Subj : Re: Linux for a Beginner To : comp.os.linux From : pandora_xero Date : Fri Jul 02 2004 04:24 pm drietow@hotmail.com (David R) wrote in message news:... > I'm a Windows person who grew up from DOS to Windows 3.0 and now > Windows XP. Now I want to try Linux but there are so many > distrabutions (I don't know the proper term). Is there one > distribution that stands out for beginners over the others? Should I > buy with support or download? I'll be dead honest with you. I started using Linux with no resources, and no help except for this newsgroup. I went through four different versions of Mandrake, and could recommend none of them for a newbie (problems with network cards on two different computers. I also tried Redhat's Fedora Core... the download version lacks many multimedia capabilities that I wanted, so the next one i tried was SuSE. Excellent distribution. Not saying that i'm recommending any of these distros, but most distros will have a live CD version (i.e. Mandrake=Mandrake Move, SuSE=SuSE Live CD, Debian=Knoppix), basically a distro in a can. not very many customization options, but they are worth a look. I say try some of the live CD's before you download the whole thing. I've not tried SuSE Live yet, but the best i've tried so far is Knoppix, which is based upon Debian. Buying with support is generally better, but I say Freedom is Great, and Free Beer Makes it even better ;) .