mdogg

Synaptic package manager is only a front-end for apt (advanced packaging tool) which is mainly used with debian

But jspeedracer is right, installing an app is literally a "sudo aptitude install" [I like aptitude people!] away. It's really that simple. I use both windows and linux, and I use them based on what I need at the moment.
For example, the other day I had to do some video editing, of course I used windows, linux isn't there yet. After that, I wanted to do some video encoding, so I switched to linux.
With linux, as with any operating system, you have to realize what it can and can't do. There is no point in spending countless hours trying to get one little thing to work in linux, if it works better and easier in windows. Though I am an avid linux user, time is more important. I love windows for certain things, and I love linux for other.

I think in order to have the best experience, I would not "switch" to linux, I would simply add it to your repertoire

Personally I feel that gaming for linux is just not there. I would use windows and save your time to learn more important things about linux.

for college work, multimedia, and internet use, linux is absolutely fantastic.
Multimediawise you have so many options. Mplayer is fantastic with vdpau, hd content is no problem. Also my favorite multimedia program ever is ffmpeg. All that crap you have to go through to encode and convert movies is gone once you learn ffmpeg.

the internet..well its the internet. except you can't use the move media player which bugs the hell out of me.

for college work, open office is a great alternative to MS office. And if you don't like open office, you can install MS office under wine.


Distrowise, I would start out with ubuntu, and make some very small projects for yourself so you can learn more about it (SQL addressbook, batch renaming script, batch video converter, automatic backup script, etc). But if you really want to get your hands dirty, try gentoo. It's an amazing learning tool that is extremely satisfying.

Basically, try linux, its awesome. It expanded what I am able to do, and opened me up to the world of open source software. But while you're doing this, be careful, and don't expect everything to work.

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Good Linux Users Don’t Talk About Microsoft

Really, I’m not out to destroy Microsoft. That will just be a completely unintentional side effect.– Linus Torvalds

DUNC4N

BLinux pretty much said it all.

Its challenging, fun, and you actually may learn something

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31337

Well, I'm sort of in the same boat as you, except the distro of choice is normally left up to the user. That's why as I have just decided to seriously try out linux I'm burning discs of the following distros to try out:

Ubuntu
Kubuntu
Xubuntu
Mythbuntu (I know it's media center, but hey I'm curious )
Fedora
Linux Mint
Gentoo
openSUSE
PC Linux OS
CentOS
Debian
FreeBSD
Mandriva

And I'm try to get Slackware, but for some reason it won't DL here at work.

I'm also trying GNOME and KDE variants of each that offer it, I lean more towards KDE but what the heck I've not used that much anyway.

EDIT: hmm...Sabayon looks interesting...may have to try it.

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esocid

More secure (contrary to what those closed sourcers say).
Better desktop effects (compizfusion using OpenGL).
More customizable and configurable to your tastes.
And most importantly, you have more control over your kernel.

There are many apps available for linux, with some overlap, but with everything there are exclusive apps and proprietary ones which aren't compatible. Exe files will run in wine, but you'll want to use source tarballs (.tar) or rpms.

You'll be best of jumping into Ubuntu.

***You'll have to remove a card, SLI doesn't mix with Linux***
Just in case you get everything installed and wonder why the hell it won't boot completely.

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My-Guides Fedora 12 Installation Guide My-Guides Fedora 11 Installation Guide

mdogg

IMO the best way to try out distros is with a virtual machine. That way all you have to do is download the .iso and set it as a virtual disk.

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Some stuff I made

Good Linux Users Don’t Talk About Microsoft

Really, I’m not out to destroy Microsoft. That will just be a completely unintentional side effect.– Linus Torvalds

OpTiMaTeZ

***You'll have to remove a card, SLI doesn't mix with Linux***
Just in case you get everything installed and wonder why the hell it won't boot completely.

i can see that tip saving me countless hours, thx for the advice. +1

mdogg

http://www.pcmech.com/article/good-l...out-microsoft/

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Some stuff I made

Good Linux Users Don’t Talk About Microsoft

Really, I’m not out to destroy Microsoft. That will just be a completely unintentional side effect.– Linus Torvalds

31337

I would do that, but my net at home sucks and I don't have a portable drive large enough to carry all the images home from work.

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mdogg

oh snap dude. I'm sorry about your internets.
Also if you want ridic performance with a 26mb(!!) image, check out slitaz

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Some stuff I made

Good Linux Users Don’t Talk About Microsoft

Really, I’m not out to destroy Microsoft. That will just be a completely unintentional side effect.– Linus Torvalds

timw4mail

I agree with the previous points, but most of all, just have fun. Customize it like crazy. (KDE is better for this, IMO) Have fun just trying new things.

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