New to Linux- New Asus Laptop

[Ichy]

Hello Linux Forum members! I have been wanting to switch to linux for a while, I am a gamer so i know I'll be duel booting; until steam becomes native. I am used to command lines as I do have a lot of experience in programming languages. Most of what i will be using it for is for 3d purpuses, using Autodesk's Maya software, Softimage and Nuke for composting. this also includes mel (a node based language like c/c++ native to maya) and python scripting/programming/learning; learning more so for python.

I have a new Asus RoG (republic of gamers) laptop that currently is running windows 7 ultimate, and I wanted to duel boot a linux distro. So My question is thus, do popular Linux distro's contain support for new Laptops. More specifically Arch Linux, Slackware, or Ubuntu. I do want to actually learn Linux, so I'll probably stay away from Ubuntu after reviewing the "linuxquestions.org" forums.

the reason I ask is because I've noticed a lot of Linux users aren't really using the newest or hottest hardware around and was concerned about... drivers and comparability issues. I'll do more research into duel booting linux when windows 7/mac osx is already installed.. Unless some kind soul would be graciouse enough to post a link to a good tutorial on how to do it.

Thank you all!

 

[amdfangirl]

Use Fedora or Linux Mint, both have good support for new hardware. As for a dual-booting guide, Google it. There are so many it's not even funny.

 

[bmouring]

Realistically, you can use any Linux distro to learn about Linux (they all come with the good stuff: easy access to tools to build what you want to use, terminals, kernel source repositories, powerful package managers, etc.)

I would suggest using a VM to taste-test some of the more popular distros out there to see which of them you prefer best (and, in some non-intuitive way, using a few systems will actually push you to understand the underlying systems a bit better anyway) before proceeding with greater-than-zero-but-not-excessively-so risk of dual-boot setup. My personal suggestions would be Mint, Fedora, Arch, Debian, and, yes, at least give some version of Ubuntu a spin, at least to try it out.

Once you've gotten comfortable with working with Linux, you may want to roll up your sleeves and get your hands dirty with something like Linux from Scratch (or the with-training-wheels-packaged-with-a-nice-package-manager version, Gentoo)

 

[Ichy]

Thanks for the reply guys. I grabbed virtual box to try out arch.. read up on it and like the rolling release concept and some of its other features.. I've tried ubuntu before as a vm with its own built in vm.. forgot what it was called.. didn't like it.. probably because of the gnome desktop. I'll prob grab Slack, and Mint as well eventually.

 

[bmouring]

.. didn't like it.. probably because of the gnome desktop. .../quotemsg]
Again, the beauty of Linux: I have Mint 11 installed on my dev machine at work, didn't really care for Gnome3, installed and configured fluxbox just the way I like it.