Re: Larry in Texas USA

If your computers won't run the 4gig stick, why would they run an 8gig
stick?

On Thu, 08 Oct 2009 14:30:32 -0500
Came this utterance formulated by Larry Wilson to my mailbox:

[snip]

> All I want is a decent Linux program running on a good or great
> computer not one of my old computers. 

Splitting hairs but linux is an Operating System not a program. The
difference is that thousands of programs come with your Linux OS ready
to run.


> I guess I will have to buy a computer with Ubuntu already loaded as
> the operating system?  Honestly the flash drive seems to me the best
> way to have a good alternate program but*Will I be throwing away 90 us
> dollars for a 8gig flash drive that will become a partner for the old
> 4 gig flash drive that never worked?*

You have several alternatives that you may have not yet explored. I list
them in what i hope is least complex to most complex.

1. Live DVD's/CD's - These are designed to let you explore the programs
available on Linux without disturbing your windows disk, though you may
read and write to it. They run all programs off the live disc, which
incurs an ongoing time penalty due to the requirement to read/uncompress
each program. Examples:

 :: Mandriva One
 :: http://www2.mandriva.com/linux/one/

 :: Knoppix (The original and arguably most famous live disc)
 :: http://www.knoppix.org/

 :: Ubuntu (Which is both a live disc and an installer)
 :: http://www.ubuntu.com/

 :: Mint (Which has more windows codecs included for multimedia)
 :: http://www.linuxmint.com/

2. Partition you existing hard disk in two halves and run either Windows
or Linux, based on a choice you make when you start your computer up.
This is the most common method of trying out Linux. It depends on
available hard disk space, and some hardware may not be easy to setup
(because the manufacturers do not support Linux). All distributions
support this method, most support it as their primary method of
installing and running. Although i said two halves you can get away with
four to eight gigs for Linux. You can still save work to your windows
partition from Linux. If you consider yourself an intermediate Windows
user or less I recommend you find a local LUG (Linux User Group) and
attend at least one meeting, then find out when you can bring your
computer in for help installing Linux. Texas LUG's here:
http://www.linux.org/groups/usa/texas.html

3. Buy a larger or second hard disk for your computer and install using
method 2 above or 

4. Install VMWare - this will enable you to startup _BOTH_ Linux and
Windows at the same time and swap backwards and forwards between them at
will. The closest experience to this for a windows user is running
an RDesktop session. This is not recommended for beginners, usually
requires gobs of power, memory and extra hard disk space.
______________________________

All the above methods may not work on off-the-shelf computers due to
cheap parts which no-one has bothered to make work with Linux. This
problem is an order of magnitude less than when i first started in
Linux, but some manufactureres especially are not linux friendly e.g.
Cannon. HP is Linux aware but are still known to install Linux
unfriendly hardware. None of the methods above, with the exception of 4,
require you to lose your windows data and setup, though a backup to
external device is recommended before *ANY* install of *ANY* software on
*ANY* computer.


-- 
Michael

All shall be well, and all shall be well, and all manner of things shall
be well

 - Julian of Norwich 1342 - 1416
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