Some newbie ?'s

[linux123]

Hi there,
I'm getting ready to jump into Linux and have some questions.
1. Which distro would work best on a relatively new system or maybe more appropriately which distro has the most updated drivers? I realize that I can always get them if they are not included but I would like to get up and running as painlessly as possible before I start mucking around with it. I've got an AMD 750 Athlon, ASUS A7V mb, SB Live, Creative Labs Anihilator 2 video card, Lexmark 3200 printer, USR external modem.
2. I have a 30 GB hard drive and am planning to reinstall Win 98 SE on it and re-partition it anyways so how big should I make the partition for Linux? I've read that Linux uses 2 partitions - Does it do that internally or do I need to make 2 partitions for it? Also, I have been surfing around and found references to a cylinder 1049 error. What is that and how can I prevent that from happening? Does it matter which partition I put it on? I am planning on splitting my HD up into probably 6 - 8 partitions or so.
Those are the burning questions right now. Hope I wasn't too long-winded. Please send your input to newtolinux@attcanada.ca Thanks.

[prince_kenshi]

I am too lazy to e-mail you but I'll post anyway. The drivers included does not depend on the distro. Unlike Windows, the drivers are built into the kernel. So as long as the distros have the same kernel, they'll have the same drivers. Just get a modern version and you're set. The partitioning part is really up to you. Different distros need different amounts of space by default. I think they could all fit in 2 gigs by default but that's not leaving much room for other stuff. Unless you have a lot of stuff to put in Windows, I think splitting it about half should be good. Linux does require (not technically, but pretty much) at least two partitions: one for root and one for swap. You can seperate it into more partitions if you like but that just seems ineffecient to me unless you want to limit certain directories. The cylinder 1049 error was caused by old Lilo not being able to load an OS from a partition after cylinder 1048 on the drive. If you get a new distro though, you don't need to worry about it. If you do get an old one, just make a seperate partition for /boot and put it first, and then put the Windows system partition next, and make sure both end before cylinder 1049. You should be careful when grouping your hard drive into many partitions. A single hard drive can only have 4 primary partitions and extended partitions actually count as primary partitions. And last of all you shouldn't tell people to e-mail you but instead you should just check here occasionally for your answers. It's too much trouble to compose an e-mail with all that junk in it.

[DMR]

linux123,

The cylinder limitation is actualy at 1024 (plenty of info online about this), but that problem has been fixed in the latest versions of LILO (and perhaps grub; I don't use it, so I don't know).

Your particular preference of distro is pretty much up to you, and what you want to use Linux for. Some distros are more "newbie friendly" than others (with easy-to-use GUI installation programs and such) if you just want to get up and running, but if you want to get into manually configuring your system to learn the "guts" of Linux, you might not want such a simplistic approach. There have been *many* posts in this forum from people new to Linux asking "which is the best distro" type of questions. Use the Forum Search to browse the archives, and just enter something like "which distro" as your search criteria.

As for the partitioning issue: no, Linux doesn't force you into a particular partitioning scheme. There are basically two schools of thought on this, though. The first being that you create only two partitions, / and /swap (and possibly /boot). This approach is often suggested as a good way to start out, since you don't have to manage multiple partitions, but it does have its drawbacks (see below).
The other scheme is to create separate partitions for each critical filesystem. That way, if you crash your system in a way that hoses one filesystem, chances are that the data on you other filesystems (because they actually are separate partitions) will be intact. This NHF (http://www.linuxnewbie.org/nhf/intel/installation/partition/multi_partition.html) has more info on the pros and cons.

I've always run with a multi-partition setup, and I've never found "partition management" to be a problem. And yes, having separate partitions has actually saved me from doing a complete reinstall once.

Oh, and prince_kenshi is (almost) right about partitions. With IDE/ATA drives, there can only be four primary partitions per drive, of which only one can contain an extended partition. However, any given physical/extended partition can be divided into multiple "logical" (16 max I think; could be wrong) partitions.

Also- If you install Linux first, and choose to install LILO/grub (as your bootloader) to the MBR of the boot drive, the subsequent Win98 install will overwrite the MBR and wipe out LILO/grub.