Topic: XP BSOD, O RLY?

I'm getting a little fed up with the XP BSOD (critial error encountered, beginning physical memory dump, yadda yadda) showing up on my PC, mostly when I reseat the wireless USB connector. I'm thinking it's something wrong with my HDD, so I'm going to back up my data, clean both HDDs out (since the current secondary is larger than the primary anyway), and start anew.

My question has to do with OS's. I could easily pop over to buycheapsoftware.com and grab an OEM of XP, but would I be better off using this opportunity to get acquainted with Linux? What's holding me back is the sheer number of PC games I play (WoW, Civ 4, Battlefield, Battle for Middle-Earth, possibly GalCiv2 and Oblivion in the future) and the applications I use (Photoshop, Flash, Dreamweaver, etc).

I've looked at a couple Windows emulators for Linux but still am uncertain. Any advice from more Linux-savvy inmates would be most appreciated!

~~~
Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. - Albert Einstein


(Edited by Gothmatum on 08-14-2006 21:56)

I'm not too savvy but I know you can use Cedega with a lot of games to emulate directX and UT works with linux.

You gotta install windows first though if you want to dual boot, which is probably the better option for games. Photoshop and games are also why I'm still a windows user.

If you're going to wipe your harddrive, then yes this is a perfect time to allocate some space with which you can try another OS.

I agree with Reisio. No reason not to try linux if you have the space. Split the hard drive up in half when you wipe it clean and install Windows and then install Linux like Hugh suggested.

I might suggest trying Ubuntu or Kubuntu. Ubuntu uses the Gnome window manager while Kubuntu uses KDE. KDE is a bit more like Winders.

Later,

C:\

This is why I want to switch:
http://www.novell.com/linux/xglrelease/

A friend has it on his laptop it looks great and handy.
I've always planned on switching (I'd probably give gentoo.org a go) so it may never happen.

It's not handy or useful at all, but if you like how it looks, you like how it looks. I remember watching the tour videos on novell.com when it first came out and the guy narrating the video actually said something like "Yeah, so...that's Xgl - not particularly useful or anything, but...yeah...".

If you just want transparency and shadows, you don't need Xgl - X.org has had transparency for a while. 3ddesktop has been around, too. The only new thing with Xgl is the implementation (and newb-friendly TLA). Won't hurt to use Xgl, though.

kind of off topic, but what distribution of linux do you run reisio?

Later,

C:\

Gentoo atm.

Actually... since I'm contemplating some sort of dual boot setup to try Linux in an attempt to bring stability to my PC, that is sort of on-topic.

I know very little about the different Linux distributions...

~~~
Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. - Albert Einstein

I recommend just doing some reading on them yourself - Wikipedia will probably be enough. Consider licenses, and the entities that produce the distro (international volunteer group? company in it for the money? hobbyist teenager in his basement?). Consider what comes preinstalled and if you care, whether you prefer GUI tools or CLI tools, binary packages or building from source, conforms to popular schemas or takes the road less travelled, whether it's a distro actually made by its production group or is just a derivative of another distro and merely a modification. Probably worth considering the BSDs, too.