Installing Linux/Unix on my laptop

hoogie

hoogie

hoogie

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Hi all,

I have recently bought a new laptop and was recently thinking how I have very little knowledge of Linux as an OS, I used it a bit for a module at Uni but that is as far as my experience goes.

As someone who works in IT I thought it would be a good thing to learn a bit about Linux/Unix and was considering installing aversion on my laptop and having the option to do dual boot.

What version or Linux/Unix (not 100% in the difference) would be best to use?

How would I go about setting up a dual boot system?

Thanks for any help
 
Re: Linux vs. Unix

Unix is a family of operating systems that can be traced back to the mid 1970s. They all operate pretty similarly as they followed the Unix philosophy of each tool doing one and only one job and doing that job well. In the early 1980s a group of people saw the demand for a free system that would behave like Unix but not be encumbered by proprietary licensing and prohibitive costs. These people got to work on the GNU project (pronounced guh-new, somewhat like canoe) which aimed to produce a freely licensed (free as in freedom) Unix-like operating system. They wrote a great number of useful parts required by a working operating system, including a compiler, linker, debugger, shell, user tools, and lots more. They struggled, however, in creating a kernel for GNU. This was the last step they needed but development was slow because the advanced model they chose to use was very complicated. Along came Linus Torvalds, a student at the University of Helsinki in 1991 who, for fun, wrote an i386 Unix-like kernel modeled after Minix, a non-free Unix-like OS. This combined with the GNU utilities made for a complete usable operating system. Other people hopped onto the idea and development has been going on ever since.

Linux is just the kernel. A Linux distribution, or distro, is what people use. These are collections of software grouped together into a single coherent package that's usually equipped with an installer. All the parts work together to have a working Linux system. Popular distros are Ubuntu, SuSE, Red Hat (Fedora), Debian, Slackware, and Gentoo, just to list a few.

Unix, on the other hand is now controlled by a certification group called The Open Group that maintains the Single Unix Specification. They aim to ensure that systems that want to call themselves Unix are obeying the standards set forth. A few actual Unix systems around these days are AIX, HPUX, Solaris, IRIX, and now Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard on x86. These systems are certified but that doesn't necessarily mean they're superior to Linux, it just means they went though the certification process.
 
Re: the rest of your post

I recommend either Ubuntu or Fedora for your goals. Ubuntu is quite user-friendly and has a huge community backing it. Pretty much any problem you can imagine has already been had by somebody and is documented on the web somewhere. It has an easy installer that will effortlessly configure dual boot; it'll see your existing OS installation, install a bootloader, and configure the bootloader to let you choose between your OSes. This is what I run.

Fedora is the community-supported testing ground for Red Hat's enterprise products. I also recommend Fedora simply because Red Hat is the most popular distro in corporate environments and the two should work similarly.
 
Thanks for the reply, I am downloading Ubuntu.

Just to check once I have installed the OS do I have to do a lot of manual driver installs? And do I need to install an anti virus program or anything like that?

Have never installed Linux before so no idea what I need to do and what is done for me.

Thanks
 
Depends on your hardware, a lot is already built in. One of the good things about Ubuntu for you is that it will manage a lot of the restricted drivers for you. Anti-virus is not really needed in my opinion.
 
The Ubuntu install is a piece of cake :)

If you want to check it out beforehand, have a look here. Like Una, AV isn't that important in Linux... although I'm pretty sure that Ubuntu includes ClamAV by default. It's useful to stop distributing those Windows viruses though ;)

You might want to install your video card drivers... which card have you got?
 
When installing Ubuntu will it create its own partition?

I have never used a dual boot setup before, would Ubuntu still be able to access my Windows documents on the other partition?

My video card is a Geforce 8400m GS, doubt there are any Ubuntu drivers for it... It doesn't have any 3D features or anything though does it?
 
Yes the installer will give you the option to partition your drive correctly. I would take a backup of anything important before hand though just in case. Ubuntu till be able to access your files on your windows partition (but it will be read only as default).

For 3d graphics it depends on the version of Ubuntu you install (I'm currently using Gutsy Gibbon - which comes with composite/gl enabled as standard. However this is a test version so not recommended for normal use). In feisty not enabled as default.
 
Last edited:
hoogie said:
When installing Ubuntu will it create its own partition?

I have never used a dual boot setup before, would Ubuntu still be able to access my Windows documents on the other partition?

My video card is a Geforce 8400m GS, doubt there are any Ubuntu drivers for it... It doesn't have any 3D features or anything though does it?
Click to expand...


funnilly enough, nVidia drivers for linux are fantastic and you'll get full openGL support.

www.getautomatix.com once you're installed and install a bunch more useful stuff, including nVidea drivers!
 
Hate said:
funnilly enough, nVidia drivers for linux are fantastic and you'll get full openGL support.

www.getautomatix.com once you're installed and install a bunch more useful stuff, including nVidea drivers!
Click to expand...

Are the nvidia drivers not included in restricted drivers manager? I think they should be.
 
Una said:
Are the nvidia drivers not included in restricted drivers manager? I think they should be.
Click to expand...



Yup :)
Automatix is handy though for installing other programs that are commonly used.
I wouldnt class nvidia's drivers as fantastic but there certainly better than ati's offerings.
 
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