In general, Intel chipsets are well supported under Linux. Many Intel chipsets even support Compiz enabled 3D desktops out of the box. Intel does a decent job of providing true open source drivers to be included in Linux distributions.

Same as installing XP from scratch, you need to go in knowing what video card (chipset) and other hardware you have. Then go from there, in terms of installing and tweaking the best drivers.

We kinda need to take the troubleshooting effort one step at a time to determine why you're having problems. My guess is that the current Live CDs you're booting with are not automatically recognizing type and specs of monitor you have. But, that's speculation on my part at this point in the game.

Going by the PDF you posted of the nVidia based system, I recommend you try adding the parameters to boot with a generic vesa driver.

Did you try that on the nVidia box (or any other box). If so, what were your results?

I recently switched to half-linux, too, just to try out some things.
In the past, I tried to install linux as a second destibution, too. I got some problems, didn't get any internet connection, no WLAN drivers worked, and all the reboots and so on were quite annoying. So I now decided to download "vmware", emulate a virtual machine on my XP dist, and install ubuntu 10.04 on it. It worked perfectly fine, I fell in love with the "apt-get install" command, and GIMP was installed within seconds.
I'd just recommend installing a virtual machine on your Windows partition first, to check whether you like the different Linux versions or not. You can install as many different VMs as you like to. This does not only save CDs, it also works a lot faster and safer.

Just my two cents.

Baum ;D


€dit:
This site actually sells linux. I'm not sure this should be done in any way

Well, I got fedora and ubuntu working. I'm having a little trouble getting my wireless working but everything works right nonetheless. Now the adventure begins.

how much space do you have to have to install it..vmware and ubuntu 10.04?
is vmware free?

vmware player is free, but vmware has some non-free software aswell, so be sure to download the correct thing.
vmware installer ~85 mb (download)
ubuntu 10.04 ~500 mb (download)
partition with Linux ~minimum of 7gb

I should have been clearer with my last post rather than leave it hanging. Sorry about that.
On my desktop computer I noticed that my video board is an nvidia FX62000 but my driver was for an FX 5500. I completely removed the driver and then installed the right one and my desktop works now with Linux (Fedora and ubuntu). Regarding my spare Dell, after paying better attention to the boot tup screen i realized how to boot from the CD and that works too.
So thanks for the pointers and advice.

An hour later, this is my first use of Linux,now to decide what software to find, I was thinking about krita.

Yes, this is a good method for trying out the various Linux Distros or for running a mix of operating systems on the same host, whether you use Windows or not.

I have a bunch of drives ranging from 40g-200g so I just load up distros on one of those when I want to play.

Glad to hear you're making progress. There are 3 different nVidia drivers; one for the current cards and two legacy card versions. I use the 173xx driver for my FX5200. I'm happy they are still supporting my old MX4000 card with the 96xx drivers.

I did notice that there are no 96XX Legacy drivers in the RPMfusion repos for F13 but nVidia has updated the drivers to work with Xorg 1.8. Hopefully, they will have those drivers in the repos before F14.

Due to Fedora releasing a new version every 6-7 months, I usually skip a release or two. I'm currently running F12 on my main box so I'll look at F14 after it has been out a couple of months. Official updates and support for a given version of Fedora will continue until several months after (release#+2) so updates for F12 will be provided until F14 + two months(or so). That's the Fedora support cycle in place now. Most people are ready to upgrade by then anyway.

I haven't used Krita lately but they were making good progress with it last time I checked. It was designed to run on the K desktop. Have you tried out the K-Desktop environment yet? I liked the early versions but I abandoned K when they moved to 4.0 and redesigned it. I think they released it too soon and the way things worked in the new version, came as a bit of a shock. Maybe I'll take another look at it soon. Perhaps I'll like it better now that it's matured a little more.

Sorry for my long winded ramblings.

Just want to say: Buy a small pack of quality DVD RWs, that way you can try hundreds of Linux distros without needing a hundred discs. Also, be prepared to rescue your system if for any reason an installer fails or messing up your bootloader.

Not trying to scare you, just saying that Linux tools are powerful, so be careful and be ready to figure things out yourself.

I've figured things out about computers since 1979, so i'm more than ready. Since i posted the first post on Linux I've found answers to every question i had.

Okay. I was in a rush and didn't read the entire thread.