Noob questions

It depends on what you want to gain from training.
There are many different styles of Karate - ranging from traditional to modern sport styles.

Are you looking for exercise, sport, self defense, to be part of an ancient lineage or tradition?

Tell us what you hope to gain by training and we'll try to reccomend something for you.

If you start training at home on your own, you will develop a lot of bad habits. You may be disappointed if you train at home for too long then (if you go to a good school) have to put on a white belt and start over - beginning with "unlearning" what you did at home.

Decide what you want to do, find a good school, and later on you can use video and other sources to supplement your training.

Learning at home is not impossible but it is a good deal more difficult than learning at a dojo. The immediate feedback you get from an instructor is critical to early learning of correct basic technique.

If you can not study at a dojo for either geographic or financial reasons and home is your only choice then you could train alone. As all have pointed out this is a hard road that you will travel. Early questions that might give you some idea if you can succeed studying alone might include: How athletic are you? Do you pick up new physical skills easily? Do you have mirrors, a video camera a suitable space? Do people describe you as a self-starter? Can you look at yourself with a brutally critical eye?

In this information age remote learning is possible. Possible not easy. To be successful you have to be very coachable but more important than that you have to be able to see what your doing and be able to accurately correct it to what you should be doing from available examples. You will progress much more slowly than your counterparts in a dojo and must be willing to accept that.
I am pretty sure that with this as a starting point and an idea of how you might answer the questions above, there are enough folks on this forum with enough knowledge to give you a nudge in the right direction.

There are so many styles of martial arts to train in. What you need to do is figure out what style would fit you the best based on your goals, fitness level, strengths/weaknesses, interests, etc. Just find something that fits your lifestyle and personality. Second of all, if you are serious about becoming a martial artist don't try it on your own. Not that it would be impossible, but it wouldn't be as enjoyable or beneficial. I completely agree what everyone else has said about not being able to grasp every aspect of karate on your own, because it's true. There are so many details and some of them are not easy to catch. That's why you have fifth degree black belts still perfecting the most basic kicks. But in addition one of the nice things about being a martial arts student is having that support system comprised of other students and instructors. Throughout the years of training they become like family to you. Anyways I'm done ranting now lol..but whatever you decide, I wish you the best of luck

ok thanks I see what you guys mean..honestly I'm not sure what style of karate I would like to take !! and I would like to do it as a self defense/sport type of thing(I need to get in shape) but I'm not sure if I can take Karate seeing as how there is about 6 Taekwando dojo's in my area I'll probably go for that, though one dojo says it teaches Karate and Taekwando(not sure what style of karate though kind of a Noob to this stuff )

Be careful of any martial arts school that isn't very precise about what it teaches. Karate & TKD is very vague... a lot of places use terms like this for marketing purposes... sounds a bit suspect to me.

Check it out though.

If you mention what areas you can travel to, people here may be able to suggest decent karate schools for you to look up. You don't have to be too specific, but even if you mention towns/cities you could get to, people might make some suggestions for places you should check out.

Additionally, if any of the TKD schools you mentioned have websites, put them up here or on the TKD/Korean Arts forum and people will be able to give you feed back on them e.g. if the school seems legit (or not!).

Give us links to school websites that you find.
Also, go watch a class and see if that is what you want to learn.
There are other things to watch for.
Kids wearing black belts will indicate no standards. Also, look at the higher ranks and see how they move? Do they all move the same when doing basics? If not, maybe there is no consistency in the teaching - no correction of mistakes - in other words poor teaching with no standards.
Watch how the teacher runs a class. Is he just standing there counting off while students punch and kick? Or is he making corrections and explaining details.

Karate and Tae Kwon Do are largely generic terms. Many TKD schools, and others, call what they do "karate" for marketing purposes. It's easier than trying to explain that "it's similar to karate".
What ever you do - NEVER SIGN A CONTRACT. My experience is that legit teachers do not have contracts. They may give you a discount for paying for several months at a time. But DO NOT sign anything long term or for a "black belt course".
Ask a lot questions, come back here and be careful.