[Techtalk] Alpha linux and dvd drives

[Nicoya Helm]

Okay, so I've been given the task of seeing if I can get linux working
on an old Alpha box we have.  Two questions for techtalk: 
1. Suse 8.1 vs. Redhat 7.2 - anyone have any experience, good or bad,
w/ running either of these on the alpha platform?  Suse's is
unsupported, but then, I believe so is Redhat's.  I'm more familiar w/
Redhat, but not so much that I would install it vs. Suse if the Suse
install is better on alpha systems.  I'm downloading both right now.

2. Replacing the standard IDE cdrom on this system w/ an IDE dvd-rom
(not a burner).  I'm assuming that if I can get the system to recognize
and read files from a cdrom under linux, getting an IDE dvd-rom drive to
work shouldn't be a problem.  Anyone w/ any caveats or experience to the
contrary?




~~~Nicoya...