Advice/Help

Fragil1ty

Fragil1ty

Fragil1ty

Associate
Joined
8 Jan 2011
Posts
444
Hey guys, so I want to install a Linux distro on my Windows machine, I miss the whole unix system as it was so fluent when I had my Mac, sold that a few months ago and I kind of miss it.

1. What's the best distro to use right now for a user that is quite knowledgeable, likes a good user interface and likes customisation.

2. I'm a programmer/coder, so I need a distro that is friendly to that (I guess they all are really).

3. I've had problems in the past because apparently Linux doesn't like my wireless adapater the Netgear WNA3100 I think it is.

Thanks for any help!
 
Arch Linux (as long as by "likes a good user interface" you mean you aren't afraid to install and configure one yourself). :)

I think you'd have to use ndiswrapper to get the wireless working though.
 
Fragil1ty said:
1. What's the best distro to use right now for a user that is quite knowledgeable, likes a good user interface and likes customisation.
Click to expand...

I'd suggest Sabayon; it's based on Gentoo but also has its own binary package management system. Thus it's always kept nicely up to date on a rolling release. It comes with something like seven different ISOs to choose from, depending on which desktop environment you want to use (although you can install others at your leisure obviously).

Also Arch, yeah, but only if you're prepared to put in some extra time configuring the system to your liking. Perhaps Debian, testing branch?

2. I'm a programmer/coder, so I need a distro that is friendly to that (I guess they all are really).
Click to expand...

Yeah, they are. Undoubtedly there are some minor distros that are designed with programmers in mind, but that would merely mean all the popular IDEs are pre-installed. Not a good enough reason to go with a minor distro in my opinion.

3. I've had problems in the past because apparently Linux doesn't like my wireless adapater the Netgear WNA3100 I think it is.
Click to expand...

Try Ndiswrapper as suggested. From the link:

"Many vendors do not release specifications of the hardware or provide a Linux driver for their wireless network cards. This project implements Windows kernel API and NDIS (Network Driver Interface Specification) API within Linux kernel. A Windows driver for wireless network card is then linked to this implementation so that the driver runs natively, as though it is in Windows, without binary emulation."
 
I'm going to suggest Linux Mint as a nice introduction to Linux. And I also suggest the slightly older version 11 rather than 12 as three GUI is closer to a Windows PC in look and feel.
 
Hades said:
I'm going to suggest Linux Mint as a nice introduction to Linux. And I also suggest the slightly older version 11 rather than 12 as three GUI is closer to a Windows PC in look and feel.
Click to expand...

I run Mint 11 aswell.

Arch is another good recommendation but as said above it requires more 'setting up' however afterwards, because you do a fair bit of configuration i find troubleshooting was a bit more simpler.

How long ago did you last run a Linux install? If it's been a matter of years then the wireless drivers have come a long way since then.
 
I guess it is down to personal choice however after trying a lot of the other distro's I always seem to come back to Xubuntu as it just works and I generally do not have to play around trying to get things working on it.

I then just run VMWorkstation and play with the distro's I need within that so I can easily rebuild if needed.

Mint would be a good choice though.
 
Fragil1ty said:
Hey guys, so I want to install a Linux distro on my Windows machine, I miss the whole unix system as it was so fluent when I had my Mac, sold that a few months ago and I kind of miss it.

1. What's the best distro to use right now for a user that is quite knowledgeable, likes a good user interface and likes customisation.

2. I'm a programmer/coder, so I need a distro that is friendly to that (I guess they all are really).

3. I've had problems in the past because apparently Linux doesn't like my wireless adapater the Netgear WNA3100 I think it is.

Thanks for any help!
Click to expand...
You could install a hypervisor but then you need to run a second PC / Laptop in order to utilise it

My advice would be this:

1. Install Xenserver 6,0 on your PC (its the fastest hypervisor out there, forget vmware)

2. buy an Ipad 2

3. Install Windows 7 host on your Xenserver 6 host

4. Install CentOS 6 x64 on your Xenserver 6 host

5. Install Ubuntu on your Xenserver 6 host

6. Install Fedora 15 on your Xenserver 6 host

7. Install Mint (if you have to) on your Xenserver 6 hsot

8. Choose your favourite since Ipad supports them all with various remote access apps.

9. Wire your wired NIC into a Cisco switch and fire it off via Aironet

Best ROI.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom