XP.

Same boat. Hit the 2GB limit on a DVD conversion.

culpepper wrote:

Today I had a look at Knoppix4 on live dvd which came with the current Linux Magazine.It looks quite nice but this has the same problem of reading NTFS but not writing to it.

It's (currently) not supported due to the complexities of NTFS see here.

culpepper wrote:

It could not see my Installed (seperate)linux drive at all which suprised me.I might have another play with it tomorrow.I managed to crash it by trying to change the US English setting to UK English.

.. which would seem like a cautionary tale to the OP not to rush in.