Which distribution of Linux should I get?

BlackRider · Post by **BlackRider** » Mon Mar 31, 2003 7:51 pm

I'm looking at: Debian Mandrake Red Hat Help! Which should I get... can't get them all. <img src=http://www.ezboard.com/images/emoticons/smile.gif ALT=":)"> COLORS!

Post by **XMEN Gambit** » Mon Mar 31, 2003 8:08 pm

Red Hat is the easiest to install. Debian is the easiest to maintain. (Look up the apt-get and apt-update commands.) RH is a big distro. Debian can fit on a quite small drive - all you have to do is get a small self-running install going and then it pull the rest of what you need off the net as needed. <img src="http://www.xmenclan.org/xmengambit.gif"/> XMEN member Card-carrying DTM OKL Fish-napper Though a program be but three lines long, someday it will have to be maintained.  The Tao of ProgrammingEdited by: <A HREF=http://pub141.ezboard.com/bxmenclan.sho ... ambit>XMEN Gambit</A>  <IMG SRC="http://www.xmenclan.org/images/x.gif" BORDER=0> at: 4/1/03 12:00:54 pm

BlackRider · Post by **BlackRider** » Mon Mar 31, 2003 8:16 pm

so I can forget about downloading these large .iso's? <img src=http://www.ezboard.com/images/emoticons/smile.gif ALT=":)"> hrmm... I could get both... <img src=http://www.ezboard.com/images/emoticons/smile.gif ALT=":)"> COLORS!

XMEN Ashaman DTM · Post by **XMEN Ashaman DTM** » Tue Apr 01, 2003 11:42 am

Debian is nice. I prefere Mandrake over RH though. Just a personal preference really. <img src=http://www.xmenclan.org/avatars/ashaman2.jpg width=150 align=left> <left><a href=http://www.dragontalonmercs.com>Dragon Talon Mercenary</a> <a href=http://www.xmenclan.org>Member of the XMEN</a> Have a Nice Day! </left>

BlackRider · Post by **BlackRider** » Tue Apr 01, 2003 11:51 am

Haw many OSs can I fit on a 30GB HD? <img src=http://www.ezboard.com/images/emoticons/laugh.gif ALT=":lol"> COLORS!

XMEN Ashaman DTM · Post by **XMEN Ashaman DTM** » Tue Apr 01, 2003 11:55 am

Several. But remember that you need two partitions for optimal performance (I think? Been a while since I ran Linux). One that's about 250 MB, the other that can be the rest of the drive. You can always edit LILO (if you install that) so that you can run different OS'es, or different configurations (say command line only, or start with a certain GUI, or whatever). <img src=http://www.xmenclan.org/avatars/ashaman2.jpg width=150 align=left> <left><a href=http://www.dragontalonmercs.com>Dragon Talon Mercenary</a> <a href=http://www.xmenclan.org>Member of the XMEN</a> Have a Nice Day! </left>

Post by **XMEN Gambit** » Tue Apr 01, 2003 11:59 am

Several, if you do it right. Asha, have you tried the new RH 8? That's one of the slickest I've seen, lots better than previous versions. I've not tried Mandrake myself. But I think for long-term use Debian has too much going for it. <img src=http://www.ezboard.com/images/emoticons/smile.gif ALT=":)"> Installation, while still a little awkward, is rapidly getting better, too. They're working on a gui installation now; I've seen screenshots. Here's <a href="http://www.digital-drip.com/articles/os/debian-1.shtml" target="top">one guy's experience with Debian installation</a>. Oh, and here's a really great place for linux info. <a href="http://www.linuxquestions.org/" target="top">Linuxquestions.org</a> <img src="http://www.xmenclan.org/xmengambit.gif"/> XMEN member Card-carrying DTM OKL Fish-napper Though a program be but three lines long, someday it will have to be maintained.  The Tao of ProgrammingEdited by: <A HREF=http://pub141.ezboard.com/bxmenclan.sho ... ambit>XMEN Gambit</A>  <IMG SRC="http://www.xmenclan.org/images/x.gif" BORDER=0> at: 4/1/03 12:02:24 pm

Jester DTM · Post by **Jester DTM** » Tue Apr 01, 2003 12:29 pm

is there a real benefit to having linux over ms ? <table border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0"><tr><td><a href="http://www.thzclan.com/cam" target="_blank"><img src="http://www.thzclan.com/cam/jester/thb_ccam.jpg" border="0"></a></td><td><img src="http://www.thzclan.com/kirabby/Eebay/spam.gif" align="middle"></td><td><a href="mailto:jester@thzclan.com">996</a> <a href=http://www.thzclan.com>Cerberus of THZ*</a> <a href=http://www.xmenclan.org>XMEN</a> <a href=http://www.dragontalonmercs.com>Dragon Talon Merc</a> <a href=http://www.thzclan.com/hosted/planetside>Allied Tribal Forces</a></td> <td> <img src="http://www.thzclan.com/hosted/jester/si ...

Post by **XMEN Gambit** » Tue Apr 01, 2003 1:08 pm

Let's see... 1) It's free. 2) The source is available. If there's a problem in the code, you can go in and fix it. Or just adjust something you don't like. Or add something new if you think of it. (Of course this only applies to programmers.) 3) There's no "big brother" watching you run Linux. Did you know that when you run Windows Update, a list of all applications installed on your computer is sent to Microsoft? Let's not forget all the new Windows XP activation headaches that happen when you change parts of your hardware too often. 4) Linux is more stable than Windows. It crashes MUCH less often. 5) On an equivalent system, and if you don't pick the wrong GUI to use, Linux will usually run faster. Many distros of Linux run just great on a box that WinXP would choke on - or possibly not even install on. 6) There are a LOT of possible desktop GUIs to use, from slim basic interfaces to huge elaborate eye-candy filled ones. Of course, there are drawbacks as well. 1) Your Windows games probably won't run on Linux. There are ways to get some of them to work, some games are written for Linux, and others have Linux clones, but almost always the "latest and greatest" PC game won't run off the shelf. 2) Sometimes it's difficult to do something in Linux, especially if you're used to Windows doing it for you. In short, the interface is a little different and setup can be a cumbersome and hair-pulling experience. 3) No phone support. You can get it if you want to pay Red Hat or someone like them to do it. And of course you can always call your linux-guru buddy to help you, but you know that's not what I mean. <img src=http://www.ezboard.com/images/emoticons/smile.gif ALT=":)"> 4) Sometimes you'll find devices that have no Linux drivers. These are getting fewer, but if you've got a rare, non-standard piece of hardware, you might not be able to use it. (But you can always write your own driver! <img src=http://www.ezboard.com/images/emoticons/laugh.gif ALT=":lol"> ) <img src="http://www.xmenclan.org/xmengambit.gif"/> XMEN member Card-carrying DTM OKL Fish-napper Though a program be but three lines long, someday it will have to be maintained.  The Tao of ProgrammingEdited by: <A HREF=http://pub141.ezboard.com/bxmenclan.sho ... ambit>XMEN Gambit</A>  <IMG SRC="http://www.xmenclan.org/images/x.gif" BORDER=0> at: 4/1/03 1:10:15 pm

XMEN Ashaman DTM · Post by **XMEN Ashaman DTM** » Tue Apr 01, 2003 3:13 pm

Of course you can have other destops, and file managers for windows too. Litestep for example. ( www.litestep.org ) I tried it and it was nifty, a little strange at first, but damn nifty! <img src=http://www.xmenclan.org/avatars/ashaman2.jpg width=150 align=left> <left><a href=http://www.dragontalonmercs.com>Dragon Talon Mercenary</a> <a href=http://www.xmenclan.org>Member of the XMEN</a> Have a Nice Day! </left>

Gryphon · Post by **Gryphon** » Tue Apr 01, 2003 4:24 pm

<a href="http://www.maximumpc.com/features/featu ... 09-24.html" target="top">Six Hard Drives, 37 OSes</a> <img src=http://www.ezboard.com/images/emoticons/laugh.gif ALT=":lol"> <div align="left"><hr color="#daae52"><a href="http://www.thzclan.com/gryphav.gif/sigs.php" target="_blank"><img border="0" src="http://www.thzclan.com/gryphav.gif"></a> <a href="http://www.thzclan.com/cam" target="_blank"><img src="http://www.thzclan.com/cam/gryphon/thb_ccam.jpg" border="0"></a> <a href="http://www.thzclan.com/tcdb" target="_blank">Tribes Clan DB</a> - List your Tribes1/2 Clan, Guild, Fansite, League, or Script site <a href="http://www.thzclan.com/snooknet" target="_blank">SnookNet Web Design</a> - My web building adventures <a href="http://www.ryanaaron.com/dtm" target="_blank">Dragon Talon Mercenaries</a> - Online Gaming Guild <a href="http://www.planettribes.com" target="_blank">PlanetTribes</a> - Sp3ci@l pr0jekts <a href="http://www.3dactionplanet.com/planetside" target="_blank">PlanetSide Shuttle</a> - Newsie extraordinaire <a href="http://www.thzclan.com/hosted/planetside" target="_blank">Allied Tribal Forces</a> - A PlanetSide alliance started by Tribesplayers<hr color="#daae52"></div>

BlackRider · Post by **BlackRider** » Tue Apr 01, 2003 6:55 pm

Hrmm... well, now I've got 5 CDs w/ Red Hat on them... what's the best way to partition my 30GB HD? I was thinking about using 10 GB for Red Hat (if its supposed to have 2 partitions, would 0.5 and 9.5 GB partitions due? the small one is the swap partition, isn't it?) and how should I partition my drive? Could I fdisk it from w/in XP or do I have to use a DOS boot disk or something? (I don't really mind losing data... I can quickly back up all I want.) I'd probably lose XP all together, but its required for school that I keep a dual boot of XP and Linux. So where/how do I start? <img src=http://www.ezboard.com/images/emoticons/smile.gif ALT=":)"> *edit* Is there a free but trustworthy disk repartitioner that is XP compatible? Can I fdisk from within XP? COLORS!Edited by: <A HREF=http://pub141.ezboard.com/bxmenclan.sho ... ckRider</A> at: 4/1/03 8:04:58 pm

Post by **XMEN Gambit** » Tue Apr 01, 2003 9:11 pm

eek! For partitioning Linux, especially when you haven't made up your mind about a distro, you should create at least three partitions. First partition is a tiny little one for booting. Couple of meg will do. (Bootstrapping has to start withing the first 1024... uh, cylinders? Blocks? I don't remember.) Then your other two partitions are probably a half-gig for swap and then the main one(s). <img src="http://www.xmenclan.org/xmengambit.gif"/> XMEN member Card-carrying DTM OKL Fish-napper Though a program be but three lines long, someday it will have to be maintained.  The Tao of Programming

XMEN Ashaman DTM · Post by **XMEN Ashaman DTM** » Tue Apr 01, 2003 9:23 pm

Read the directions on RedHat's site. OR.... First, you if you are going to have another OS on the drive, you need to partition it using that OS. Then you can install Linux. (I'm assuming you mean a dual boot machine.) If you are doing a dual boot from one single disk, you gotta be careful. Windows won't recognize the NTFS partitioned space without a special DLL file to understand the file system (the NTFS system is for Linux/Unix). If you use one disk with two OS'es, you'll shift/squeeze/reshape the windows partition to allow for room for the NTFS partition. Since you are using RH, you need to actually do 2 NTFS partitions. One is for swapping. This one doesn't need to be too big. 1 GB is too much and 100 MB might not be enough. Something like 300-500 MB should be fine. The other is however big you want to make it. If you have two harddisks, thing are MUCH easier. You just install Windows on one, and Linux on the other. They can be on the same IDE channel. I prefer to have any Linux/Unix installs on the slave drive, and Win2kPro on the master drive. After you figure out how you want to have your partitions setup, you'll want to get ready to install the stuff. If you are going to have windows on it, then you should have Windows already installed. Then plop the first CD .ISO image into your CD ROM drive, and restart your computer. Go into the BIOS section and make sure that your CD ROM is selected as the boot device. Then let the computer boot from the CD ROM. When the thing loads up you'll get to an installation manager. This thing will ask you how you want to partition your drive. The only file system that you can use is NTFS, so no worries about having to choose. Partition it according to what I wrote above. After that, the thing will start to copy files from the first disk. Then the second. And possibly the third. The rest are optional stuff, like a development kit, other window managers, etc. You should be fine with just a basic install. You'll need to switch out the CD's as necessary. When it's all done, the thing might ask some questions and it might not. Just answer them as best as you can. When the thing is reboots, you should reconfigure your BIOS so that it boots from the primary harddisk. Then reboot again and you'll come to a screen where you can select what to boot (a boot manager/loader). Select the Linux partition. It will start to check everything. At this point you'll need to know what hardware you have in your machine, and what your network settings are (domain name, IP, Default Gateway, Subnet Mask). RH should be able to handle DHCP and obtain an IP and subnet mask automatically, but just in case, it's easier to have everything handy. Then you'll come to the start screen or whatever RH has. You'll have the opportunity to choose what desktop manager to use (personally I prefer KDE). Going with the defaults is good if you don't know. Somewhere in there it will ask you to define a root (Super Admin) password. Do NOT LOSE THIS! It's the only way that you can access and change your computer's files without a reformat! It will also allow you to setup as many user accounts as you desire. After all of that, you will be in a Linux environment. You should look at the RH webpage for command-line commands. Certain commands are similar to DOS, or Windows' DOS-like environment. dir is an example. To get help on a certain command, open a window and type: man command for help on the particular command. <img src=http://www.xmenclan.org/avatars/ashaman2.jpg width=150 align=left> <left><a href=http://www.dragontalonmercs.com>Dragon Talon Mercenary</a> <a href=http://www.xmenclan.org>Member of the XMEN</a> Have a Nice Day! </left>

XMEN Ashaman DTM · Post by **XMEN Ashaman DTM** » Tue Apr 01, 2003 9:25 pm

Gambino: doesn't Redhat take car of the boot partition? I know that Mandrake and one other distro (forgot) only allowed me to setup a swap and main partitions. The boot stuff was handled with LILO. <img src=http://www.xmenclan.org/avatars/ashaman2.jpg width=150 align=left> <left><a href=http://www.dragontalonmercs.com>Dragon Talon Mercenary</a> <a href=http://www.xmenclan.org>Member of the XMEN</a> Have a Nice Day! </left>

Which distribution of Linux should I get?

Which distribution of Linux should I get?

Re: Which distribution of Linux should I get?

Re: Which distribution of Linux should I get?

Re: Which distribution of Linux should I get?

Re: Which distribution of Linux should I get?

Re: Which distribution of Linux should I get?

Re: Which distribution of Linux should I get?

Re: Which distribution of Linux should I get?

Re: Which distribution of Linux should I get?

Re: Which distribution of Linux should I get?

Re: Which distribution of Linux should I get?

Re: Which distribution of Linux should I get?

Re: Which distribution of Linux should I get?

Re: Which distribution of Linux should I get?

Re: Which distribution of Linux should I get?