# Which version to download/install?



## celticbrooder (Feb 29, 2012)

Hello, newbie here (first foray into Linux land ;-)

Actually have 2 machines I'd like to try my hand with Linux/FreeBSD.

Chaintech CT-6BTM MoBo, Intel 440BX/DX, PIII 450(Katami), 1G RAM (4x256), NVidia GeForce2 MX/MX400 AGP (64MB), RTL8139D NIC.
Mercury KOB 694x TFSX MoBo, Via VT82C694x, Celeron 1.2M, 762MB RAM (3x256), NVidia GeForce2 MX/MX400 AGP (64MB), RTL8139C

One of them for music, DVD, on line news (have a couple of TV Tuner cards - might be neat to get one of those running ;-)

The other is for background music, downloads, burning discs and general PC "mule" work like 64-pass RAM scans, zero-writing HDDs... stuff that can take hours and I don't want to tie-up my main (3rd) machine.

Question: at the ftp there was a "current", "stable" and, among others, "i386" versions

I can burn an iso, just wondering which to download and try first.

thanks

p.s. also have a Promise FastTrak100 2/4x PCI/IDE controller; BIOS doesn't allow booting to RAID controller but, with 4 healthy WD BB-sries HDDs, in addition to a primary boot drive, a 4x RAID 0 might be kinda spiffy ;-)


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## DutchDaemon (Feb 29, 2012)

celticbrooder said:
			
		

> Hello, newbie here (first foray into Linux land ;-)



I urge you to take a step back, and read FreeBSD? So, what is it?, because that is about the worst possible first line you can post on a FreeBSD forum ... FreeBSD is not (a) Linux, it pre-dates Linux, and it has an entirely different architecture.


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## celticbrooder (Feb 29, 2012)

apologies... had checked several sites regarding "best" Linux "distro"(?) for beginners and my intents; looked like PCLinuxOS or Free BSD... guess I was mistaken... thanks anyways.


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## Beastie (Feb 29, 2012)

celticbrooder said:
			
		

> apologies... had checked several sites regarding "best" Linux "distro"(?) for beginners and my intents; looked like PCLinuxOS or Free BSD... guess I was mistaken... thanks anyways.


Well, just because FreeBSD is not a GNU/Linux distro doesn't mean you can't try it! 



			
				celticbrooder said:
			
		

> Question: at the ftp there was a "current", "stable" and, among others, "i386" versions
> 
> I can burn an iso, just wondering which to download and try first.


You probably should start with RELEASE for i386. You may want to use STABLE later on if you want. Have a look at this Handbook chapter for more information.


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## DutchDaemon (Feb 29, 2012)

No problem. You could try PC-BSD (http://www.pc-bsd.org), which is a pre-configured FreeBSD plus desktop out of the box. FreeBSD is a great OS. It's just not Linux.


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## throAU (Mar 1, 2012)

I second the recommendation for PC-BSD.  Allocate an entire disk to it, and the installer is as simple as any out there (e.g., Ubuntu - Linux).

If you've never used a Unix before, Ubuntu and PC-BSD are probably the easiest 2 variants to start off with.


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