Re: New laptop/Linux

christine wrote:
Jim wrote:


Jon Martin Solaas wrote:

DigitalHighway wrote:


Hi. I have some questions about linux. I just bought a Dell Laptop
Model Inspiron 6000. I am using Windows XP pro. I am a beginner in
regards to my knowledge of Linux. I want a dual boot system and I am
confused with all the Linux versions to choose from. I plan to use
Parition Magic 8 to create the partions. I heard RedHat(mandrake) is a
good place to start. But, I hear Debian is a great version also but
more advanced. Any suggestions for installing, choosing the right
version or any help would be greatly appreaciated. Thanks
Jordan


I have a Dell Inspiron 5150 running Fedora Core 4. This is the
"Community" version of RedHat. Fedora (or RH) doesn't come with a lot of
multimedia support, ie. no mp3 or dvd decoders (for legal reasons).
Luckily the livna (rpm.livna.org) repository has all the additional
packages you need. RedHat has turned into an «enterprise» distro these
days. It is very stable and you pay to get license and support. RedHat
also has a long life-cycle, so if you want to always have the latest and
greatest, you'd better coose something else. Fedora is pretty much up to
date. Because the building blocks of RedHat is GPL they have to release
the source of their distro, and this is used by others to build distros
like White Box, Centos and others, which in effect is RedHat without
logos, trademarks, commercial support and licence fee.

For a laptop wifi-support is also likely to be of importance. With my
broadcom card I have to use ndiswrapper (available from livna).
Ndiswrapper is a way to facilitate native windows drivers under linux.

So, all in all, FC4 + Livna is pretty ok, but you need to manually set
up a few things. Not difficult though ...

Many people recommend the Debian based Ubuntu distro, which supposedly
has good wifi support. Mandriva is also known to have exellent hardware
support. Suse I haven't tried.

When it comes to partitioning, the normal procedure is to set up
partitions during installation using tools built into the setup program.
Ofcourse you can also use PM beforehand to prepare the partitions.


Inspiron 4100 here running Knoppix/Debian. All's fine except the usual
dicky wifi via Intel miniPCI scavenged from a dead Fujitsu Centrino.
Everything else configures just dandy.



hi!

it's a good idea to try out your hardware with some live-in distro. i have
tried knoppix and kanotix and both runs 100% on my laptop acer 8006. both
will find all my hardware. i have installed suse10 on one of my tabletops
and kanotix on another. suse10 runs on my laptop (at the moment). wlan, bluetooth, dvd modem ethernet everything runs fine:-)

cheers,
christine

I've noticed that SuSE seems very well suited to laptops, particularly the wifi side of things. Looking into reinstalling this one with 9.3 at some point, and that'll be the last I see of Wintendo as a main platform on any of my kit.
.