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I still don't know where to go for finding programs to download and install.
Google.

e.g., Google for "Linux program to edit videos". You will rapidly find mention of many video editor programs. That's how I found "Kdenlive", "OpenShot", and "Avidemux" - the three video editors (among many) that I decided were the best for my specific needs. I decided by going to each programs main web page, looking at feature lists, gazing as screenshots of the program in action, reading reviews, looking at Youtube tutorials on program use, etc.

Once you've decided you want to try one of these programs, it's usually as simple as typing something like the following on the command line:

"apt-get install kdenlive"

Of, if you're not savvy on the command line, you can click on "Package Manager" in the start menu and install it that way.

These commands above are dependent on the specific distro you are running. The above examples are for Debian-based distros (like Ubuntu, LinuxMint, etc.) FYI, when you click on "Package Manager" on a Debian-based distro that would fire up the "Synaptic" program under the hood. However, on a RedHat-based distro, that would fire up the "RPM" program.

In Linux, many programs are just wrappers for other programs. e.g., the actual program that installs "packages" (programs) on Debian is "dpkg". To make dpkg simpler to use, the program "apt" wraps around it. And to make apt easier to use (and to add a GUI), the "Synaptic" program wraps around apt. You can install what you want with any of these, depending on your knowledge and experience. And there are other ways to install stuff as well, but no need to go into that now.
 
A note about pushing older PC's to the limit with Linux: I programmed/installed Linux Lubuntu (latest addition) as the OS on a 20 year old computer. AMD 64 Athlon 4000+ single core (2.4GHz) with 2GBs Ram (PC 3200/DDR 400MHz) Way slow by today's standards.

It ran fine but wouldn't play youtube videos, and 'heavy on resources' web pages like Fox News took a lot of time to fully load and navigate. But it would not crash, was just slow. Then I installed a video card, still old but high specs and a good performer in its day. That took enough load off the CPU when using the on board video, it make a significant difference. It's a keeper as a functional back-up. Posting with it now, bouncing from page to page fine and running good with multiple browser tabs open.

This PC is up-gradable to a dual core. All in due time.... might increase the memory too. As is, it's still slow but usable.

Edit: A note about Lubuntu. I started using it for it's compatibility with older PC's. That and the familiar layout and functionality similar to the Windows OS's I've used. But most importantly - It gets regular updates.
 
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Yes, making seemingly small changes to an older PC can really breathe new life into them. An old Thinkpad laptop I found lying around had a 200G 5400 RPM hard drive in it. Even with 8G of RAM, it was slow running with either Windows or Linux. I swapped the hard drive with a 1TB SSD and that made all the difference: it's plenty fast now and I have more storage. It's my primary ham radio computer running Linux Mint.
 
I have 2 Linux questions: can I download photos from Iphone to it? And, if I hate it, is there some way to put Windows back without an install disk?
I believe you can just point your web browser to icloud.com and download them just like any other download. I have not done this personally (I don't own anything Apple).

I would recommend leaving your Windows disk exactly as it is, and buying a brand new SSD and installing Linux on that. Then you can choose at boot time whether you want to boot Linux or Windows. If you have enough free space on your existing disk, you can split that into a Windows half and a Linux half. But honestly, I'd just buy a second disk for Linux. You can get a fine SSD for $50. Here's one:

https://www.amazon.com/Crucial-MX500-500GB-NAND-Internal/dp/B0786QNS9B

You might need a mounting bracket and connection cables if you don't already have those.

This way you don't touch your Windows installation and take a chance of messing it up. Chances of that are very small, but not zero, especially if your computer knowledge is not good. If you are not computer technically inclined, I would ask a knowledgeable friend to assist you in installing a second disk and putting Linux on it. It is not difficult, but if you have no experience with this type of stuff, you're probably not going to be able to get adequate help and advice over the internet.

As I have recommended in other threads, if you just want to try Linux, you can boot it from a thumbdrive. Provided your computer is new enough to boot from a thumbdrive in the first place. You will want a USB3 port on your computer and a USB3 thumbdrive. USB2 is too slow. I would recommend "MX Linux" for thumbdrive use - because of it's great abilities to allow you to save things you've done to that thumbdrive as you go along, so everything is still as you left it if you boot back into Windows and come back to Linux again later.
 
I believe you can just point your web browser to icloud.com and download them just like any other download. I have not done this personally (I don't own anything Apple).

I would recommend leaving your Windows disk exactly as it is, and buying a brand new SSD and installing Linux on that. Then you can choose at boot time whether you want to boot Linux or Windows. If you have enough free space on your existing disk, you can split that into a Windows half and a Linux half. But honestly, I'd just buy a second disk for Linux. You can get a fine SSD for $50. Here's one:

https://www.amazon.com/Crucial-MX500-500GB-NAND-Internal/dp/B0786QNS9B

You might need a mounting bracket and connection cables if you don't already have those.

This way you don't touch your Windows installation and take a chance of messing it up. Chances of that are very small, but not zero, especially if your computer knowledge is not good. If you are not computer technically inclined, I would ask a knowledgeable friend to assist you in installing a second disk and putting Linux on it. It is not difficult, but if you have no experience with this type of stuff, you're probably not going to be able to get adequate help and advice over the internet.

As I have recommended in other threads, if you just want to try Linux, you can boot it from a thumbdrive. Provided your computer is new enough to boot from a thumbdrive in the first place. You will want a USB3 port on your computer and a USB3 thumbdrive. USB2 is too slow. I would recommend "MX Linux" for thumbdrive use - because of it's great abilities to allow you to save things you've done to that thumbdrive as you go along, so everything is still as you left it if you boot back into Windows and come back to Linux again later.
LOL, I did used to be an engineer ( CIVIL not computer LOL) but...this is making my head explode...I think I will let daughter do it next time she visits....but thanks

I looked, my laptop has had over 20 updates already I wasn't even aware of. I found out about this one because I got a message saying " this update might take longer to install do you want to schedule it?" WTH...do they update at night while your computer is off or what? Weird
 
I have 2 Linux questions: can I download photos from Iphone to it? And, if I hate it, is there some way to put Windows back without an install disk?
The bummer with Linux is it doesn't like iphones. With an android phone it's easy to plug in via USB charging cord and transfer pics from phone to PC. Awhile ago I looked into software for transferring pics directly to a PC running Linux. That made my head spin, I didn't find an easy solution. There's ways around it as Haertig said, but that ain't for me.

Also as Haertis said - Don't overwrite your Windows. I wouldn't even recommend writing it along side on the same hard drive. At least not for a beginner.
 
Yes, making seemingly small changes to an older PC can really breathe new life into them. An old Thinkpad laptop I found lying around had a 200G 5400 RPM hard drive in it. Even with 8G of RAM, it was slow running with either Windows or Linux. I swapped the hard drive with a 1TB SSD and that made all the difference: it's plenty fast now and I have more storage. It's my primary ham radio computer running Linux Mint.
For hard drives: All I've used with Linux are SATAII mechanical. They work fine for me. What I've noticed so far is the difference that increasing memory makes. I doubled the RAM from 4gigs to 8gigs in my new daily driver and it made a noticeable difference. Just a 512Mb increase (going from 2gigs to 2.5gigs) in my new back-up helped.

Edit: I've also noticed that with less memory there is more hard drive activity. That tells me that a faster hard drive would help in applications lacking sufficient memory.
 
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Also as Haertis said - Don't overwrite your Windows. I wouldn't even recommend writing it along side on the same hard drive. At least not for a beginner.

Ditto.
Linux runs just fine on an external hard drive or external SSD drive.
Once you have it installed, you just plug it in before powering up and your Windows hard drive isn't involved except as a data drive.
Works best with USB-3 or USB-C port and compatible cables and external drive. USB-2 will work but will slow you down.
I have both an external Linux drive, and a VirtualBox Linux virtual machine. Forget about using Microsoft virtual machine for Linux, it's more headache than it's worth..
I used the external drive to boot to Linux for a while but I found that I could do most everything in the VirtualBox Linux just fine. With VirtualBox I can run Linux inside Windows without rebooting. Since I have dual monitors, I can run the VirtualBox linux on one monitor and Windows on the other monitor and it's like having two computers running side by side that use the same mouse and keyboard.
Since Chrome, and by extension Brave no longer fully support Windows 7, the only streaming service that still works in Brave on Windows 7 is Netflix. For the others I have to run them in the Linux virtual machine.
I have a pretty old computer (3.8 GHz i5-3570K CPU from 2012, but motherboard has been replaced, 8 GB Ram) but it will run HD video in a Linux virtual machine with no problem.
 

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