Tips on moving to Linux?

[CritAnime]

That was my thought exactly.  My system is only a P4 with 3GB RAM. Apparently you can download Microsoft's Virtual Machine 2007 and use it in Windows XP, but I don't think a VM is a practical option for me with this system.  I'll probably either just make a true partition when I'm ready or install on a USB stick (with the intention of later moving it to a real hard drive partition).

I can't install a dedicated hard drive for Linux because my system already has drives on all the IDE channels/pairs.

Virtual Box is a free VM program. It works well and you may just get away with VM'ing it rather than spending money and time on Microsofts own VM stuff. The amount of RAM will work because I am sure that the lightweight Lubuntu uses roughly 300-500mb when fully loaded.

If you want to install Lubuntu to a USB stick then check out this thread. You will need at the very least a 4gb USB stick. Or if you have a spare USB physical drive then even better. Just remember that performance might be slightly impacted due to read and write speeds. And with the amount of RAM you have I would highly suggest using a Swap partition.

Just a quick question. How are you planning on connecting the system to the net? Is it on Wi-Fi or hard wired?

[Ral-Clan]

Virtual Box is a free VM program. It works well and you may just get away with VM'ing it rather than spending money and time on Microsofts own VM stuff.

If you want to install Lubuntu to a USB stick then check out this thread. You will need at the very least a 4gb USB stick. Or if you have a spare USB physical drive then even better. Just remember that performance might be slightly impacted due to read and write speeds.

Justa quick question. How are you planning on connecting the system to the net? Is it on Wi-Fi or hard wired?

Hi! Well, my desktop is wired - and I had the internet going straight from the Lubunto live CD automatically.  That was neat.

I do have an XP laptop used by the rest of the family for average day-to-day stuff.  If my Linux experience is positive I could see installing Linux on that one day.  It of course is wireless.

Why, is wireless networking a particular tricky thing with Linux?

[CritAnime]

Hi! Well, my desktop is wired - and I had the internet going straight from the Lubunto live CD automatically.  That was neat.

I do have an XP laptop used by the rest of the family for average day-to-day stuff.  If my Linux experience is positive I could see installing Linux on that one day.  It of course is wireless.

Why, is wireless networking a particular tricky thing with Linux?

it's down to the chipsets that manufacturers use. Some use a common chipset which have freely available drivers (oddly enough these tend to be the cheaper cards and such), so they can be used within the Linux kernel without issue. If a manufacturer uses their own chipsets and closed srouce drivers then its a case of finding out of the manufacturer is supporting Linux.

My main issue with Linux has always been with wireless networking and finding a adapter/card that worked. I had a crappy old belkin adapter for years but it crapped out and I ended up buying some of those plug into a socket lan things.

As a side note all this Linux talk has got me to log into my Linux partition which I havent touched in a while because I have been using a Cisco netowrk simulator for learning CCNA. It was way outdated lol. I was using Ubuntu 13.04 and it is now at 13.10. But a simple

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sudo apt-get dist-upgradesorted that lol.

[ElPolloDiabl]

@ral-clan

Don't bother with the MS Virtual Machine. It is rubbish, it can only emulate very basic things.
Oracle VM is very advanced and fun to play with. You can fiddle around and not break anything.

[CritAnime]

@ral-clan

Don't bother with the MS Virtual Machine. It is rubbish, it can only emulate very basic things.
Oracle VM is very advanced and fun to play with. You can fiddle around and not break anything.

Yup. MS VM is only good if you are going to be running just Windows on a basic level. I have used it to host Win 98 on occasion. Virtual Box is much more feature rich. However I am concious of the limitations of the host.

Seems the more I think about it the more that installing to USB might be a more sound idea.

[Tenacious]

...One of the coolest ones is Knoppix...

This was my first Linux experience years ago - loved it!  Klaus Knopper was an Amiga user, he still pays homage to the Amiga's Startup-Sequence while booting Knoppix.  It also moves easily with a script to a bootable thumb drive and is very usable from there (Great way to bypass Windows spyware ).  My only bitch: It should be simple to turn OFF Compiz Fusion.  It isn't.  Better yet, I wish it weren't included.

One of the cleanest and most intuitive distros I've tried is Debian 6 (uses classic Gnome2).

[CritAnime]

My gateway Linux experience was with Mandrake 7.2 Power Pack Deluxe. Came on a whopping 7 cd's back in 2000 and needed 5gb for a total install. It was a beast.

Found a review http://www.linuxplanet.com/linuxplanet/reviews/2567/1

The installer for this was a bit of a learning curve. It had a "graphical" installer. But by graphical it meant a cli with some colours and boxes. Think installing something on DOS. So it was a real pain the backside especially when you had to deal with the Mandrake specific installer stuff. But once I had it running it was a beast.

I remember I had to leech the net connection at college to get software for it. It came with a package manager called RPMDrake. Made life easier but if I got a program that needed dependencies I didn't have then I could do jack all about it. Which is why I invested in a external V92 modem running at a blistering 56.6kbs. Then I got one of these USB ADSL things, at the start of the ADSl boom.



That was a pain to get working.

I seem to recall mine coming with KDE 2 as the default window manager.

[haywirepc]

I think the best advice for anyone moving to linux is that first and foremost, spend some time learning getting around and launching programs. Next, spend some time finding replacements for things you used in your old system. (and installing them) There are plenty of websites which you can visit that show common replacements for windows programs.

Chrome and firefox are more of less the same accross linux/osx/windows now, so thats no problem...

The problem some have is that there simply IS no decent replacement for some things... Like if your used to final cut forget the linux video editors they are %&$#?@!%&$#?@!%&$#?@!%&$#?@! in comparison, okay for basic stuff but forget doing serious projects. This is thankfully starting to change now, nice things on the horizon.

I suggest that most people dual boot. Eventually, you may find yourself only rebooting for those few apps you really can't find good replacements for, which are very few I think... Me? I still reboot to play games and use my audio/video editors of choice. But more and more I am linux almost all the time. Its just a joy to use compared to the alternatives, but then I like customizing things and having more control.

Me? I love being able to run windows/dos and amiga apps all on the same box. Wine is good for many things, dosbox and uae run anything dos or amiga pretty great...

Wine? Well some things just don't run, so I reboot to run those things...

[Bif]

Didn't read the whole thread but my advice would be to get whatever Linux you want running off a USB stick first if you can. This way you can see if it even works as well as you like before you go permanently messing with your partitions or whatever. This is really about the same thing as dual booting because if you want to boot XP, remove/deselect USB, if you want Linux boot off of USB. I've been running Linux Mint off of USB for about 6 months now and have no immediate plans to even install it on the HD as I don't really see any advantage to that yet. I can still access all the data on my HD partition anyway. If I want to try some other Linux distro I'll throw it on another USB and away I go, nothing to even mess with if I toss my previous distro away.

I did previously try Linux distributions over the many years but I never had much luck due to hardware incompatibilities. This was the first distribution that ran on a computer I have with no problems. So for me running Linux has a lot to do with will it actually work to your satisfaction, at least with USB drives it's pretty painless to try for a while.

[CritAnime]

I have already mentioned this but find some cheat sheets. One for general Linux commands then one for your specific distribution. Having cheat sheets to hand are mega handy. I have one for Linux that I have had for years, I laminated it to keep it safe, and a Ubuntu specific and Debian Specific one I update every so often. One of the greatest things you can learn is how to use the Terminal. And a physical cheat sheet always helped me.

[Duce]

Good thing about Linux is most of the distros either have live cd variants or fairly easy VM solutions to give them a whirl rather than having to do a "real" install of them.

I'm partial to Ubuntu these days just due to ease of use, but there's a fair portion of the community that swore off Ubuntu when they made it more "windows like" UI wise a few stages back.  If I used Linux more, I'd probably use something other than Ubuntu, though.  I just use it mainly due to ease of use right out of the box, it's very familiar feeling to a Windows user like myself.

Personally, I found that a good thing.  I work in the PC trade as a part time living, and get a lot of old hand me down, XP era PC's that I have no use for.  I generally donate them to people that can use them, non profits and such and such people generally have no issues picking up Ubuntu's learning curve if they have some Windows experience.  It's not for everyone, though.

Mint is very nice as well, as is Puppy Linux.  Puppy has a very low overhead and works just great on older boxes, as does Slack.

[Ral-Clan]

Yup. MS VM is only good if you are going to be running just Windows on a basic level. I have used it to host Win 98 on occasion. Virtual Box is much more feature rich. However I am concious of the limitations of the host.

Seems the more I think about it the more that installing to USB might be a more sound idea.

A question about virtual machines:

Lets say you are running Linux, and have a PCI card (or other hardware) installed for which Linux has no drivers (so useless from within Linux). Then you set up a Virtual Machine running Windows XP, and in that virtual machine there are drivers for that PCI card. Can the PCI card be used normally from within that Virtual Machine?

I ask this because I have a semi-pro audio card and graphics tablet for which there might not be Linux drivers.  I probably will go dual-boot instaed of VM, but just wanted to get an answer on this question first.

Thanks.

[ElPolloDiabl]

No. Everything needs to be on the host. Only CD drives etc. can be added separate.

[desiv]

No. Everything needs to be on the host. Only CD drives etc. can be added separate.

Actually, kind of..  If you use XEN as your hypervisor (VM)
http://wiki.xen.org/wiki/Xen_PCI_Passthrough

But it's (actually, all of XEN) for the pretty advanced admin.  Not an end user friendly option.  ;-)

desiv

[persia]

I'm thinking building a SteamOS box for one of my TVs.  It has fairly minimal needs.  

http://www.pcworld.com/article/2095494/how-to-build-your-own-steam-machine-today-for-560.html

[Kuya Marc]

Hello World!

This thread is something I could not avoid posting in...

In regards to the Linux operating system... I have been working Linux since July 1997. It started off as a profession, now it's just a hobby of mine.

As for OS wars, like Windows vs. Linux, I no longer do those.

My focus is productivity, however, I'm retired due to medical disabilities, and since 2014 has started, I'm focusing on simplicity for a less stressful computing environment.

My primary computer, the ailing Compaq Presario M2000 laptop, has been running Windows 7 Starter Edition since last May 2013, as a financial birthday gift from my parents in USA. I used to dual-boot Linux on it, but had to recent stop doing it because my laptop is now on death row.

I have two netbooks running Debian 8 "Jessie" Linux: The ASUS Eee PC 2G Surf (700MHz Intel) and the Neo eXplore II (900MHz Intel). Both netbooks are configured with FS-UAE & FS-UAE-LAUNCHER, as I'm porting all systems from Amiga Forever Plus Edition into them, to "substitute" use of the Amiga Forever Player in Windows. I'm manually decoding RP9 files for use with FS-UAE-LAUNCHER.

I have two System-on-a-Chip (SoC) computers running Linux: BeagleBone Black (headless, Debian 8 "Jessie") and Raspberry Pi (LXDE, Raspbian 7 "Wheezy").

My Android Tablet PC is the Samsung Galaxy Tab 3. Yes, it has Amiga Forever Essentials installed. It also has JuiceSSH Pro installed for servicing my Linux computers via the command-line interface.

In July 1997, when I first learned Red Hat & Slackware Linux, I learned Linux strictly via the command-line interface (CLI). At that time, I was used to using Sun Solaris (UNIX) and I was a MCP (Microsoft Certified Professional).

Since 1989, the C programming language has been my preferred programming language. Back then, I was porting C source code from IBM PCs & Apple Macs into Amiga 500. Last year, I re-discovered how to compile C source code in an emulated Amiga 500.

In 2010, I entered embedded systems development and my veteran experience with the C programming language has proved extremely useful. I've programmed Atmel 8051/AVR/ARM, Microchip PIC, or others. When it comes to Amiga via emulation, I plan on working my embedded projects.

Because of the Say speech synthesizer of the Amiga 500 I had 25 years ago, one of my extraordinary hobbies became phoneme-to-speech speech synthesis. Now, I work SpeakJet speech synthesis as a specialized hobby. When I have noticed the Serial Port panel in Amiga's system's folder, I do have some ideas for Amiga speech synthesis via SpeakJet.

Now it is 2014 and my medical disabilities are severely affecting all of my computer work. I do not know how much longer I can keep my "supergeek" status, but retirement is just around the corner for me. I can no longer repair computers. Arthritis is now in my hands and fingers.

My statement is, "It does not matter what operating system you use, just as long as you make something from it. Because, when your human body becomes weak and/or disabled, you have accomplishments to talk about."