I decided to fish instead of cutting bait some time ago. I converted my laptop to Suse 8.2 with no Windows partition left. That version failed to support my ltmodem. I found a driver that did the job here . Apart from that I was happy with my choice.
Iīd like to add that Suse also offers a free live evaluation version on a CD. You can boot and run the version from CD without installing. That way itīs possible to try it without messing up the original installation.
For those who like to see if Linux is something they might like I recommend the free Knoppix CD . Itīs a full distribution that boots and runs from CD. It doesnīt mess with the hard drive installation either.
Linux may not be a mainstream operating system but it sure is established and working. With most distribution itīs no longer a real challenge to install them. I managed to install an intranet server from scratch for my home with a Debian distribution in about 20 minutes of work (actual installation took longer but didnīt need supervision) despite having no prior Linux experience.
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If it isnīt broken, it doesnīt have enough features yet.