<HTML ><HEAD ><TITLE >The Easiest Option: Buy, Don't Build</TITLE ><META NAME="GENERATOR" CONTENT="Modular DocBook HTML Stylesheet Version 1.76b+ "><LINK REL="HOME" TITLE="The Linux Installation HOWTO" HREF="index.html"><LINK REL="PREVIOUS" TITLE="Recent Changes" HREF="changes.html"><LINK REL="NEXT" TITLE="Before You Begin" HREF="before.html"></HEAD ><BODY CLASS="SECT1" BGCOLOR="#FFFFFF" TEXT="#000000" LINK="#0000FF" VLINK="#840084" ALINK="#0000FF" ><DIV CLASS="NAVHEADER" ><TABLE SUMMARY="Header navigation table" WIDTH="100%" BORDER="0" CELLPADDING="0" CELLSPACING="0" ><TR ><TH COLSPAN="3" ALIGN="center" >The Linux Installation HOWTO</TH ></TR ><TR ><TD WIDTH="10%" ALIGN="left" VALIGN="bottom" ><A HREF="changes.html" ACCESSKEY="P" >Prev</A ></TD ><TD WIDTH="80%" ALIGN="center" VALIGN="bottom" ></TD ><TD WIDTH="10%" ALIGN="right" VALIGN="bottom" ><A HREF="before.html" ACCESSKEY="N" >Next</A ></TD ></TR ></TABLE ><HR ALIGN="LEFT" WIDTH="100%"></DIV ><DIV CLASS="SECT1" ><H1 CLASS="SECT1" ><A NAME="BUY">3. The Easiest Option: Buy, Don't Build</H1 ><P >Linux has now matured enough that there are now system integrators who will assemble a workstation for you, install and configure a Linux, and do an intensive burn-in to test it before it's shipped to you. If you have more money than time, or you have stringent reliability or performance requirements, these integrators provide a valuable service by making sure you won't get hardware that's flaky or dies two days out of the box.</P ><P >For those of us without a champagne budget, the rest of this HOWTO is about how to install Linux yourself.</P ></DIV ><DIV CLASS="NAVFOOTER" ><HR ALIGN="LEFT" WIDTH="100%"><TABLE SUMMARY="Footer navigation table" WIDTH="100%" BORDER="0" CELLPADDING="0" CELLSPACING="0" ><TR ><TD WIDTH="33%" ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top" ><A HREF="changes.html" ACCESSKEY="P" >Prev</A ></TD ><TD WIDTH="34%" ALIGN="center" VALIGN="top" ><A HREF="index.html" ACCESSKEY="H" >Home</A ></TD ><TD WIDTH="33%" ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top" ><A HREF="before.html" ACCESSKEY="N" >Next</A ></TD ></TR ><TR ><TD WIDTH="33%" ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top" >Recent Changes</TD ><TD WIDTH="34%" ALIGN="center" VALIGN="top" > </TD ><TD WIDTH="33%" ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top" >Before You Begin</TD ></TR ></TABLE ></DIV ></BODY ></HTML >