So, you have decided to abandon the mighty Micro$oft and try something different.. Prepare for challenge! Joking, of course.

Installation of Linux can be very painless. Unfortunately, the amount of trouble you are going to get depends on your hardware. And mostly important, peripherals like modems, soundcards, etc. Sure, PnP is good, when something does all the work for you, but if you happen to have a PnP modem or a soundcard, you might get a little frustrated while trying to get it to work.

For a HOWTO on hardware compatibility go to http://sunsite.unc.edu/mdw/HOWTO/Hardware-HOWTO.html , but just to throw in few things:

• If you have a Winmodem or any Win-hardware, you will not be able to get them to work with Linux. So, if you have a USR Winmodem, buy a different one.
• The good video card is important, if you are planning on running XWindows.
• Before starting the installation, go to Windows, Start menu, Settings, System. In there, go through the each device and write down all info you can find, more specifically I/O bases, IRQs, DMAs, Brand names ( Break out the old manuals that came with your computer, and find amount of RAM on your video card, hsync/vsync of your monitor. You will need them to configure your XWindows). If you don't have those manuals and put your computer together yourself, then you probably know all that already.
• Sit down and think over how to partition your drive. Normally, it depends on your needs, but just a general thought: root should not be larger than 100M. /usr should be of a decent size, since most programs will be installed there. Then, if you are thinking about having many users in your machine, /home should be given a separate chuck of your hard drive.

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