Anyone care to recommend a particular distribution? I'm going to use it just to run Apache, php and MySQL; not for any public purpose, but just to practice on. I'll still be using Windows for everything else.

Thankee. :)

Just those? Redhat. :nice:

Fedora Core, basicly the same thing as Red Hat.

Just about anything which run those services and uses LinuxSE, or some form of protection & encryption, as a base.

Ubuntu. Debian-based (so you use apt-get for package management, which, imo, is better than rpm), and in my experience, a lot less hassle than FC. Also, it's a much smaller download than FC - 1 CD versus 4.

edit: in a (vain?) attempt to avoid having this turn into a counterproductive thread with a million and one conflicting recommendations, I'd have to say that I've found Fedora Core (I've played around with FC2 and 3) to be pretty solid and user-friendly; please don't interpret my first paragraph as some sort of bashing of a good distro.

FreeBSD....ports rock.

Thanks for the input, all. I'll probably just go with Fedora since it seems to be one of the most popular.

KNOPPIX!!!!! Its extremely easy to use and fun too.

I like Mandrake (now called Mandriva)

:topic::

I didn't find my windows cd, so I installed redhat9.0 - it kept asking me to write in my username and password. Problem being that I'd never given it a username and password. Based on that, I say linux sucks :o

:topic::

I didn't find my windows cd, so I installed redhat9.0 - it kept asking me to write in my username and password. Problem being that I'd never given it a username and password. Based on that, I say linux sucks :oYou had to have. if you didn't, try root as the user name and a blank password.

I might still have it installed, if so I'll try that when I get home. Thanks.

It did ask me for a password two times :l but never any username.

I've been doing this for years and the problems with running a dual boot with windows has me staying away from redhat.

When you get tired of redhat fustration you can upgrade to Mandriva LE 2005. Mandrake has been ranking above redhat at distro watch for as long as I've been looking.

I'm in now, and I have to say. If it wasn't for the incredibly poor usability, the trouble you have to go through to get something installed and the fact that almost none of the programs I commonly use are available for linux - it might be quite good :l

I'm in now, and I have to say. If it wasn't for the incredibly poor usability, the trouble you have to go through to get something installed That's redhat

I hear many good things about Ubuntu (http://www.ubuntulinux.org/)

yes but the newest mandrake has a bug that gets you linuxant full drivers for free