another newbie

[Ron Kassen]

Hello all,
Please bear with me as I ask some repeat questions.  First, let me tell you
where I am coming from:
I am a hardware and troubleshooting expert.  I am not trying to be
egotistical here, I have had fourteen years of computer experience, with
DOS, Windows 3.1, Windows95, Windows NT, some with Windows 2000, and diverse
PC based hardware experience.  I am a quick learner, and it is time to learn
again.  It has been a long time, I am rusty, and this is just what I needed
to kick me in the can and get me moving again.  Now for the questions:
I downloaded zipspeak and unzipped it to the \linux directory on my hard
drive (actually it created that folder itself).  After trying to fire it up
once and having it not find the partition, then realizing that I needed the
sda1 partition instead of the hda1 partition (I have scsi hard drives), I
loaded it successfully.  However, when I got to the login screen, typed root
and pressed enter, I did not know what to do next.  So, I did the
ctrl-alt-del to shut down the system (I don't know how to properly exit from
linux), rebooted into windows to go find the docs.  I think the docs are
actually where the zipspeak.txt says they are, but not in a format that
windows can read.  So how do I read the docs?
Second question:
I would like to convert from Windows to Linux because I am looking for a
more stable operating system that I do not have to reload every month (did
you know that Microsoft actually recommends a reformat every year with their
operating systems?)  However, I have some concerns.  I use the computer to
do my finances, serf the net, grab email, play wave and mp3 files, burn cd's
and more.  Are you using linux exclusively?  Am I going to have to keep
windows around to do stuff like burn cd's, do wave and mp3 files, etc?  I
know that I can serf the net and grab email with Linux, but what do I do
with all the emails that I have saved in a Microsoft outlook pst file?  How
do I edit the etc/rc.d/rc.modul file to tell linux what net card and sound
card I am using?  I know that I can read all the docs I want, but until I
actually start playing in Linux, I won't learn a thing.  I know to be
cautious - I can quickly destroy the data on the system.  Any
advice/help/etc would be appreciated.  Also, Linux is like another language
to me - I don't know it yet.  Be patient with me while I learn.  I know
there are some docs that I can get off the net, and I will go get them.
Thanks in advance!

RK