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I would also suggest Mandrake. I've just upgraded to 10, and it was pretty much plain sailing. However if you have an older PC you may fair better with a more lightweight distro. Having said that, 10 is lighter and faster than 9.1 or 9.2. A friend recently installed it on a PII 450 /w 256Mb and has what he terms "acceptable performance" out of it. Basically I would suggest putting the first CD in, let Mandrake do what it wants for partitions and accept the defaults for the install options. In time you will learn (as I did) what packages you do and don't need, but when if you accept the defaults (needs a couple of Gb) you won't go far wrong. Then as David said follow the prompts and it should "Do what it says on the tin". Basically it's all down to disk swapping from there unless you have the MDK 10 DVD from the last Linux Format. Mandrake 10 is also pretty good at picking up your hardware, so unless you have something very outlandish in the box you ought to fair OK and get it to detect without much difficulty :) Specific points: 1. I have exactly the same sound card. MDK 10 saw it and lobbed in the right modules painlessly. 2. Multimedia card readers or other kit, especially USB based *may* be an issue. 3. If you want full 3D capability from your GFX card you *may* need to find the right modules. For Nvidia download the driver set off their website. For Radeon, good luck! The main question is how old is the kit in the box? My newest acquisition is an Nvidia Geforce FX 5600 which again the system spotted straight away. Unless you have anything brand new released in the last couple of months I'd say you ought to be OK. Kind regards, Julian -----Original Message----- From: owner-list@xxxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:owner-list@xxxxxxxxxxxx]On Behalf Of David Johnson Sent: 05 June 2004 14:03 To: list@xxxxxxxxxxxx Subject: Re: [LUG] Which Distribution? On Saturday 05 Jun 2004 13:40, Solfius wrote:
I've had a browse on the net and it seems the "best" distro for new users is either Mandrake or Red Hat. I've looked at Red Hat but don't fancy a
now
unsupported version, so I was wondering what Fedora is like for a new
user.
What would you recomend for a distro?
Personally I'd recommend Mandrake. Fedora has always seemed a little too unstable for my liking.
I'm assuming I'll have to find a new set of drivers for my sound card, or worst case the card is incompatible with Linux (it's a Sound Blaster Live! Player 5.1 on the offchance someone has any idea what will happen to it)
is
there anywhere in particular that is a good place to start looking for Linux drivers? I'll check the manufacturer site when I get round to
looking
at the sound card, but I was wondering if there was anywhere else other than Google.
You almost certainly won't have to download or install any drivers at all. Unless you've got some uncommon hardware, everything will be included in the distribution and will be installed automatically. Your SB Live 5.1 will be included in this and will work perfectly - I've got one myself.
So basically what I'm about to try and do is exterminate all remnents of Windows 98 and install Linux, is there anything I should look out for that could render the machine kaputt?
Nope. Bung the disc in, follow the instructions and you should be up-and-running (probably) within half an hour. Have fun! David. -- David Johnson http://www.david-web.co.uk/ -- The Mailing List for the Devon & Cornwall LUG Mail majordomo@xxxxxxxxxxxx with "unsubscribe list" in the message body to unsubscribe. --- Incoming mail is certified Virus Free. Checked by AVG anti-virus system (http://www.grisoft.com). Version: 6.0.691 / Virus Database: 452 - Release Date: 26/05/2004 --- Outgoing mail is certified Virus Free. Checked by AVG anti-virus system (http://www.grisoft.com). Version: 6.0.691 / Virus Database: 452 - Release Date: 26/05/2004 -- The Mailing List for the Devon & Cornwall LUG Mail majordomo@xxxxxxxxxxxx with "unsubscribe list" in the message body to unsubscribe.