UNIX for Dummies Questions & Answers

First off, hello all, I'm brand new to the forum!! I look forward to learning alot here. Secondly, I'm sorry if this has been asked before, as I did search several ways, but the results were rather overwhelming. I'm trying to determine which Linux distribution I am going to purchase. If I had my way about it, I would go with Red Hat. However, I have a Compaq laptop (what in God's dear name was I thinking!!) with ATI Mobility Radeon M6-P graphics card and I'm having difficulties getting startx in RedHat 7.1 to recognize the card and the laptop LCD display. The installer GUI comes up just fine, but the graphic desktop gives me issues. Anyways, I'm thinking that maybe RedHat 9 would now have support for these, but from the brief search I've done on google, it looks as if its still not supported in RedHat 9 either (but again, I don't know this for sure). The upside to all this however, has to be that I've heard that Mandrake Linux (9.1 I'm assuming, maybe even earlier) supports this particular graphics card and display. Basically, I guess my question is will I be disappointed in Mandrake Linux, as compared to RedHat, or is is six one-half dozen the other?? Sorry again this is so long winded, but I REALLY have an urge to learn the material and I'm anxious to dive in ASAP. Thanks for the help.

AP

The choice is personal. Both are great Linux distributions.

Neo

According to your X problem on your laptop, the LCD has a fixed frequency. Search in google for XFree86 Laptop, and you'll soon have an answer.

hiho,

Do you know KNOPPIX? It is a bootable CD with a collection of GNU/Linux software, automatic hardware detection, and support for many graphics cards, sound cards, SCSI and USB devices and other peripherals. KNOPPIX can be used as a Linux demo, educational CD, rescue system, or adapted and used as a platform for commercial software product demos. It is not necessary to install anything on a hard disk KNOPPIX is a debian based system, so it works with dpkg and apt.
KNOPPIX is really one of the best ways to show everyone how powerfull and also wonderfull linux is... you when you enjoy the distri you also can install it..... just try it...

http://www.knopper.net/knoppix/index-en.html

greetings Preßy