Total Newbie question

[Jim Smith]

Been using Atari's, Mac's, Wintels for years, but know nothing about Linux. But I am SICK of Windows and Micro$oft. So I am seriously considering switching to Linux.

My question is, will it run existing software and, if so, what? Currently, I have a Toshiba laptop, Satellite 1905-S301 with a 1.96 GHZ Pentium 4, 762 MB RAM, a RW/CD-DVD and am on a LAN with another Win XP system.

Also, I am in Brasil where technical support is either always wrong or non-existant.

Am I dead in the water, or is there hope to have a MS-free zone here?

Thanks,

Jim Smith

[krusher]

Depends what you want to run...
http://www.winehq.com/

Major linux distros include star office.
Or, get it free here:
http://www.sun.com/products-n-soluti...taroffice.html

If it wasn't for the games, I would have switched completely a long time ago.

[ByteBack]

For a Linux newbie I recommend Linspire. Linspire has a great forum for Linux and Linspire newbies.

Now regarding running Windows applications in Linux....no!

There is software out there (like Wine) that claims to run Windows software. From my experiance, it doesn't work!

But you can find Linux alternatives for most of your software needs.

If you have any other questions, please don't hesitate to join the Linspire forums.


Cheers!

[braindead]

Like Byteback said wine is "suppose to work" but in most cases doesn't. I use Mandrake 10 and think it's great, once you get used to it. I't a awful lot like windows and getting easier to use all the time. All your documentation is free, software, is free, and advice, is free. It still isn't quite windows yet but getting there in leaps and bounds. That's the only operation software that I have on my laptop and have no problem doing everything the same as windows, just not with the same software programs. I have it networked at home and can see all the other windows computers without any problems. Just can't open windows programs. Can open and use word and excell using open office, another free program, same as ms office,,,not $400.00 to buy.

[DMC]

Since you are a complety new, I suggest a non writeable Linux to his hard drive. Therefore, I suggest Knoppix, I am a big fan of this for people trying to do 1 thing, or learning Linux. I then would switch to Slackware. I can't even get wine to work.

[mjman]

These are all good suggestions. Mandrake, Slackware, and Suse are all good distros. I personally run a dual boot with Win XP and Fedora Core 2 (Fedora Core 3 is to be released on monday). In order to get a feel for linux, i tried out the knoppix 3.7 Live CD. i believe that Suse also has a live CD. That will let you try it out without committing.
The only programs that I've found are hard to find for linux are graphic arts programs, although i recently read that Maya has been released for linux, as well as a few other small freeware programs. If you're interested in scientific programs, many are written for linux, and most are free. That is the main reason I decided to install FC.

[s7p9a2m4]

I've tried most of the distros and the only one I keep using is Mandrake.