Xrati said:
How do these OS's function with the different motherboards and chipsets out there?
99% of the time it will auto-detect everything and work right away. Might need to find the name of the chipset for your ethernet controller first, but it will give you a big list to choose from.
Xrati said:Is it going to take days to get up and running once you install one of them?
No, not really. Getting SE4 and other games running well might take some time, but other functionality will be ready as soon as the install is complete.
Thermodyne said:
For a free first nix install, redhat is an easy install.
I wouldn't recommend Red Hat. It is a very annoying distro, and it's RPM system is pretty aggravating in general. A real hassle of a distro, in my experience. Debian's Aptitude is just beautiful.