I am thinking of moving to the linux OS. Does anyone have any comments on the following questions: 1. By using Linux, would I be getting any real improvement in security? 2. What's the best Linux distribution?
In my opinion: 1. Improvement due to less malware (most people in my experience don't run AV unless sending files to Windows machines). Most security software available for Windows you can get for Linux or similar products will do the same thing. 2. Depends on what you want to do or prefer. Good starter distros are Ubuntu or I prefer Linux Mint (Both are OK to game on aswell). There are lots of other ones depending on your experience level. hxxp://distrowatch.com is a good site for lots of different distros with news.
1. Yes. You can browse the web without worry about viruses. You can download software without worry about getting tricked into installing adware. 2. Go with Linux mint. Its the most complete and best out of the box distribution. I would suggest you learn how to use Clonezilla for easy back up and restore and then play around with other distros such as Ubuntu, Kubuntu, and so on. After awhile you will settle on Linux distro that you enjoy the most. Personally I started with Ubuntu then Linux Mint and Im now on openSUSE.
1 - Yes. Linux is safer by design. But it does NOT mean it's invulnerable. For example, don't run "BritneySpearsNaked.sh", don't install software from 3rd parties (only stick with the Official Repositories), use good passphrases, don't run as root, etc, etc. 2 - For beginners, Linux Mint.
The most popular is the best. Why? Because if you do more than browsing, like gaming, you'll have problems and you'll need support to solve the problems. Take for example Linux games on Steam. Lots of problems with them.
please read these they give you pretty idea what is offering what http://distrowatch.com/dwres.php?resource=major choose any if you new to linux go with linux mint or ubuntu (one best linux among all) if you want rocksolid linux with kde experience go for open suse or mageia you want rocksolid experience and little advance user experience want classic go with redhat clones in linux mint or ubuntu as security all you need is start basic firewall.........install rkhunter thats all ............ for advance security you can go with apparmor/selinux...............etc
Huh? I've had 0 problems with Linux games on Steam. The few there is so far, that is. If I ever switch my main desktop to Linux, it will be for SteamOS.
I have around 30 games and I think I had problems with at least a quarter of them. From games trying to use both monitors instead of one to stupid auto scroll.
While opensuse seems to have stopped my distro hopping addiction, I would not recommand this distribution to a new user. There are several reasons: 1) not a straight forward usb installation 2) lots of errors on initial boot which resolve with updates but could be challanging to a new user 3) no out of the box codec support 4) installing new programs requires using Yast which is not as straight forward as Ubuntu or Linux mint app store 5) trackpoint support requires creating special rules with root privalages which again is challanging to a new user. If you are going for gaming then I would recommand Ubuntu, just becuase that distribution is supported by Steam. Use Ubuntu as a transition linux distribution and then jump ship to Linux Mint. For those who are gaming in here... does LM supports Steam out of the box or do you have to do some work? After few weeks when you become more comfortable with terminal, creating rules and configuration files then I would highly recommand openSUSE. It has the most beautiful desktop.
Not many problems on Mint with Steam. The tray icon doesn't work right (right click and left click do the same thing) & the notification menu is behind Cinnamon so when a friend will join a game you won't see what game. Personally, I wouldn't recommend any distro which requires use of terminal even if you're expert on Linux. Using terminal to do things should disapear.
Many things are done much faster with the command-line. The command prompt is still available in Windows, by the way. (at least Win7)
Why? GUI is more convenient for some things, terminal more for others. Use the right tool for the job. No! Don't do that! Find out what the commands do first, read the man pages, read the documentation. Please don't blindly run stuff you find online. If you run stuff without knowing what it does, you won't learn anything useful and might wind up deleting all your data some day.
Ooops. I think I came across wrong. What i meant is that using terminal is not hard. There is nothing hard about copying and pasting a command. Obviously I find out what the command does first. I would never blindly execute a command on my laptop. Also there are resources and people I trust more such as askubuntu or dedicated distro forums. My point was that terminal is really easy to use and there are a lot of great people out there willing to help you out with common linux problems.
I do lots of copy/pasting from web resources into the terminal because I usually have to get something fixed or working right and I don't want to spend loads of time researching what the commands mean, if I don't already know. It's a great time saver. I will sometimes try to figure these things out later when I have time. I also copy from sources I trust. If something does happen to go wrong, who cares, I just restore an image. Usually I never get burned this way, but if I do it's often video driver-realted. Darn nVidia