can someone tell me what's a good, free version of linux for a noob just testing it out(will probably be permently installed on PC since it won't run anything higher than WIN98 for some reason)
... and if you don't want to commit yourself to installing it, try Knoppix. It runs right off the CD! W00t!
Got to agree with RTT and Trigger. Both spot on. With a Linux distro the basic components are much the same, you "pay" for an installation engine or management utility. With SUSE it's called YAST2 for example. Lindows and Xandros are more completely integrated in the same way Windows is, but still share all the same common apps. Knoppix on the other hand is a well-known distro called Debian configured to require little or no hard disk space. Once installed and running they can all look much the same. Go with one of the already mentioned offerings and you get great setup utils and reliable installs.
Got to say I'm a complete noob with linux and just startesd installing redhat 9 on an old machine i had lying around, had no problems installing it so far. Very easy to follow setup.
definitely go for redhat, also, if your machine specs are kinda low powered, go for redhat 7.1, it would be much more forgiving. I know this cause redhat 7.1 ran better on my p2 233 laptop than win98.
I've just had the bright idea to post some system specs: intel 300mhz cpu, 300 somthing ram and a 1 gig harddrive (it's actully 12?? megs for some reason and I'm gonna get a bigger one as ASAP)
ya defintiely go for either redhat 7.1/7.2, mandrake 8.0 or 8.2, pr gentoo if you have a month to install it.
