based on your analogy I am looking for a shoe that is friendly to install and run on my hard drive and will educate me regarding linux since I have a spare computer at home which I would like to turn into a server in the future

Don't worry about the newest and best...
 
Look at the distros that may fit your needs. Read reviews, or visit distrowatch.com to look at what is out there.
 
Suse Pro 9.1 costs now, but earlier versions can be gotten cheap. See here for example, if you don't want to download free versions - ie: don't have a fast internet connection. Note that Suse 9.1 Pro costs.
 
Since you want to share files between XP and Linux, I suggest the following to avoid the XP/kernel 2.6 issue (Fedora Core 1 or 2, Mandrake 10).
 
Get ahold of a partitoning utility, like PartitonMagic. Make a fat32 partition right after your XP NTFS partition to use to share your MP3's and such, at a size that fits your needs to share. This avoids the issue with XP next to the newest Linux distros using the new kernel.
 
Allow the rest of the drive space left, or what you wish to allocate to Linux to be unformatted.
 
Allow your new chosen distro to use the unformatted space to install onto.
 
Get comfortable with your distro without adding a bunch of apps to your original install.
 
Then decide if you need to make any changes on how things are set up (various partition setups with Linux) and come back and ask us.
 
For now, don't get too hung up on formatting the drive (how many linux partitions - root/home/etc..). This can be confusing to a new Linux user.
 
Keep it basic..then decide if you need any changes on how things are set up.
 
 
 

Originally posted by martouf:

Quote:before you make your decision, have a look here at the Mepis distro site. 
the choice of SuSE personal vs. professional means whether or not things like
gcc (GNU C Compiler) are included without any additional steps.
This is very dependent on whether or not you have broadband. With broadband, aquiring whatever apps/tools is very fast and easy. If you have 0nly 56k then it's an issue and you need the files on CD. MepisPro will be coming out soon with that option, but I've found it just as easy to get the apps from the Debian repository.
 

Quote:are you intending to have a Win98-type web surfing system for your use?or a software development and/or LAN server system?
 
if the former, then LiveCDs and 'personal' distro versions will certainly provide
the means to further your education.
We have people who are running Mepis/Debian for everything from a straight desktop to a pure server. It's all how you want to set it up.
 

Quote:if you need an analogy: fitting you with a distribution is like fitting youwith a shoe. The choice of shoe depends on what you intend to do with it.

If you know the purpose up front, that may be true, but, starting with a vague idea... well???
 

Quote:if you need an analogy: fitting you with a distribution is like fitting you
with a shoe. The choice of shoe depends on what you intend to do with it.

[tt]If you know the purpose up front, that may be true, but, starting with a vague idea... well???[/tt]


you sure you want to go feed the goats in those shoes? 8)

Originally posted by martouf:

Quote:you sure you want to go feed the goats in those shoes? 8)
You're right, in that case he needs to stay with M$
 

Here is a question for you guy which is prolly a really stupid one. I was thinking to make life easier to purchase a second hard drive for my system either Western Digital 80/120/160 8mb drive and install Linux on it. Therefore I would have my 120gb primary drive with Win XP Pro and the new hard drive as a slave with Linux on the same IDE channel. Question is how would I be able to boot off the second drive when I wanted too. Would I have to always go into the bios and select boot off HDD1 instead of HDD0 to run the second os?

gidday atcskyfox
 
Holy moses, this thread is beginning to even confuse me But anyway ... according your last question as to how to boot from a secondary disk.
 
The dual-HDD configuration you are suggesting is in fact pretty similar to the configs as I use them. Therefore I can give it away quite freely: You don't switch around in the BIOS at all as LILO, the reliable workhorse amongst the linux bootmanagers, handles all this fuss easily.
 
In terms of a step by step guide this would go as follows ...
 
Harddisk installation
Leave your current XP-drive as it is and install the new drive. My tip, though, would be to attach the new drive as secondary master, as it can utilize a different IRQ and IDE controller than the primary master which usually results in smoother disk-to-disk-operations.
 
Harddisk partitioning
For the sake of a smooth data exchange I suggest that you split up your new drive as follows:
 

Code:

PARTITION .. SIZE ... TYPE ................... MOUNTPOINT1 .......... 1-2GB .. Linux Swap2 .......... 60 GB .. Linux (ext3 or reiser) . / 3 .......... 30 GB .. FAT32 (data exchange) .. /mnt/data4 .......... 28 GB .. FAT32 (mp3, vids etc.).. /mnt/media

 
Alternatively you can also combine 3+4 to a single 60gig partition and format it as FAT32 with the Linux-partitioning tool (which will not complain). Don't bother, the wussy Windows will just be fine with this FAT-partition even if it's larger than 32GB.
 
OS choice
I don't want to intensify this issue any further, but be informed that I am a huge Mandrake (for desktops) and Debian (for servers) fan Though DapperDan and danleff clearly know what they are talking about when they recommend Fedora or Mepis (btw: visiting the Mepis site found me a bit confused due to the "blooming" Mepis distribution-schemes; pretty confusing).
 
TIP:
I usually leech a couple of distros, retire to my secret chambers and install different distros a whole weekend long, complie custom kernels, specific hardware drivers and applications that I need. The distro that doesn't bother me too much with any of those "libblahblahblah >= 1.2.3.4.5 required" messages wins.
 
So the smoothest to install is the "linux of choice" for the next months, til the next versions of other distros are out. Therefore I'd say: If you have broadband just get Mandrake, Fedora, Mepis ... whatever distro: and install all of them; one after the other, always repartitioning your secondary drive (as an exercise just to get the knack). The one that suits you best and that supports your hardware best (watch your ATI and the A7N8X-GBit-LAN-chip) is the distro you should take.
 
OS installation
As you already have XP installed, all you have to do now is to go into the BIOS and make your system boot from your Linux installation-CD.
 
Bootloader setup
One of the final steps is to set up the bootloader, for many distros this will be "LILO". Also all distros that I know will ask you where to place the lilo-bootloader-code. Here you should choose your primary drive.
 
LILO will then take over the boot process presenting you a menu containing all the operating systems found on your machine. The sweet thing about LILO is that it doesn't care where the operating systems reside (disk 1 or disk 2). It just needs to know the partitions, the rest is done via the bootsector-code from the primary harddisk.
 
Well, that's about how things go in a dual boot environment. If you plan your steps carefully you should have no prob at all (apart from finding the right distro
 
Hope that helps

Thanks blackpage for the help! I was confused also with the Mipes distribution which to get the most current version I would have to pay for it. As of my idea, I will currently take my 120gb which has Suse running on it and partition it out as this.
Partition 1- 30gb for WinXP Pro/Games/Programs
Partition 2- 70gb Fat 32 for Storage/MP3/Video
Partition 3- 20gb for whatever Linux distro I finally settle on
 
I have been using Fdisk to partition the drives however when in Win XP I have been unable to format the Partition 2 with Fat32 the only option is NTFS. Is there a way I can format my Partition 2 with Fat32 without getting the program partition magic?
 
**AND, when I install any linux distro and point it to install on the Partition 3 if I chose automatic partition will it create a swap file partition and a linux partition within the 20gb?
 
 

Despite any issues with Mandrake 10, I would go with that one, as one newbie to another. I had Mandrake 9.2 but it was a bit dated, and 10 uses a new kernel and it includes built in support for nforce audio and lan (9.2 requires you to install a driver off the nvidia site). Also it it very easy to use and install additional programs, being as popular as it is, there are many installs made for it. Mandrake is an rpm based distro, you click on the rpm file, the enter the superuser password and it installs, its a lot easier than having to do make install and compile the thing (I'm pretty fuzzy on that). I havent had to compile anything yet. You can find RPM files for just about anything you could want, and for those without rpms, there is usually a shell script that you run wiht sh theprogram or ./theprogram
I havent yet figured out how to tell which to use all the time, but if one doesnt work, its probably the other command.

'lo again atcskyfox
 
As I mentioned above Windows will refuse to format FAT32-partitions if they are larger than 32GB. The reason for this is that Windows is just a little bit ... well, stupid (to put it mildly).
 
But anyway, you can use FDISK to partition the drive, that should be no problem. Just don't try to format under Windows (as it would not work anyway) and do the formatting (a) from either within the respective linux-installation routine (for example the MDK/Suse/Fedora partitioning dialogs that are displayed during setup) or ( with the tools you already have at hand thanx to your running Suse installation.
 
As to your suggested partition layout: That looks fairly ok. A 70GB FAT32-partition is absolutely no prob, though be informed that you loose quite some storage space due to another MS-idiocy.
 
FAT32 is a very "basic" filesystem that uses clusters. A cluster is the smallest allocation unit that the filesystem can address and it usually spans 2 sectors.
 
Depending on the size of the partition those cluster sizes can be e.g. 1kB, 2kB, 4kB, 8kB or 16kB. With increasing partition sizes also the cluster size is increased. For a 70GB partition you will probably end up with 8kB. That means that even the smallest text-file that only contains a single character will yum up 8kB as this is the smallest allocation unit on the partition.
 
Sidenote: This discrepancy between actual size and allocated size is also displayed if you right-click a file under Windows and select properties ("File size" and "Size on disk").
 
Don't let this disturb you too much as nowadays harddisks are cheap and enormous in size. So before you have filled up your current drive you have probably earned enough gough to slap in just onother 200GB drive
 
have a nice day

Ok here is what I accomplished last night. I have downloaded and burned the following ISO's- Fedora Core 2, Mandrakelinux 10, and the Suse boot disk. Now I have two questions:
1) There are beta versions available for Mandrakelinux and perhaps the other distros also, should I download those betas instead of the ones I have?
 
2) I am looking to get the latest version of Mepis which some say is SimplyMepis 2004 Final (strange how it is only one cd)...but on some of the FTP site I see Mepis 2004 RC1, RC2, etc...which do I download to install on my hard drive?
 
Thanks!

at home i had a dual boot system, one is xp and the other is red hat 9.0
before you try and install any linux distro try researching about its hardware compatibilities.
my red hat 9.0 did not detect my NIC which is braodcom4400 i think?! so i just downloaded the linux verison of that driver and walla i get to configure my network connection!