Linux or windows (university)

Two important factors have the whole weight of the linux or windows decision for me, and truth-be told, I can't answer them myself, hence I ask those who are more knowledged/experienced then I to help out.

I bought a Latitude D630 (Dell)
the specs are on my signature


I need to know if Linux will be fully compatible with this notebook. (I will also game a bit, dungeon seige 2, starcraft, age of empires II & III, CS:S)

secondly, I am beginning University soon, I was wondering if using Linux in a CANADIAN university will hurt.I know that the whole university runs on windows XP, so what WONT i be able to do on campus, that other windows users will be able to do with ease?



thx

 

Someone correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe that the Linux community's support for Dells, especially for the Latitude line is particularly strong, any hardware included that isn't already supported shouldn't be too long before it is.

I see you skipped the Intel wireless option though, I think you'll have to use NDISwrapper to get that working, as I've heard there's no open source Broadcom wireless driver.


If you want to use Linux, and you want to game, then your best bet is probably to just dual boot. You CAN use Wine or Cedega, but it doesn't work for all games/programs (check compatibility here, and here).

As for using Linux at college, I don't know if anything's different in Canada (I imagine not so much), but at my own university, there's isn't really anything in terms of network usage that I can't do that Windows users can. Getting on our wireless WPA-RADIUS server is easier using GNOME's Network Manager than it is using most Windows solutions.

In terms of classwork, it really just depends on what program you're in, and what classes you're taking. I'm in the Computer Science and Applied Math program at my school and for the vast majority of my work, I haven't needed Windows at all. Other programs however may require you to run some Windows only software, like if you're in an Engineering program and need to run CAD all the time or something. Or if you're in a Web Design class, they may specifically teach using Adobe Photoshop, or Macromedia DreamWeaver.

I love Linux and highly advocate using it, however, if you're in school, I highly recommend having access to Windows one way or another (dual boot, a virtual machine, or access to a computer lab). How often will depend on your specific classes, but you will want to have access to Windows for those times when you are forced to use some piece of Windows only software. While Wine CAN work for some programs, it is a bit fussy, I don't think it's worth the headache if assignments/grades are on the line.

 

If you can't tell if Linux would do what you need, make sure you keep Windows. I'd suggest dual-booting. I can tell you that if you install a 32bit version of Linux, recent versions of Wine should run Starcraft fine. Not sure about other games

 

I also think that dual booting would be the best course for anyone who wants to work with linux. You don't have to quit Windows cold turkey (like I did) and you can learn a lot about how it works, the filesystem, and gaming while having a backup. If working with ndiswrapper is too much for you, you can boot into windows on campus and linux back home/apartment.

 

As a linux user at my uni...

The wireless didn't work last year, but this was because they required you to be using a particular anti-virus program which wasn't applicable with linux. I expect that this will be fixed for the next semester, but it is something you might want to check.

Also, as an English student who used the university labs for all my printing, it was a little frustrating cleaning up my documents in Word after they were written/saved in OpenOffice. I didn't find either of these to be a deal-breaker though, and I haven't really looked back from the switch, although I do keep a dual-boot for playing games.

 

Your wireless card likely won't work in Linux; you should've gone with the Intel card.

Secondly, you can likely get many of those games working in Linux, but it will be a much bigger hassle than just running Windows.

And thirdly, I have found that at many non-technical geared schools, the IT department is... shall I say... dumb. Therefore, like me, you may have network and wireless issues. It's not an easy task, and I would recommend you to at least dual-boot before you try to go to Linux completely.

 

Great! Thx for all your replies

Guess i'll suffer through windows for the next 6 years...


As a quick question, would it be possible to install Linux on an Eternal Harddrive, and use it only when I plug it in, and keep windows on my primary HDD... which is only 80 gb after all.


thx again!

 

yes.

if your whole school is set up for xp, using xp for interoperability is a smart idea.

also- you will have a MUCH better experience running windows native games in windows.

 

I'm pondering the same thing tbh. Except I'm already dual booting.

I'm starting my second year of my CS degree this autumn, and I had my first real go at Linux not a month ago. I'm currently dual booting Vista Business and Ubuntu Feisty on my nc8430 - that is, I'm using Ubuntu for the most part. Windows if I by chance should want to game (I don't game much recently).
I say go for it, set up dual boot. If you experience issues, you can always use windows at campus, or simply (try to) solve them.

I've learned so much by just using and setting up my system the few weeks I've been using Linux.

You may want to read these (from http://www.linux-on-laptops.com/):
Ubuntu on my Dell Latitude D630
Installing Debian "Etch" on Dell Latitude D630
I'm sure you can find more user experiences by searching a bit aswell.

 

StarCraft FTW!

 

You can transition slowly as you learn Linux better and learn how your school's network works That's what I did... I just started using Linux more and more as I was in school.

And tell me where you get these eternal hard drives I hate when mine crash and lose data. But you can do it on an eXternal hard drive, I'm almost certain of it, as long as your BIOS supports booting from USB devices.

 

Askarii,
I imagine as long as your laptop can boot from USB, it should be (theoretically) possible to put Linux on there and use it that way. However, I wouldn't recommend it. Dual boot if you must, but if you're going to try Linux, might as well use part of your primary hard drive. You don't really need all that much space for a Linux, besides my home directory (where I keep all my multimedia stuff), on this machine (running Arch) is taking up less than 4 GB (including a 1 GB swap partition).

As long as you keep your documents and media files on a shared partition, I see no reason why hard drive space should be prohibitive in dual booting Linux. I'm assuming that that's why you want to run it on an external hard drive, since you mentioned that your primary hard drive has "only" 80 GB.

 

It is definitely possible to run Linux on an external hard drive connected through a SATA to USB interface. I'm typing this in a Firefox window running on a Ubuntu distribution installed on such a setup. This is a temporary situation for me while I wait for my new laptop. It works alright but can get really slow if there's a lot of swapping.

 

Meh, I'm going to repeat everyone else and say dual-boot Windows with Linux. Currently, my comp has Ubuntu 7.04 and Windows XP Pro installed on it. The installation procedure is simple, but you need at least two partitions. I would recommend a third partition for personal files (a.k.a. /home in Linux). Oh, and install Linux AFTER you install Windows if you want to use the correct boot loader.

 

Seriously, why don't you just dual boot that computer. It's very easy, and you get to play around in both worlds. With all the hard drive space we have nowadays that we can't possible use, why not just have two OS's on the same machine? Later on, if you find you don't use or need or want one of them, no loss. Just delete the partition it's on and create a new one in it's place. The latest versions of Linux can totally read and write your Windows folders, and Windows can read and write on the Linux ones too with just a tiny free download that allows it to see the other partitions... so you pretty much get complete interoperability.

 

You can boot Ubuntu from CD and test drive it to see how it works with your laptop. I did this with my Dell, and it handled all of the hardware without issues.