What version of linux do you use and why you like it.

[spiderman2k1]

I'm new to linux and want to know what version you like I heard alot of Good about REDHAT and Debian and Mandrake and SuSE linux. I really like Virtual PC that let's you try out a OS in windows 2000. virtaul PC you just install it and then install any OS in a folder. If Red Hat is for me I will then format mat one of my drive's to do a real install of Linux. I also heard Linux does not like NTFS but has no problem with fat 32. Does linux have some thing like NTFS we all know fat 32 it some what crappy. Also how in Lindow's?

[disturbed1]

I switch between Suse and Slackware. I don't think one is better than the other, it just depends on which distro's control pannels, custom scripts, and package management you can get used too. Mandrake is a nice newbee linux.

I don't use Linux full time yet. But I have a couple of PC set up for word processing, art work, and general internet that run only Linux. All of my multimedia production computers still run a flavor of Windows, for the time being. I also run a Linux box as a router, firewall, print and music server.

Linux can read NTFS, but writing to NTFS isn't stable. I tend to just use xfs. Link about journaled file systems http://www.linuxgazette.com/issue55/florido.html

General distro comparisons http://www.distrowatch.com

I won't comment about Lindows

[subclubkid]

I just installed Mandrake the other day on a spare computer I had, and I like it so far. I'm not a full time Linux user yet, there is alot to relearn. It installed easy and set up was just about as easy as Windows.

I cant really offer a useful opinion, but I like Madrake.

[Doggiedaddy]

RedHat

Dd

[gmatov]

Spiderman,
If you want to try Linux without partitioning, formatting, etc, try going to SuSE.com. You will be able to DL an evaluation version of SuSE 8.1.
Burn the ISO image to disk, "Burn Image" in Nero, and set your BIOS to boot from CDROM.
Reboot with the CD in the player. It will install minimal files to the C:\ drive, and allow you to play with it.
You don't have to partition and format.
Play with it. If you like the idea of a free operating system, free in that no-one owns it, ask again, after you see what it is and how it works.
Most of the distributions are similar, as they all have access to the same kernel, same drivers, same applications, most, but not all, use RPM, the Redhat Package Manager for installation.
If you're asking about it, I think you're ready to try it.
One warning: if you don't have a hi-speed connection, start the DL when you go an vacation. It's approx. 650 megabytes. Took me 2 hours or so with cable. I also DL'd Caldera, Redhat, Turbolinux, Mandrake, most at the same time, about 12 CDRs full. Took overnight, some 7 or 8 gigs.

Good luck, and enjoy.

George

[sterno]

The native filesystem for Linux is usually ext2 (or ext3, now). Standard UNIX-style filesystems like those have more in common with NTFS than with FAT32. Linux can read and write FAT32 just fine, but it can only be installed to FAT32 by using an ugly hack like UMSDOS (which isn't even supported by all distributions) or using a big "container" file instead of a real partition. Linux can read NTFS, but can't safely write to it.

Red Hat and Mandrake are good for newbies, if you can't manage to get them installed and initially set up you probably can't get anything else set up either. I'm not sure how SuSE compares to those two, but if you're thinking about learning one so that you can help out with Linux at work (or in any business setting) Red Hat and SuSE are the best choices because they're usually officially supported by commercial vendors like IBM and Oracle. Mandrake is also commonly supported, since it's really just a Red Hat clone.

Debian is a good, solid distribution. It has much more stringent quality control than the Red Hat derivatives do, so you'll see fewer bugs and security holes. You need more basic knowledge to get started with Debian than with Red Hat, etc. because it doesn't do as much hand-holding. However, the software installation system is much better than RPM (used by Red Hat, SuSE, and the derivatives) - part of it has actually been adapted to work with RPM by some of the RPM-based distributions because it's so reliable and easy to use.

Slackware is a good choice if you're a do-it-yourself person and want to learn a lot. It's also much closer to traditional/commercial UNIX than the others. You don't get fancy packaging systems, but you also don't get all sorts of fancy hand-holding front-ends that do strange things behind the scenes and get in your way when you try to do something they didn't expect people to need. That's part of why I use Slackware - I've used UNIX for years, I know what I'm doing, and I hate the weird non-standard stuff that Red Hat and (to a lesser extent) Debian use. Don't get me wrong, I'm very much in favor of improving the ease of administration and use of UNIX, but a lot of the changes actually make things harder for those of us who really know server administration.

[gmatov]

Sterno,
So, do you think he should try the SuSE CD bootable version, or no?
No format or partitioning, and I have had just so many people tell me they have tried, and can't get it to run for them, or they forgot to set up or just forgot, period, their passwords..
Worth trying.

George

[spiderman2k1]

Thanks guy's for the help. What I did was I install Virtual PC in windows 2000 and then installed REDHAT 9. This is the same way how MAC people run windows on a MAC. It's just a emulator but work's very well. I download OPERA but have a hard time try tring to install it i'm goiing to buy LINUX for dummies. I plan on installing other version of LINUX and give them a werl. Also you can use VMwear also does the same thing as Virtual PC.

[spiderman2k1]

Here's a pic of Windows 2000 and REDHAT 9 running in Virtual PC

[courtrrb]

I've tried RH, Suse, Storm, Caldera and Mandrake(The most GUI friendyl). I keep coming back To Mandrake every time. It is the easist by far. If your coming from MS Windows Mandrake is they way to go. It has more windows like features and the stabilty if Linux, If you do a search for the Penguin Liberation front you can get all the video editing software that you need and is easy to setup.

[timmmay]

I've tried Mandrake, Redhat, Slackware, and Lycoris.. I keep coming back to windows, especially for video editing/dvd authoring. I still fart around with Slackware as my web, file, and music server though.

[txpharoah]

I like Redhat, but then again, my only interest in Linux is to play around and some minor Internet work. It has great games. Only place I can find a decent version of TRON!

Runs on an amazingly fast P166.

[gmatov]

txpharoah,

Do you mean runs amazingly fast on a P166?
Then again, maybe not.

[txpharoah]

txpharoah, Do you mean runs amazingly fast on a P166? Then again, maybe not.

Same difference. It's a toy to me. Too slow for any real work.

[mats.hogberg]

Using Mandrake 9.1 right now - My firewall runs RedHat 6.2
DVD::RIP is a great tool for ripping DVDs to AVI/(S)VCD, but the mpeg 1/2 encoding is a bit slow (transcode/mjpegtools), compared to what you're used to with TMPGEnc, CCE, MainConcept... But I'd say it's more stable than the Windows counter parts, and quality wise at least equal.
Previous experiences are RH, Corel(!) and earlier versions of Mandrake. From my perspective, there's not much difference between RH and Mandrake.
The Gentoo dist seems popular, and has some nice features for installing new soft.

/Mats

[MrKGB]

Knoppix is one more distribution which runs from CD and has full blown X, KDE, emacs, etc :
http://www.knoppix.org/
The only problem is that it forgets all your changes after reboot

[MrKGB]

BTW, I was playing recently with RedHat 9 and first installed it under VirtualPC, it took about 2 hours.
Then installed it properly, into partition, it took 20 min.
So it looks like VirtualPC really slows down the system.

[DarkShadow]

I personally prefer "Linux From Scratch" because when done correctly is amazinly fast compared to any other distro and I have tried a couple.
Redhat Mandrake Slackware the latter is what I suggest for most people since it is faster then the bloated distros like Redhat, Mandrake

[lordsmurf]

I'm attempting to run WinLinux 2003 from WinME, but after reboot, it just hangs. I'm not using LiLo, as I just want to TRY OUT the Linux environment, mainly for games and some other freebies I like to use.

Virtual PC for PC huh? I'll look into that.

[gmatov]

Smurf,
Did you look waaaay above? DL the SuSe eval CD iso, burn as an image and boot from CD. Minimal files written to HDD, run from the CD. Try it, you don;t like it, you haven't partitioned, formatted, etc. Will not be true, but give you the taste.

[d4n13l]

I use Linux From Scratch - www.linuxfromscratch.org - you have to compile every single package from source, so it takes like a day just to get a simple skeleton of a system up and running. It's a lot of work, but when you get there, it's worth the effort. It also offers a great learning experience. My other distro of choice would be Gentoo, basically like LFS, only automated. :)

[Gazorgan]

Latest Redhat because I have a (max speed) local mirror that always has it. 5 disks (2 of apps) makes it pretty slick out of the 'box' so to speak. Not that I actually 'do' anything with it mind you, it's jsut a test platform on a PII 333. My Athlon has removeable drives....so it takes about 2 minutes to 'linux' it :P I guees technically I have 2 linux boxes then.

[mrbass]

I used linux as my desktop at home and at work for one year (summer 2000 to summer 2001 I think it was). I gave up using for my main desktop. I helped with many gpl projects, etc. but it took and is taking way longer than I predicted. Anyway I've been using it for years at work for servers. File server, print server, dhcpd server, email server, NAT (before nat firewalls came out), etc. It's absolutely awesome and has saves us hundeds of thousands of dollars at work. We use RedHat...I've tried Debian, Mandrake, ...oh yea we do use e-smith.org distro for our print server. It's a nice spin off of redhat.

[kenmo]

I like Mandrake. It's the easiest os I've ever installed. I replaced my Netware 5.1 server with Linux-Samba and have not looked back or regreted it yet !

[AzNSpiKeys]

Mandrake Linux 9.2 is out http://www.mandrakelinux.com/en/9.2/features/

what do you guys think about the new version?

[sammie]

Like others, I just kind of play around with an old box that isn't much good for anything else. I used to like Corel, which was a good Debian distro. They got out of the business, but I think someone else picked it up. Now I kind of bounce back and forth between Redhat and Mandrake when I have the time.

As an aside, I started using Linux because my wife kept killing my WinTel box. She used to program Cobol and could do just fine on an IBM mainframe, just couldn't handle the Windows GUI. All she did was surf the net and wordprocessing so I set up a Corel Linux box running one of the freebie office suites and Netscape. She worked with that for almost 2 years and never killed it once and rarely had to ask for help. A great system, just wish there were more progs for it.

I think several of us here would like to "experiment" setting up a kind of Linux Media Appliance. Recall a thread a while back where someone was trying to use one of the small Shuttle micro PCs that was interesting. If there is a Linux multimedia guru here, a beginers tutorial would probably be well recieved and appreciated. I'm old school Unix and can do all sorts of network/internet stuff in Linux, but typically can't get a sound card to work so I'd love to hear from those who can.

[sterno]

If there is a Linux multimedia guru here, a beginers tutorial would probably be well recieved and appreciated. I'm old school Unix and can do all sorts of network/internet stuff in Linux, but typically can't get a sound card to work so I'd love to hear from those who can.

There are actually a lot of newbie guides out there, but the problem is that there are also so many different ways to do it and they change faster than people can update their documentation. ALSA vs. OSS, kernel 2.2 vs. 2.4 vs. 2.6, different XFree86 versions, official drivers vs. alternate 3rd-party drivers vs. vendor-supplied drivers, etc. Some hardware is only supported by certain combinations of those, some you can take your pick.

[FOO]

The ONLY problem with linux is that
the rich environment of applications is somewhat lacking
for general users. It is getting better, slowly. I HATE windoze
because it's SECRET. something screws up and there's no hope.
Linux has Source , and it wasn't designed to be secret.

NOBODY with any sense runs wondoze servers , It's all Apache.

[dvdhelpr]

i'd like linux to support NTFS and or be able to run windows applications. i have to switch soon from 2000 as microscum are cutting it off but i will hold on. XP doesn't intrest me in the slightest. longhorn is linux with a microsoft logo.

[courtrrb]

I've upgraded my machine to MDK9.2 and don't reget it at all. I keep a WinXp machine around for video capture ONLY a 1.2G Duron with a 4G hd and 256Mem. All my video editing and DVD Authoring is done on my main MDK Linux Box. With Winex3 their is a lot if windows video editing sw that runs perfect one like TMPGEnc, mpeg-vcr and Virtualdub(Edit only). I only use these if I can't use a Linux native like Avidemux2 or Cinelerra. Once I can get great video captures on Linux I will remove Xp from my machine and will Be M$ free.