thanks fran and bill, i will check those out...and bill yes i am getting tired of windows, and from what i have been reading vista is just gonna be a whole lot more P.I.T.A. whereas everything i read about linux is the opposite(forgetting install and getting drivers issues)..far less in the way of viruses, much more stable system and lots more...and to be honest i get tired of having to have a dual boot pc, so that my DAW partition doesn't get trashed by some internet nasties...anyhow thanks again for the tips on software...btw any tips for which linux distro to use?
cheers
dennis
PS hope others can join in on this issue .. i'm not trying to hijack it and turn it into a Q+A thread.....the more opinions the better!!

[This message has been edited by miden (edited 04-20-2007).]