On Sun, Mar 02, 2008 at 09:13:53PM -0000, alex wallis wrote: > I'm wanting to get set up with a linux OS, but I don't really want to go > down the route of jewel boot, and I don't have enough resources to run linux > under vmware. Hello and welcome to the list, Have you ever heard of "LiveCDs?" Dunno if 512 is enough memory to run everything you might want, but LiveCDs run in memory alone. Just pop in the CD and start the machine, and voila, you're running Linux. Unless you manage to mount the Windows partition and try to write things there, it doesn't even touch the hard drive. There are a few flavors of linux that offer LiveCDs, like Ubuntu, GRML, , Fedora (I think), and Oralux, to name a few. They'll even get you online if your system isn't too complicated. Anyway, you can use those to play around in linux and see if you like it and leave Windows as-is. Documentation is usually included right on the CD and can be viewed with Windows Notepad or a web browser Get yourself a few blank CDs and try them all. I run Debian (no LiveCD) because of the package (software) manager is the best in the biz, and 99.9% of the time you don't have to search the web to find any software. The entire collection can be installed with multiple front-ends to the dpkg program (Debian's package manager), or go the command line route and just type 'aptitude install <package' to connect to debian.org, download and install the program. HTH, Michael
