Lots of little questions to make a slightly long post

[stavefan]

Hi all...

I have been playing with linux for a while and have been becoming more and more interested in having it become my primary OS at home (i am primarily a windows user). I recently found the program GIMP on my linux box and was very impressed with it. that encouraged me into thinking that linux may be a good choice for me, but i do have some questions/reservations that i was hoping could be answered here....

My primary machine currently has win 98 on it and it is the one that I am considering wiping clean and putting linux on..here are some issues that i am wrestling with:

hardware:
video card-ATI Rage 128 (i saw rageAholic's NHF, but does that still apply with red hat 6.2?)
sound card-sound blaster PCI128
monitor-samsung multisync 19"
cdburner-mitsumi 2x cd rom
cdrom-generic 40x
processor-AMD K62-450
ram: 96 mb
I really don't want to install linux and find that one or more of these won't work or that X won't work with one of these...


software:
1. I would like to be compatable with MSOffice products, Word, ppt, excel. Is there any program for linux that does the same thing and is compatable with these programs?

2. cd burner software. is there any? is it any good? can I create cd's for use on windows? (my girlfriend has lots of star wars pics and wav files...if i burn those on cd for her, can she read the cd-rom (she is using windows) )

and finally the big question:
which distribution in your opinion would best fit my needs considering my experience level(very little) and my hardware (see above)? i've been using red hat 6.2 on an older p-133 that i have, but I am willing to switch to something different if it would be better...

thanks for all your assistance..
stavefan

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Sometimes strange things can be very beautiful...

Aleixa, "V", "Honey Lake"

[vhg119]

i would suggest mandrake 7.2. it might take a little work but i'm sure everything on your box will work. Don't get a winmodem though.
I think staroffice can open microsoft documents.
Mandrake comes with the "standard" cd burning software. xcdroast.. cdrecord..
they're ok..

[ColdPack]

And Mandrake 7.2 is the only distro that supports cdburners out of the box.
I know of no other distro that does, yet.
So if you want a (relatively) easier time getting that cd burner up and running, Mandrake 7.2 is the way to go.
Have you considered dual-booting windows and linux before taking that final plunge?
It may be better for a "transition" of sorts since you're pretty new to the whole deal.
Just a thought.


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Experience is that marvelous thing that enables you to recognize a mistake
when you make it again.
_- Franklin P. Jones

[ph34r]

Slackware 7.1 "supports" cd burners out of the box as well - you just need to inmod the proper modules for scsi emulation, etc.

For Office compatability, StarOffice is pretty good, but if you really need to use "the real thing" then you may want to consider using VMWare to run a minimal 95 install with Office 97 or 2k.

Just about any distro can do what you want on your hardware.

[This message has been edited by ph34r (edited 14 December 2000).]

[stavefan]

I saw that mandrake and slackware are both on sale at linux mall for around $5(the 2 cd-sets)...is that a good deal? are those cd's going to be the whole thing, or is it a subset of the OS packaged by linux mall?...

I'm surprised by the fact that red hat 6.2 does not support burners out of the box...one would think that one of the biggest companies would already do so...interesting....


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Sometimes strange things can be very beautiful...

Aleixa, "V", "Honey Lake"

[thedexman]

If you're trying to maintain MS Office compatibility, you could also, try VMware and run MS Office under that (I presume you already have a copy of Office). If so, get VMWare by Dec. 16 for $99 (www.vmware.com). Star Office has not always been impecable for me in conversions.

[RageAHolic]

stavefan...on my Rage 128 system, RedHat 6.2 doesn't get more than 2 seconds into the text/graphical part of the installation before it dies...I'd go with Mandrake 7.2 as has been suggested.

It does support CD-R(W) out of the box which will seriously help you out (you can read about how to do it manually while you're burning CD's http://www.linuxnewbie.org/ubb/biggrin.gif)

Mandrake was the only distro that auto-configured a working X-server for my All-In-Wonder 128 Pro AGP. No other distro (in my experience) does this...they all require gentle massaging (or a severe beating).

It has good GUI tools to help you get around until you get more interested in doing things manually.

StarOffice (now OpenOffice) is a nice Office alternative.

CD-burning software...I've yet to use a program that I really liked, but XCDroast came the closest to being "good".

Mandrake 7.2 should definitely be up to handling the Rage 128...it uses X 4.0.1 and that version absolutely rocks with the Rage 128.

Verdict...I'd go with Mandrake 7.2 http://www.linuxnewbie.org/ubb/smile.gif

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...your friendly neighborhood RageAHolic (http://www.angelfire.com/electronic/RageAHolic/index.html)

Rage fueled by: AMD Athlon

[This message has been edited by RageAHolic (edited 14 December 2000).]

[stavefan]

Thanks for the help guys...looks like mandrake it is...now another question...

would you guys recommned that i buy the whole mandrake set $29.95 @ linux mall, or buy the Penguin Power Linux-Mandrake 2-CD Set 3.95 @linux mall? (i have no internet connection at my appt...yet...waiting for broad band, so I have to buy whatever distro i go with)

thanks
stavefan

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Sometimes strange things can be very beautiful...

Aleixa, "V", "Honey Lake"

[ColdPack]

Originally posted by ph34r:
Slackware 7.1 "supports" cd burners out of the box as well - you just need to inmod the proper modules for scsi emulation, etc.


For Office compatability, StarOffice is pretty good, but if you really need to use "the real thing" then you may want to consider using VMWare to run a minimal 95 install with Office 97 or 2k.


Just about any distro can do what you want on your hardware.


[This message has been edited by ph34r (edited 14 December 2000).]


Okay, then all the distros out now "support" cd burners with scsi emulation... Mandrake simply does most of the work for you so that by the end of the install you likely already have a working cd burner. That's what I mean by out-of-the-box. Even the newbiest of newbies can burn cd's without much work... and Mandrake as a company (if you buy the boxed set with however-many-days of installation support) will support cd burner issues as part of that "paid for" support, unlike any other distro out there as far as I know.
That's what I was getting at.

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Experience is that marvelous thing that enables you to recognize a mistake
when you make it again.
_- Franklin P. Jones

[jbstew32]

I say get the boxed set of Mandrake 7.2. It's a little pricy, but you get things like StarOffice (its a big download) and IBM's ViaVoice. On top of that, you get so many software packages that it will make you sick. I really suggest getting this if you have a VERY big hard drive.

If not, you can pick up the GPL version from www.cheapbytes.com (http://www.cheapbytes.com) or www.linuxmall.com (http://www.linuxmall.com) or even www.linuxcentral.com (http://www.linuxcentral.com) (my fav), and those will work just fine. They are only $1.95 per CD http://www.linuxnewbie.org/ubb/smile.gif

[Pyrosophy]

I am curious as to the answer to your question about whether or not someone running Windows can read a Linux burned (non-music, I guess) CD, but unfortunately, I don't have an answer.

As to the choice of cheap distros -- I won't give you a straight answer, but here goes. The 3.95 set will include the basic operating system, all the tools for the graphical side of Linux and some, but not a plethora of free software. For the more expensive set, all you would be getting is more programs (in most cases, free programs) that will be easily installed along with the whole system. If you don't install the programs when you install the whole system, they're all perfectly available to download and try individually later, but the installation can be a little tedious.

I myself am running Mandrake 7.1 and bought the really expensive version to give myself program overload (though I can't seem to see everything I installed) with the understanding that I'll see what I actually need this time around and in the future, use the base distros and download software.

Cheers,
Pyro

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You can never be strong. You can only be free...

-Guided By Voices

[RageAHolic]

As a matter of conscience I have to tell you that Linuxmall has yet to deliver my Slack 7.0 and Mandrake 7.0 cheapCD's. Yeah, that was like almost half a year ago and nothing.

The shipping was like 15$ CAN for two $1 CD's (I didn't find this out until I got my Visa bill). I eventually got broadband and d/l'ed and burned ISO's...shipping costs will be the downfall of e-commerce.

I can only speak from my experience and I therefore can't recommend Linuxmall.

I imagine many people have had good experiences with them...congrats. Mine was ****ty and I warn people about doing business with them.



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...your friendly neighborhood RageAHolic (http://www.angelfire.com/electronic/RageAHolic/index.html)

Rage fueled by: AMD Athlon