Wots so great about linux? hear a lot of people goin on about it, not just here in general i mean. is it just a lot more stable than windows or because people dont like microsoft?
J

Edit by data: Indeed offtopic. Split it off into a new topic

its a lot more secure. i only used it a bit and i found that the help files actually helped. which was a suprise being used to the cryptic adventure game that is windows help files.

It's cheaper, more stable and gives the user the option of more control. It doesn't support nearly as many games as Windows though.

I say Windows for games and Linux for work/school.

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and it's (Linux that is) more secure

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and it's prettier. :bleh:

Never used Linux though but it is considered tough than Windows and that's why it is not so popular. But now bcoz of its reliability and security people are taking it seriously!

But still I don't know anything about linux! Can anyone pls tell about its hardware requirements etc...??? If it is freeware, is there any way to download it?

Some distributions are freeware like Debian, Gentoo, Slackware, Ubuntu etc.
The requirements are somewhat like Windows (ofter lower).

Of the above mentioned, Ubuntu is the easiest to get started with. You could also try Knoppix. Knoppix doesn't need to be installed you boot off the CD. That way you can try it out before installing and make up your own mind about it.

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Just check out the screenshots I posted earlier in this thread.

Linux has improved a lot over the years and is becomming a serious candiate to become the other option then windows. The only problem is that software and esspecially games are only being desinged for windows. In the early days linux wasn't really user friendly, you had to mount your cd-rom if you wanted to use it and you had to switch on your soundcard manual. You could put al these things in a script but they weren't on by default. But since the more modern versions of linux have all the features on by default it's become a whole lot better. I thinking about making my system dual boot: a linux boot for internetting and office work and a windows boot for gaming.

According to my brother who uses Linux to program, it's not exactly a "what's better" issue, it's a "what flaws doesn't it have compared to windows"
Windows has a few problems that the regular user doesn't really notice, but drives the poweruser insane, for example: even when it's not running anything at all under windows, the computer will be "thinking", this isn't the case in Linux (according to him)
Now Linux isn't very friendly for the small computeruser, but it's getting more userfriendly (at least some of them are) you still need to work a lot with commandlines.
Linux's trademark smooth, empty, desktop comes with the cost of having to do a lot of things using commandlines and that may be a bit troubling for somebody who is used to working with icons and such. of coarse after a while you get used to it, like with dosbox.

Personally I use windows since I see no need for me to use Linux and the commandlines seem a bit daunting. Most linux-users are programmers or powerusers (but I guess all programmers are powerusers) who are comfortable with commandlines and need to empty space so they cang et a good overview over their work... and others just use it because they hate microsoft (which is a bit childish if you ask me, I once had a teacher who used Linux because he hated microsoft, but he couldn't make up a decent textfile using it)

Using the commandline isn't a neccesity, just an option. If you look at the screenshots you'll see that all things can be done with icons and a filemanager just like in Windows. The only problem I can see with switching to Linux is the installation part, that could be (doesn't have to be) daunting. But then again how many of the "regular users" have installed Windows themselves? I'll bet that most got it pre installed when they bought their computer.

Well Linux itself is probably perfectly fine if you can handle its user-unfriendly interface, I just don't like Linux-Jehova's who keep on nagging that you should use Linux followed by 10 pages of arguments\drooling and\or anti-Microsoft statements. :yawn:

(Hey, I already started using firefox, now shut your traps and let me prefer Windows)

the thing is linux is not user unfreindly. the manual commands are excellent and contain huge amounts of information not just about the version of linux you have but computing in general. it is quite simply amazing how much information you can accsess using the man command.