Linux folks out there?
Well, it looks like I've got a jobless month ahead of me (work doesn't start until June 6th, ugh) so I think I'll be screwing around with Linux until then.
I'd like to get an XP/Linux dual-boot setup going.
Anyone out there use Linux on x86 ever?
(And yes, I realize this is a Mac board, but many folks actually use both)
I'd like to get an XP/Linux dual-boot setup going.
Anyone out there use Linux on x86 ever?
(And yes, I realize this is a Mac board, but many folks actually use both)
Comments
Did you have any other questions?
My setup:
Duron600@850mhz
768MB PC-133
60G WD HD
40G IBM 75GXP
Samsung CD-RW
Generic 56X CD-ROM
Guillemot GeForce2MX
Generic NIC
SB Live
I plan on formatting the IBM drive to put Linux on...
If you do insist on using Linux, I recently installed both SuSE 7.3 and Mandrake 8.2, and both worked absolutely flawlessly for me. Depending on your Unix background or lack thereof, they might in fact even make a little more sense than FreeBSD, since they are more newbie-friendly.
Just don't even try Darwin/x86. In it's current state, it's all but unusable for anyone but masochists or hardcore developers.
Bye,
RazzFazz
EDIT: Also note nVidia still only offer 3D drivers for the GeForce for Linux/x86, so if you planned on doing any 3D stuff (2D should work flawlessly on any system using XFree86), this is another argument in favour of Linux.
[ 05-06-2002: Message edited by: RazzFazz ]</p>
I will be getting the most hand-holding version I can find until I get used to it, damned if I feel like hosing everything on my drives deciding to go cowboy with Slackware or something silly like that.
<strong>I am a total Linux/Unix moron.
I will be getting the most hand-holding version I can find until I get used to it, damned if I feel like hosing everything on my drives deciding to go cowboy with Slackware or something silly like that.</strong><hr></blockquote>
SuSE or Mandrake should do then. Their installers are probably as easy as Linux installers get. Red Had might be OK for newbies too, but I can't really comment on it since I never tried it myself.
Bye,
RazzFazz
If you don't mind spending the money (and you may as well, the distro is free!), you can also run things like MS-office, Quicktime, and quite a few windows games. check out:
<a href="http://www.transgaming.com/"; target="_blank">http://www.transgaming.com/</a>;
and
<a href="http://www.codeweavers.com/"; target="_blank">http://www.codeweavers.com/</a>;
I have WineX (for games) and the crossover plugin (for things like quicktime, windows media) and they're really slick. All work well, although of course they're slightly slower than they would be if run natively ...
But I guess if you wanted to run windows apps, you could just run windows. I guess it depends on what you're interested in. Pick a goal, and see if you can reach it. Always wanted to set up a web server? Mandrake will probably install apache for you, or if not you could get an RPM of it (think OSX package) but you could always try compiling from source. Re-compiling the kernel is sort of a badge of honor I guess, although once you do it once successfully, you'll find its really pretty easy (know your hardware first- The first time I did it, i forgot support for my ethernet card. Took me a minute before I realized i forgot to compile support for it in!).
FreeBSD is another solution. It sometimes doesn't quite have the driver and software support Linux has (which is not at all much compared to Windows) but yes, its very similar to Darwin. Not by any stretch though, Darwin/OSX does a few things a lot differently than any linux distro or *BSD (xml-style start-up scripts, etc), but FreeBSD is a cool OS. I can't wait for 5.0 ...
Oh, and you can download images of most linux distros from
<a href="http://linuxiso.org/"; target="_blank">http://linuxiso.org/</a>;
Just in case you didn't know. And they're pretty easy to burn via OSX with the hdiutil command. Not sure if you can do it via the finder (although i'm sure there is a way).
I found Mandrake 8.2 ISOs and burned them. I'll be getting after them tomorrow, not the kind of adventure I want to embark on at 11:30 pm.
I'm running Mandrake 8.2 and posting using Galeon as we speak.
[ 05-07-2002: Message edited by: groverat ]</p>
<strong>SuSe isn't free I've noticed, so it looks like I'll be going with Mandrake.</strong><hr></blockquote>
You can install SuSE for free via FTP or NFS, they just don't offer downloadable ISOs.
Anyway, you obviously have already made it through the Mandrake installer successfully, congrats & enjoy your new system.
Bye,
RazzFazz
Both OSs just act like the other drive isn't there at all.
And speaking of ports, the current 'in' Linux is Gentoo. <a href="http://gentoo.org/"; target="_blank">http://gentoo.org/</a>;
Galeon is the shiznit, groverat. You might check preferences and slightly tweak them. I have it so a middle (wheel) click opens URLs in tabs. Tabs are the crack of web browsing! Try them once and you just can't live without them.
RPMfind.net or the mirror Speakeasy.rpmfind.net (usually faster) are a great place to grab precompiled software.
Great to hear it was such a painless install.
I've never used WinXP, but I've used 95,98, 2000, and NT4 and I've noticed multitasking and memory management in Linux blows windows away.
[ 05-07-2002: Message edited by: stimuli ]</p>
<strong>Is there a way to get Linux to see my NTFS drive and vice-versa?
Both OSs just act like the other drive isn't there at all.</strong><hr></blockquote>
Linux does have experimental NTFS read access capabilities (writing to NTFS can be enabled too, but this is considered even more experimental a.k.a. dangerous to your data). Probably not compiled into Madrake's standard kernel, though.
Given writing to NTFS from Linux is strongly discouraged, it's probably not of much use for you, and I think recompiling your kernel just to add NTFS support isn't worth the effort until you have become a little more familiar with the system.
Bye,
RazzFazz