As you might expect, squeezing an entire operating system into
a single file imposes some limitations (as described in the next
section).  Although BeOS 5 Personal Edition is by no means a
"crippled" version of BeOS, it isn't as robust or as flexible as 
the "real" version, BeOS 5 Pro Edition.   We hope that the Personal 
Edition version will give you enough of a taste of BeOS 5 that 
you'll want to purchase the Pro Edition.  To purchase a copy of 
BeOS 5 Pro Edition, go to... 
  
  <http://www.be.com/products/freebeos/distributors.html>

For the latest Personal Edition news -- such as updates and 
bug fixes -- check in at...

  <http://free.be.com>

* In some cases, you may need to boot from a boot floppy rather 
than simply launch an application; this will be described in 
detail in the installation instructions.


Limitations of BeOS 5 Personal Edition
--------------------------------------

In the spirit of full disclosure, this section lists some of the
limitations of BeOS 5 Personal Edition.  As noted in the 
descriptions, some of these limitations are alleviated in 
BeOS 5 Pro Edition.


- Disk Space (Part 1)  

When it's uncompressed, BeOS 5 Personal Edition inflates to 512 
megabytes, no more, no less.  This means that you need to have 
512 megabytes of disk space available before you start the 
installation instructions (below).  The BeOS 5 Pro Edition can 
be installed in a partition as small as 256 megabytes or as large 
as your largest hard drive.