Weaning Myself Off of Microsoft
Now that I have Linux running successfully on my two laptops, I am gearing up to run it on my desktop as a dual boot system with my existing Windows XP. I have two hard drives, so it should be easy enough (riiight)…just having to clean off the hard drives to make room for it all.
I had tried the “Live CD” option (to run Linux off a CD or DVD), with OK results. But I found I couldn’t save any files to my hard drive, so what was the point? The Live CDs were also a bit slower than running something off a hard disk. (I will review some of the Live CDs later.)
Since my desktop is my primary computer for my work, if I can get myself into the habit of using Linux for most everything, then I will be able to finally say I kicked the Microsoft habit!
Wish me luck!
Have you looked at Linux Mint 5 (Elyssa) this is a an amazing distro. It is truly on great OS
Thanks…I have been checking out the Linux Mint website and it looks great. Very tempting. But I had already downloaded the openSUSE full DVD installer just to check it out…and because I’ve got Ubuntu installed elsewhere (Mint is based on Ubuntu), I’m going to give SUSE a go, just because I’d like to try something different. But I may try Mint later at some point.
You write you ” had tried the “Live CD” option (to run Linux off a CD or DVD), with OK results. But I found I couldn’t save any files to my hard drive, so what was the point?”
Normally, one can write/delete files on the HD from a live Linux (this is a way to keep on a computer going if its system on the HD is broken, full of viruses, etc). It often needs one or two (or more) command lines to hit (or to cut and paste) but it is often hidden to avoid deleting/adding too easily.
If one knows
the names of the liveCD/DVD and
the type of your filesystems ( for XP it is FAT32 or NTFS (ask for the properties of your disk, or to defrag it); for Linux, it should be ext3 – …tenths… of others exist, but are less used-) , many people (in better English than mine, I bet) can find out what to do -theoretically, 2-5 lines to hit….-
BTW, live CD are slow to start because, each time they start, they must know the size and properties of your screen, the nature of your disk, etc… while, once installed, Linux (or other OSes) “know” the hardware they have to deal with…. => therefore, if you move an HD from a computer to another, with an OS in it and try to boot on the moved OS, it may be very weird…
“Normally, one can write/delete files on the HD from a live Linux (this is a way to keep on a computer going if its system on the HD is broken, full of viruses, etc). It often needs one or two (or more) command lines to hit (or to cut and paste) but it is often hidden to avoid deleting/adding too easily.”
That makes sense…but those commands were not immediately obvious…and I’m glad I went with the dual boot now. Thanks for your comment.