Wallis Posted August 28, 2006 Share Posted August 28, 2006 Yep, i've decided to make the change. I have a friend who first convinced me that Linux was life and Windows was death, and now he's going to help me jump the linux bandwagon. What finally convinced me was the fact that there was nothing holding me back, I've never played games on this computer, the only type of work I do on this is either word processing or writing Java, which I can do just fine on a Linux. So these are the last days of my windows.... ahem. anyway, to the linux among you: when did you switch, and how did you learn to use it: a little bit at a time, or were you instantly imersed in it, and sink or swim learning? I've yet to decide what distro i would like to have, and i'd like you get ya'll's opinions. -Wallis A right to be heard doesn't include a right to be taken seriously -Hubert Humphrey Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PoyBoy Posted August 28, 2006 Share Posted August 28, 2006 I needed a computer, and found an old one. I didnt have any money for Windows (I was/am a kid) and thought linux would be good. I started with Ubuntu. The forums are very good there, since you should do the berlitz immersion technique, this is very helpful. Hope that helped a bit Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Duelus Posted August 28, 2006 Share Posted August 28, 2006 I had heard talk about it and how great it was so I dived right into redhat about 2 years ago, formatted over windows, I ended up not really like redhat for a desktop so I reinstalled windows, and did some more searching, I found out about debian, installed it and loved, it I read that if your going to learn linux, learn it from CLI before you ever use a GUI, so I only used CLI until I felt confident and started playing around with GUI's on *nix, I still prefer windows as My desktop but linux as a server and as a mythtv box. I love Gentoo and Ubuntu, I hear that ubuntu performs best on laptops though. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
uber_tom Posted August 28, 2006 Share Posted August 28, 2006 i can't remember how i heard about it. i installed my first copy of SuSE 6.0 in late 1999 or early 2000, it took a while to get used to it KDE 1, wasn't that pretty. support was also pretty bad, getting dvd's to play took me about a week and i got a frame rate of about 5 (granted it was a K62 500). i finality had it has my main OS about 2 years ago, although about 3 or 4 months ago i started duel-booting again (on this machine at least) thanks to battlefield 2 and that's all i use windows for now. i can get most of my other games to run with cedega. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cooper Posted August 28, 2006 Share Posted August 28, 2006 The first time I tried to make the switch was out of pure interest. I installed Slackware, toyed with it a bit but never managed to get the XServer to support my piece of shit Trident card. Wiped it and went back to Windows. A few hardware upgrades later left me with a Cyrix 6x86 P150+ which was horrendously unstable under Windows for me. Figured I'd try Slackware again. I bought the InfoMagic 4-CD set that came with some really nice noob-level documentation explaining the basic utilities and how to use VI and stuff. I managed to get X to support my graphics card this time, and more importantly, getting my ISDN card going under it, a disaster under Windows, was a _breeze_. Stuck with Linux from that point on. Never felt any reason to switch back. Work has since come along with a pressing desire on me to run Windows, so they're now paying for my VMWare license. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
metatron Posted August 28, 2006 Share Posted August 28, 2006 At the time I got heavily into computers the Microsoft OS was MS-DOS which wasn’t that popular or good, so I was using BSD as a family friend sold computer equipment to universities and I got a good deal on a new computer. From then on I was running BSD or SunOS up to the mid nineties and I started playing around with Linux which wasn’t a big jump from what I was using. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
T8y8 Posted August 28, 2006 Share Posted August 28, 2006 Could you throw some laptop specs at us? I run Ubuntu on my laptop almost exclusivly, running the 2.6.15-386 kernel, AIGLX + Compiz, IPW2915 wifi. Everything worked with little effort. I've heard Gentoo is great to really learn how linux works, but I don't think I'd recommend it as a first distro. Ubuntu. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
blizz Posted August 28, 2006 Share Posted August 28, 2006 I started with crappy linux distros (cough) and used NetBSD for like 2 years. Very fast and also stable. Well, i got gentoo some day. It was quite funny, although it sucked in many ways, too.. So I found crux and well it's just making he happy all the time. How did i learn *nix? Humm... It took some time. NetBSD was a great thing. Always asked myself "how can I do this", looked it up somewhere (on a manpage or just googled it) and knew it afterwards. The difficulty and the learning curve all depend on the distro you will use. My current distro is rather simple in terms of complexity but it requires knowledge of quite a few things. It's up to you ;-) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wallis Posted August 28, 2006 Author Share Posted August 28, 2006 Laptop specs: Dell Inspiron 1300, 1.40GHz Celeron M, 248Mb RAM, currently w/ Windows XP Home Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jester Posted August 28, 2006 Share Posted August 28, 2006 Ubuntu actually Xubuntu runs extremely smooth on my dell inspiron I love it. 8) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wallis Posted August 29, 2006 Author Share Posted August 29, 2006 Well, Todd suggested Slackware, it is how he learned. However, he was learning on an extra computer, while this is my main, and only. So he gave me a knoppix dvd... and here i am. I like it so far, but i got it about 20 minutes ago. I'm using my touchpad, which is behaving super sensitively, but I'll go fix that... if i can find where that is. lol. I'm loving this already. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FrihD Posted August 30, 2006 Share Posted August 30, 2006 I learned from slackware when a man (a uber linux-user) said me he started with slackware and had no problem with it. Well the transition from windows is harsh, but it's bearable if you have time to spend. Now i use Zenwalk. It's a very light distro based on and compatible with Slackware. It also has quite the same install procedure. I run it on a Dell Lattitude 110L (~1200Mhz ; 256Mo ; intel graphic and intel wifi) and only the wifi card need a "configuration" to work (copy a proprietary firmware). Everything else works quite great out of the box. Is really fast. Well, Zenwalk may be cool for beginners i think. Ubuntu is said to be good too. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
georgia_tech_swagger Posted August 30, 2006 Share Posted August 30, 2006 Do NOT use Slackware for your first distro... it's suicide. It has no package management. Now that might have been fine and dandy for leaning wayyy back, but it's nothing but masochism now. If you want to ease in, use SuSe or (Ku/U/Xu)buntu. They are by far the most friendly. If you really want to learn Linux in depth after that, use Gentoo, because it still has very very good package management, and a terrific set of documentation. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rFayjW98ciLoNQLDZmFRKD Posted August 30, 2006 Share Posted August 30, 2006 Slackware has package management! The built in one is not very good, but it works. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
�ïGGer Posted August 30, 2006 Share Posted August 30, 2006 What a great topic. There are many good reasons for switching from windows to linux. At first making the choice of what distro is good for you is complicated but after that if a person is willing to read and has the disire to learn anything is possible... I collect software so pretty much you name it and I have it, that started as a hobby 10 years ago. Thanks to the people that participate on the Hak.5 forums it makes this thing of ours very enjoyable. Keep up the good work... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
georgia_tech_swagger Posted August 30, 2006 Share Posted August 30, 2006 Slackware has package management! The built in one is not very good, but it works. If it doesn't do dependencies -- it's not package management. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FrihD Posted August 30, 2006 Share Posted August 30, 2006 Slackware uses the "KISS" principle. It's not really hard, it just needs time to learn how works linux, what are libraries etc... Whatever, if a "package" is not avaiable for your distro, or if it has problem you'll certainly have to learn how to compile it yourself. If your xserver hangs, if you have a "crappy problem", it's the very same : you'll have to learn what a Slacker *only* needs to learn. That's why i quite disagree with people who say that slack ain't for noobs. The "full_gui_distro_which_install_everything_in_a_click_and_makes_me_a_linux_gu ru" is a myth. Moreover, those who say "noobs need dependencies" may change their credo and says "how deep in linux system do you want to dive ?".... there are also good noobs, curious who learn fast. It's a kind of prejudice to think otherwise. I'm of those who think that if i can't solve a problem, it's more likely to be my fault than the packager's one. I think that dependencies are good for those who want to try fast a lot of different apps (but slackware, suse or another distro with full install, or knoppix dvd reach the same goal). Just an informative note : Zenwalk also have a packages manager with dep, but it only has a few "certified and well-tested" packages. In fact, a quite dumb sentence can sump-up the problem : "the less you have to know to use your distro, the less you learn". (with its variant : "the less you have to know when your distro fits your needs, the more you'll have to learn when it doesn't"). Here's my distro-scale (based on my own opinion and expercience) : ">" need more knowledge than. LFS > Gentoo > Slackware > Zenwalk > Red Hat = Suse = Mandriva > Ubuntu > Knoppix. Then Wallis, where do you want to start ? what do you want to do with your comp ? Do you prefer tutorials with deep explanations or tutorials with some screenshot where the button to click is circled ? Then we can tell you what you need. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
blizz Posted August 30, 2006 Share Posted August 30, 2006 Slackware uses the "KISS" principle. It's not really hard, it just needs time to learn how works linux, what are libraries etc... Same goes for Crux.. I didn't like Slackware when i used it.. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wallis Posted August 31, 2006 Author Share Posted August 31, 2006 Thank you for all of the help guys. I am very eager to learn linux inside and out, however I'm just starting school right now so I don't have so much time. From the very beginning I'll need to be able to type up documents and spreadsheets and have internet access. After that, I'd love to have the more in depth tutorials that I can read in my spare time (haha). And then something else where I can go when i'm saying to my self "oh crap what did i just do?" Perhaps I should go get a book or something that I can keep on the desk at all times. Well, the point is...um...I'd be happy with Oo and Opera. And gaim. and gimp. and a media player. Other than that... something I can learn in my free time, but still use it when i first get it. If thats even possible. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
VaKo Posted August 31, 2006 Share Posted August 31, 2006 Basically Linux is a giant blackhole that will suck in all your free time as you spend hours configuring the simplest thing... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PoyBoy Posted August 31, 2006 Share Posted August 31, 2006 Not if you have SuSE 10.1!!!! Easy to configure with YaST as long as you dont try to do it command line unless you know how to fix YaST when it borks Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wallis Posted August 31, 2006 Author Share Posted August 31, 2006 Basically Linux is a giant blackhole that will suck in all your free time as you spend hours configuring the simplest thing... Well, good thing I quit Model UN. Resolved: All time formerly spent researching for Model UN will now be spent learning Linux. And doing my chemistry labs...speaking of which...I should be writing up a report for one now. Damn. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PoyBoy Posted August 31, 2006 Share Posted August 31, 2006 And doing my chemistry labs...speaking of which...I should be writing up a report for one now. Damn. I know the feeling well. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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