Linux Ubuntu

[Lankidoodles]

I'm thinking of changing my operating system from Windows XP to Linux Ubuntu im just wondering if Ubuntu is a good operating system and what are the advantages of it and disadvantages.

Thanks alot xx

[Llamatron]

What do you use your PC for?

If you just surf the net then Linux will be fine, in fact it'll be a lot safer than using XP.

OpenOffice is a fair substitute for Microsoft Office providing, like most of us, you don't use 80% of Office's whizz bang features.

I've used Gimp for photo editing but it's nowhere near as feature rich as Adobe Photoshop or Corel.

Download the CD and have a play around.
Windows and Linux are quite quite different.

http://www.ubuntu.com/getubuntu/download

I believe you can boot off the CD and run the OS without actually having to install anything.

[fo3nix]

If you're wanting to learn more about GNU/Linux and play with it, then Ubuntu is the most user-friendly right now.

However I'd suggest you install it on another partition (or even better, another drive), so that if you don't like it you can always revert back to XP.

Remember that not all the same Windows programs work on GNU/Linux. There's no photoshop (Gimp is a poor alternative; the interface is awful), and sometimes it's just not as easy to do stuff as it is in Windows.

[boobesque]

and if you want to keep using linux thereafter i suggest getting rid of ubuntu for a good distro such as fedora or slackware or maybe even mepis

[fo3nix]

Personally I'd stick with Ubuntu ;)