Please More Info Please

[barks]

hi all,
i have used most windows versions for the last 25 years!
why would i choose to move to linux?
is it the free thing and that bill has enough cash?
or is it actually better?

i have read the sticky and done the poll.
but what i want to know is what is the best linux for me IF :-

i love a slick gui
i want a fast os
i have a laptop - p4 2.6ghz 512mb ram
i know a fair bit about stuff, (c++, cisco)
i like the idea of free and sharing

is linux really safe?
what virus software should i use
i know you will have done this before but the poll states newbie, old stuff, server but not fast laptop use?

PLEASE REPLY TO ME

[oz]

Welcome to the forums, barks!

I'll try to answer your questions in the order presented:

Because you want to.
If you want it to be.
If it's better for you, then it's better.

Check the link in my signature for lot of info about Linux and "which distro"?

Safer than Windows.
I don't use any.

Hope this helps...

oz

[barks]

are you telling me you dont use any anti virus software?
if so why?

anyhow what do you recommend?
im swayed to debian, suse, ubuntu
which of these will run the fatest on my laptop?

1 last question - if i use a partition on my hdd and i have to keep xp for work ect, is it posible for a virus to infect the other os's? or will an xp virus not see the linux partition and vise versa?
thanks

[BillieJean]

hello.

well my suggestion is, just try it. with live cd's (insert and boot into the full desktop) that many distros offer today you really have nothing to loose.

now to questions:
i've been using linux for 1 year now and haven't got ANY slowdowns, no speed/security instability, whatsoever. not a single virus/spyware, and without usage of ANY antivirus software. and needing no AV makes your system run much faster, especially on older machines. i had a few system crashes though, but i believe that it was my fault. well that's nothing compared to the number of system crashes i had with windows anyway. i can assure you that linux is much safer than windows.

better or not, i'll put it this way - imo, linux IS better. with so much choice of desktop environments, window managers, applications and customizations, you can really build yourself a dream system, even without any special computer knowledge. there's freedom of choosing that windows just doesn't offer (example, it's very unhappy if you use a video player that isn't WMP, or mozilla instead of IE, etc...). with the linux system usually comes an office suite that can easily replace MS office, and even more - it's 100% free!

for many applications made for windows there's a linux port or a clone made for linux. and there are many original programs for linux that i find better than any windows app built with the same purpose.

but, some apps - such as adobe photoshop and most games - just don't have a linux replacement. but, keep in mind that it's the software manufacturer's fault because they don't make linux versions. a similiar story is with software drivers,
there are also emulators like wine, crossover office or cedega, which you can use to run *SOME* of the windows apps/games. and the list of supported apps is getting bigger and bigger every day.

now i may have scared you, but unless you're using cutting edge hardware (like geforce 8800 for example), your system should work just fine.


if you're choosing a distro, i'd recommend a distro with KDE (one of the desktop enviroments, there are also GNOME and XFCE).

if i were you, i'd try Kubuntu as an apt based distro, or Mandriva as rpm based distro. they both come on live cd's so if you don't like it, don't install. simple.

overall, my experience is that i really got enlightened when i started using linux, because it's not dumbed down like windows, yet easy to use.

[BillieJean]

are you telling me you dont use any anti virus software?
if so why?

anyhow what do you recommend?
im swayed to debian, suse, ubuntu
which of these will run the fatest on my laptop?

1 last question - if i use a partition on my hdd and i have to keep xp for work ect, is it posible for a virus to infect the other os's? or will an xp virus not see the linux partition and vise versa?
thanks

ubuntu is debian based and it's more newbie-friendly than debian. however, i prefer one of it's derivatives - Kubuntu.

if you get windows firus on linux, it will not be able to infect windows or linux.

and we don't use AV on linux simply because there's no need to, since almost all of the viruses are made for windows, and because linux is VERY hard to infect.

[waterhead]

Although Windows viruses usually don't hurt Linux, there are ways that they could be passed through Linux, to a Windows installation.

One way is through e-mail. Many servers are Linux based, if you run an e-mail server, there are Linux AV programs to scan the mail.

The other is through a shared partition. Many dual-boot users have set up a partition formatted as FAT32. This can be easily written to by both operating systems. You will still need a AV program for Windows, and make sure it scans the FAT32 partition.