Which Linux for Noobs?

cosmic.synergy

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I'm also planning on migrating from Windows to Linux. Too much copyrighted, closed codes contribute to their bugginess and when you're running a for-profit multi-billion dollars business, you cant have a too efficient product. Got to dumb it down a little, so that you can get people to buy your 'improved' version. AKA planned obsolescence.

I've heard a lot of opinions about how ubuntu is great for beginners from friends and linux users. But for people with the libertarian mentality that gave birth to the free software movement, ubuntu is becoming bogged down with proprietary crap. Check out 100% free OS like Trisquel.
 

jekslee

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Ubuntu or LinuxMint

If you're a Linux noob, like me, the only distros you should even consider are Ubuntu or LinuxMint. These 2 distros support a wide range of pc and laptop hardware , esp the wireless adaptors (a major issue unless you don't plan on accessing internet....). Webcam support can also be very fickle but will have higher chance of support with Ubuntu and LinuxMint.
 

togetthere

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Ubuntu and Mint are good examples of distro for beginners who wants to have a feel of how linux feels like as a whole.. Many pp tend to be stagnant at Ubuntu "ease-of-use" and not realise the real usefulness of linux. If "ease-of-use" is what one is after, mac osx / windows should be the direction.

I strongly suggest pp to migrate to more advanced distros such as arch linux to learn more about linux and whats "under-the-hood".. Through the manual installation of arch linux, one will discover and learn much more about linux albeit there is moderate difficulty involved. But sense of satisfaction is guarantee. Is also the next step to become a linux power user.. =)

who knows.. u might one day fency gentoo.. lol
 

weap0nx

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I am interested in testing out Linux using my laptop (ASUS M5200 - 1.6GHZ 768MB ram).
I did a search on the internet on which is suitable for noobs like me and which has higher distribution (thinking will have better support) and free :p

I narrow down to Mandriva One 2009 KDE and PCLinuxOS.

As I said, I am very new to Linux and hope to be able to user friendly interface. Will be mainly used for surfing net, Open Office and GIMP etc.

I hope that advise can be given to me whether is the above mentioned two will be suitable for me and if not any other recommendations.

Thanx in advance

Edit: Seems that a lot of people are using UBUNTU and describing how easy it is to use. I may try this out first.

None.

Linux is not for noobs, for l33t only.
 

travelkhan

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Singpass Error

HI,

I downloaded the latest JAVA for linux, but still Singpass website cant detect my browser has Java installed!!! But i did a test on Java site, and they replied my browser is Java enabled.

Anybody encounter this before? I am not a Linux user, happen to buy a cheap notebook and realised its on Linux!!! My OS stated Linpus Linux Lte 1.0.3.E, is that Ubuntu u guys are familiar with?

@bookkeeper, try the following, it works for me.
Using Ubuntu->Looking for the following package to download.
1. Sun Java
> Remove the rest of java + java plugins. e.g: icetea, open jdk

2. Google Chrome

3. Login SingPass / Surf via Google Chrome. It works for me!
 

vcrpex

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Easiest to use linux?? I would vote for ubuntu, but to say ubuntu is only for noobs, it is far from truth. Some IT admins i know who can use gentoo or arch, are using ubuntu for their day to day desktop or laptops. It is more supported and much easier to get a reply if some things aren't working during the installation. I can watch ppstream/sopcast in ubuntu direct without windows(virtualbox), connect to Citrix server, do mt4 trading, the normal surfing and downloading of stuffs is much faster even though I am connected on wireless all the time. one thing that people always compare is how it is to windows, in the first place, linux is not windows. Just that most people only learn about windows, it is the same learning curve, something you learn from the beginning.
 

decker23

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bro how to ppstream in ubuntu . share lei .

HAHAH

and true enough ubuntu community is very good.

start with command line first. take the hard step forward. and learn some shell scripting.

after a while u will realise the GUI is the biggest headache and that commandline is the best way out.
 

genie47

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A quick update here. I bought 2X Compaq CQ43-304A using the AMD E300 cheap because both are DOS machines. Installed the full version of Linux Mint 11. Beautiful! I was installing Windows 7 side-by-side on another one that is to be used by my wife.

LM11 installed so much faster than W7. Then the drivers for the processor and GPU are found in the repositories and this made LM11 installed very fast. The W7 didn't have the drivers which prompted me to download the W7 drivers from HP to get it working which explains why I couldn't get it up to speed.

LibreOffice was installed defacto from LM11 but W7 required me to use the WO installation disc. All-in-all, W7 required updates which took another 2 hours.

So far, the main bug of LM11 is that when a software is installed using the software manager, it lists it as "uninstalled" when it already is. Minor bug.

McKTb.jpg
 
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genie47

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Another Linux for noobs. In fact, I would recommend this over Ubuntu or Linux Mint for complete noobs. MEPIS 11



Based on Debian just like Ubuntu (derivative) and Linux Mint (now Debian rolling release). Installed it because LMDE 11 was crashing constantly. MEPIS is based on Debian stable. I installed it and horror of all horrors, it was boring like Windows 7. Everything worked out of the box! From speakers, microphone, wireless and even the webcam. No other tinkering required.

Resource wise, it is a rather strange OS. It uses KDE4.5 but resource wise not that big compared to Gnome. My wife's same CQ43 with the same specs is very slow compared to MEPIS.
 

sum123

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Try ElementaryOS. Nice design and based on Ubuntu.

h**p://elementaryos.org/discover
 

faruk55

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what model is ur canon printer? how old is ur printer?

my ubuntu can detect automatically n install the necessary drivers once i plug it in..
mine is AIO printer
 

eatsleeplim

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tk

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my ubuntu detects my samsung laser automatically no prob also.. :look:
 

Rock-kun

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linux dont support my cannon printer driver. What should I do?

Canon offers downloadable Linux drivers for some of their printers.

Make sure your distro has all the dependencies needed to install the driver before downloading it. CUPS is almost always required by many vendor drivers; even Samsung's closed printer driver makes use of CUPS for its backend.
 

nyancat

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moi personally used to use Ubuntu... but since moi still schooling, need to use software, sometimes very mafan to find solutions for problems, especially when you're on a tight deadline...

side tracking:
For programmers and IT people, fun to tinker is fun la, and you can make a lot of cool things happen, e.g. personalize to the max. But gaming and other software we use in our lives e.g. Funshion still need to use VMs or software like Wine to use, most open source OS is not up to the job.
 

coutuser

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Canon offers downloadable Linux drivers for some of their printers.

Make sure your distro has all the dependencies needed to install the driver before downloading it. CUPS is almost always required by many vendor drivers; even Samsung's closed printer driver makes use of CUPS for its backend.

KNN, if I buy printer and it is not supported then how?
 

tk

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read that linux kernel 3 include some updates with new drivers.. maybe can try updating the kernel.. me now on ubuntu 11.04 with kernel 3.1.2..

Announced by Linus Torvalds on July 21st, Linux kernel 3.0 brings nice features, such as Btrfs data scrubbing and automatic defragmentation, Berkeley Packet Filter JIT filtering, unprivileged ICMP_ECHO, XEN Dom0 support, wake on WLAN, lots of new drivers and support for many hardware components, support for Microsoft Kinect, support for Apple iSight webcam, support for AMD Llano Fusion APUs, and much more.
 
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