On Saturday 02 April 2005 19:28, Chris BONDE wrote: > Christian Einfeldt > > I am planning on updating my machine. I have a 2000 Jan one. I > have been thinking of having 'dual boot', that is, Windoze XP > home and a Linux variety. However, there appears to be more > varieties than enough. What are people using, what is a stable > one, and why would I want to do such to mix up this poor old > mind?
Hi Chris, This is a good question, or rather, two good questions. I am an attorney who is a relatively simple end user. So I certainly appreciate your concern about trying novel things that might be confusing. I'll answer your second question first. Why would you want to do a dual boot? As much as I like Linux and open source, I would say that the answer to your question is maybe you DON'T want to do a dual boot at all, unless you have a good Linux Users Group (LUG, for short) near you to help you out; or unless you want to learn a lot of new stuff about computers. Learning to use Linux is helpful for several reasons. It doesn't get viruses, really. Theoretically, I have heard that there are viruses for Linux out there, but Linux has so many built in defenses, it's hard for a virus to spread rapidly as with Windows, so in four years of using Linux on multiple computers all connected to the Internet, I have never gotten a virus. Another good reason to use Linux is that it is more stable and doesn't crash. Occasionally, I have had a problem with my desktop crashing, but that is not really Linux crashing, that is the desktop. So it is quicker to reboot, because you only have to reboot the desktop, which is much faster than rebooting a whole operating system. Another good reason to move to Linux is that there is lots of good free software available for you, and you don't have to pay for it, unless you need special services, such as helping you to install stuff. There is a very, very simple Linux distribution (called a "distro" for short) called Linspire, that has a special feature called Click n Run (CNR for short) which lets you easily install new software. But that distro won't let you dual boot, so you would have to move completely over to Linspire Linux. I have a dual boot on my notebook computer. The reason that I have a dual boot is that Windows requires updates too frequently, Windows get viruses, easily, and all the other stuff I mentioned above. So I decided that rather than risk Windows getting a virus, I just installed SuSE 9.2. SuSE, like Linspire, will do just about everything you need to do as easily as Windows. The difference is that Linspire is much, much easier to install alone, but SuSE will allow you to do a dual boot, which Linspire will not. To answer your first question, about which distro is best for dual booting, my vote is SuSE. If you want to move completely over to Linux, I would recommend going to Walmart on line and looking for a Linspire computer. I have found that Linspire has a very tight, helpful community, which is key to using any kind of computer. Plus Linspire has CNR, which is very easy to install stuff. Some people say that Linspire is a bit more expensive than the other distros, but IMHO, that is false. I usually spend about $50.00 USD per year for SuSE Linux upgrades. (All figures here are in US dollars). Linspire's CNR service is $50.00 per year. For $89.00, you can get the newest Linspire PLUS a year's worth of CNR service. SuSE pro (don't get the home version) costs $89.00, too, but it's installer is more complicated. If you are confident with computers, there are lots of free Linux distros. Xandros has an update service like Linspire, and they are also about $50.00 per year for that service, but I *think* that Xandros is free. The only reason that I haven't used Xandros is that I just fell into using Linspire because there is a store in Canda, called Sub500.com, which sells pre-configured Linspire notebooks, and so it was easy to buy a Linspire notebook pre-configured. Other good, free, easy to use distros include Mepis, which is very easy to install (don't know about dual boot) and Knoppix (I also don't know about dual boot there). My dual boot on my IBM thinkpad with SuSE Linux and Windows was put there by a tech friend of mine who does that kind of thing for a living with a law firm. So I suggest that the best thing to do is to join a local LUG (Linux Users Group) or hang out on the Linspire forum or some other distro's forum, and see what distro you like best. But don't attempt to do the dual boot yourself. You will probably get frustrated, and then you will get a bad picture of Linux. It's better to either stick with Windows (yuk); or back up all of your data and install Linpsire 5.0 over Windows; or go to Walmart or Sub500.com and consider buying a Linspire 5.0 computer. BTW, don't get Linspire if you don't have at least DSL. If you just have dial up, you will get frustrated with Linspire, because it will take too long to download stuff. I'm a simple end user, and I moved over to Linux, and I'm really glad that I did, but I wouldn't have been able to do it without the help of friends. Fortunately, the open source community is very willing to help you move over to GNU/Linux. BTW, although some people call Linux just Linux, the full name of Linux is GNU/Linux, because a big chunk of the operating system is actually GNU, which is a repeating name (recursive acronym) called GNU's not unix. That whole thing is confusing to lots of people, so many people just call the whole operating system Linux, although you could say that's technically incorrect. It really depends on whom your talking to. > > Chris > > > Hi James, > > > > Even though most users of OpenOffice.org (OOo for short) run > > Windows, it seems that most of the users on this list are > > running Linux. That might be why you haven't gotten any > > response, other than Daniel Carrera suggesting Linux, which > > actually probably is a good idea. > > > > So sorry that no one has gotten back to you. I have cc'd Chad > > Smith, who uses Windows more than lots of others on this list, > > and he might know. > > > > Good luck.
