Exactly what is it? I know Ubuntu is a freeware Linux OS, but what are the benefits of it over Windows 7? In short, what would be the reason for downloading it?
If you’re that clueless, don’t do it.
It is not compatible out of the box with windows programs.
It is a completely different way to interface with your computer. There’s no start menu, etc.
Saying that, that is the only OS I have installed on my laptop that I use at university. It’s nice if you know what you’re doing. It’s more secure, and you need not worry about viruses. It’s pretty stable too. Plus you can interact deep down with the system more so (generally) than with windows.
Trust me, I wasn’t thinking about installing it at all, just wanted to get some information on it. By deep down in the system, you mean bios/console I’m guessing. It’s benefits are really just those? What does it lack in comparison to Windows, and why do you have to know what you are doing? I’m pretty good with computers as a general statement, but I’m a bit of a Windows guy, had a Mac for a few years and it was terrible in comparison, so I’d like to know about the other “big” OS.
No, BIOS is a part of the motherboard, not the OS.
Um the only thing Ubuntu lacks in comparison to Windows is compatibility and user friendliness.
It has many benefits. It’s largely customizable (check out a youtube video on one of the composition managers available for it – “compiz” being the most popular)
It’s typically faster too. I’d just google “benefits of linux” if you want more in-depth answers.
Ok, thanks for the help.
you don’t need to install linux to try it, download the iso and put it on a disc, then boot from the disc and it will load without installing anything on your hard drive or even accessing it, linux can easily boot off any media, right into the actual desktop user interface
Ubuntu is one of the leading distros but that doesn’t make it the best, if after using it for a while you feel something’s missing you can always switch to another distribution, there are boatloads of them to choose from
If I were to run it off the disk, it would be slower though, yes? Could use that to test if I get more interested in it.
writing long ass posts while stoned as fuck here we go
depends on what you mean, loading times are slower (duh), the performance (FPS) is completely unaffected however you won’t be able to keep changes after reboot unless
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you install it on a spare flash drive
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you install to HDD
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Ubuntu has a very easy built-in tool to install itself to a USB storage device and make that bootable too, it’s much faster (depends on your flash drive) than the so-called live-CD and allows persistent changes like documents, new software and UI settings.
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Linux can live alongside your windows disk space and ubuntu will automatically insert NTLDR (windows bootloader) into the startup menu (before linux starts loading) however you need to think about how much HDD space you have to spare and how much you might need for linux because you need to specify that during the partitioning part of the installation.
Fuckin stoners…:hmph: (jokes)
But yeah, he has his shit together.
try Ubuntu off a cd, and play around, as long as you’re not :retard: it’s a good way to learn about it.
I understand the bottom part, but not the top 
How do you know about me? Should I be checking my house for cameras?
He wasn’t talking about you:
Please keep in mind this forum is best viewed with your eyes open.
Always a good idea. Make sure the tin foil on your ceiling is still adequate while you’re at it, it keeps them from reading your brainwaves you know…
Be aware that learning ubuntu means reading a lot of forum posts, which are in many cases outdated. Ubuntu is one of the best “newbee” Linux distros, because you can do many things without using the Linux shell/console. I hope you know that installing programs in Linux is far different as in Windows. You have to install programs via packagemanagers like apt-get/aptidute through console or Synaptic. Doubleclicking .exe may work if you have wine installed. Wine is some kind of an Windows emulating program in order to install Windows programs in Linux distros.
You may have problems with hardware initially if it’s new. Wireless cards in particular can be problematic. I used to use ubuntu on my old PC and just tried it on a Samsung R580 laptop and the monitor brightness control doesn’t work despite all the advice from the community so I uninstalled.
Wireless cards aren’t too bad if you can get hold of the xp driver and used it with ndiswrapper.
btw WINE is not a windows emulator (it actually stand for Wine Is Not an Emulator!). It aims to provide a compatibility layer for windows programs in linux by recreating the windows API. It doesn’t run everything and you often have to mess around with it to get things to work properly. There is a compatibility list here so if there are any windows programs you want to run check it’s in the list.
Linux isn’t really a gaming platform as sadly microsoft has pushed directx so hard. For a while openGL couldn’t keep up but it appears to have finally hit a level playing field with 4.1 but only new cards support it.
I like ubuntu as it’s so fast and hardly ever crashes. You can be up and surfing the net before the windows splash screen disappears in a lot of cases.
I know that wine is no emulator, but it’s the best way to describe Linux noobs what it does(especially since my english isn’t good).
I didn’t had any real driver problem. Just the Ati hd 2000 driver sucks, but since there aren’t any games with real high graphics it isn’t a real problem.
I passed through my ubuntu phase back in 2006, when XGL/Beryl had just came out and working nvidia card drivers were released. I remember I had to manually edit sources.list, menu.lst, xorg.conf and a bunch of other shit to get it up and running. I even had to enable an extra set of packages to play mp3 files. nowdays it’s all built in and noob friendly…
it’s just okay to me, you should have seen me setting up Arch Linux
Picture you crippling.
i was pretty patient, i just didn’t understand everything 
I’d be surprised if you did with those OS’. 
Did you get it in the end? If not, just follow the beginners guide and it’s not too hard.