Topic: Should I take the plunge

[Nuli]

Hi Sam,
I currently run XP home but sometime in the future Micosoft will stop supporting it and I don't want to upgrade to Vista. Apart from the high cost, my mates got Vista and he's had nothing but problems with it.
I've been thinking about Linux for sometime and having read various articles about the many flavours you can get. I've also found this area of PC PALS very informative.
Do you have to be techie to use Linux, or could someone like me with little understanding of the inner workings use it without getting into to much trouble?

I use my PC for entertainment playing DVD's and CDs. I convert analogue (Vinyl) into digital (.mp3), store it on a hard drive just to play back on my PC and I dabble with a music studio package and store pictures from my camara and of course surf on-line.
Apart from my soundcard an Auzentech X-Fi Prelude 7.1   the rest of my hardware is standard issue.

I read on here that you can get a copy of Umbutu on DVD and run it straight from the disk to see what's compatable.
Could you point me in the right direction to obtaining a copy of the latest version?

Regards Martin

[sam]

Hi Martin,

Well I personally think everyone should be giving linux a go, and I know its not for everyone. I do feel though that Ubuntu, in particular, is great for anyone who does not want to know about the internals of their computer. It works and has most software setup by default.. though I think more works needs to be done to make the installation of more sophisticated tasks easier.

I'm unsure about your audio hardware though- that could be trick and so could the software, but we can always try and get around that.

I'd actually suggest, as you said, to try a live dvd first - they are quite good but a bit slow to load and run but good to give an operating system a go.  You can get it from: http://www.ubuntu.com/getubuntu/download  - choose the Ubuntu 8.04 LTS Desktop Edition.

Let me know how you get on and we can see what happens.

[Nuli]

Hi Sam,
I'm not adverse to getting my hands dirty in other words I'm willing to dig below the surface of Ubuntu to customise it to my needs, I suppose I just need some good sources of advice and information I can go to and with a bit of trial and error, tailor make an OS that's reliable, secure and free.

My first question.
As I understand it starting your PC with the Ubuntu CD/DVD inserted would give you a live version of Ubuntu to play with and when I shutdown it wouldn't be saved. So If I booted my PC next time without the disk the default system would be my XP home.
Now the link you've provided me is for a download. Surely when I when I open the folder I've download it would load Ubuntu onto my PC.
Would it not overright my current OS XP Home?

I can't wait to give it a go..........Great stuff!
Probably try it on Sunday which will give me a bit of time to have a look at it and let you know how I get on.

Thanks Sam
Regards Martin

[sam]

My first question.
As I understand it starting your PC with the Ubuntu CD/DVD inserted would give you a live version of Ubuntu to play with and when I shutdown it wouldn't be saved. So If I booted my PC next time without the disk the default system would be my XP home.
Now the link you've provided me is for a download. Surely when I when I open the folder I've download it would load Ubuntu onto my PC.
Would it not overright my current OS XP Home?

The file you down load is an image that you will need to burn to a CD/DVD depending on the version you go for. This will not over right anything - its just like any other file but this one contains all the info for the operating system. Once burnt to DVD it will enable you to load up the operating system. There are other ways of doing it but just burning it to disk will be easiest.

Indeed, you just need to stick the disk in and let it do its thing - it will load up the live version of Ubuntu to play around with. This will not change anything on your system and thus nothing will be saved. Though you can always stick in a usb stick if you did create files in it that you wanted to save. The live cd is also the best way to install ubuntu (which depending on what you do could overwrite your OS) - but just play with the live version to begin with.

The CD will take a while to download, so if you have a slow net connection it might be easier to get a copy off a linux magazine...

[Simon]

Am I correct in thinking a torrent download is offered, Sam?  This is usually a bit quicker. 

[sam]

indeed there is... I always forget that since I normally download this type of thing on the uni system.

[Simon]

Is it theoretically possible to have Linux and Windows installed on the same machine, with boot options to choose between the two?

[sam]

Is it theoretically possible to have Linux and Windows installed on the same machine, with boot options to choose between the two?

yep, very much so (I used to do this, but now I run Windows inside linux using a free program called virtual box) - though you generally have to use the linux boot loader

[Nuli]

Hi Sam,
I've been reading up on using Ubuntu for the first time on that link you posted.
I shall down load and burn an (ISO) image onto DVD and try it out.

Forgive my ignorance and it may all become clear when I've down loaded the file,
but do I just burn the file I've down loaded or do I have to look for this "image" in the file?

Thanks for the advice.

Regards Martin

[sam]

so you need to actually use a program that allows you to burn the image to disk - in this mode it will write the individual files.

What disk burning software do you use?

[Nuli]

Hi Sam,
I've been reading the instructions on the link you provided and they point you in the right direction for some free software that will burn an image onto CD.
I've founf that the Ubuntu website does expalin it all, so I've got some reading to do.

Thanks Martin