Linux is it Worth it?

[21Motorcraft]

Yes, IM sensors, try looking here or here ....Also for your information, the new version of Open suse (10.1), will be released Thursday if your still thinking...

You can find it here ...

[Guest nibs]

I've been pleased with Fedora Core 5. However, its important to remember to have a seperate partition for /home as Fedora Core updates quite often and the recommended upgrade method is to remove everything and reinstall. If /home is its own partition then you won't have to back up gigs of files (since I had all of my videos, mp3, etc in my /home/~) before upgrading to a new version.

I've considered trying Ubuntu because it seems to dominate most of my LUG and it supports much easier upgrading. In my LUG Mandriva is seen as the distro for grandmothers, in that once its setup properly it just works.

[Squid1]

I have to qualify the Fedora core recommendations. While I used and recommended FC until very recently, FC5 doesn't work well at all for me, and interestingly enough the FC4 updates that have been released after FC5 was out botched quite some stuff on FC4, too. I am not amused, not by far.

 

I am now firmly in the Debian camp (when not using FreeBSD, of course), which includes Ubuntu. I have some issues with the earlier Ubuntu I tried, but none of them would affect new users.

[n1ce_hat]

My main reason for this query is that my girlfriend is setting up a new system with linux and i was wondering how hard would it be to do that with dfi expert mobo. My other reason was that my girlfriend and you guys have given me alot of reasons to do so too.

wait, your girlfriend is going out of her way to install linux? wow :nod:

[oshunluvr]

I have been using Mandrake - now Mandriva - for quite some time. Here's my 2 cents worth:

 

If your looking to have a totally stable, virus free, fast functioning operating system that's totally under YOUR control - switch to linux. I have NEVER EVER suffered from a virus (and I d/l a lot of crap) or had spyware take over my system using linux - period.

 

If your a heavy video gamer - you won't be very happy (at least for now). Your options are install WINE and do a lot of configure trial and error, buy Cedega (my choice) and do a little configure trial and error, buy Win4Lin Pro (not cheap but linux is free!) and run windoze as an application, partition your hard drive and dual boot (which I also do and is very simple to control).

 

The following work BETTER using linux than windows : Internet and eMail (safer) best choices IMHO - Mozilla suite or Opera (fastest engine), Office applications - StarOffice from Sun or OpenOffice (free), Audio file functions - Ripping is faster and more formats available and I love the Amarok music program, Networking - all my computers and my TIVO communicate at full network speeds.

 

Windoze is better (for now) at games. Also desktop video editing software is more readily available for windoze than linux. I have slowly increased my video editing capability under linux but most commercial video software for linux is professional level (and cost!)

 

Since switching to linux, I have not had to do any of these things: Remove a virus, remove spyware or uncontrollable popup ads, reinstall my system software because it got too slow or unstable, pay for software (except Cedega to run my kids games), optimize my hard drives, see the "blue screen of death" or read a "exception error" dialog (except in a Win4Lin window which you "reboot" by closing and relaunching) or reboot because of a program crash. I have had applications fail - most often the program crashes, unloads and offers you a log file of the problem. Usually a quick web search reveils a fix. Limewire is the most unstable app I use - for unknown reasons it will lock the X-window manager on loading (once every 30 launches or so) requiring a display manager restart, but not a reboot.

 

I believe as more governments (Spain and the State of Mass. already) require open source and secure systems linux will grow and vendors will see the benefit of publishing in native linux.

 

On my laptop my battery life doubled using linux rather than windoze - I think because windoze does so much background b/s that you can't control. With linux (any distro) you have total control over what gets installed and runs.

 

Lack of hardware vendor support is the worst thing about linux but is getting better daily. But when something doesn't work there are literally thousands of linux users working on the issue and making fixes available all the time. When something in windoze doesn't work (like almost everything about it at one time or another) you have to wait for Micro$oft to publish a patch and hope for the best. Of course, in a few years they'll put out a new version and for $200 you can start all over again with their newest crappy OS.

 

For a linux beginner I'd suggest using a major distro like Suse, Mandriva, Fedora (the top three in order of most users). They all have pretty stable install programs and GUI's. I use Mandriva because I have been since v7 and I liked the idea of supporting a commercially viable product that isn't M$ based. Also there are a lot of Mandriva users so help is easy to find.

 

I have at my desk the following distros on DVD and would be willing to send you a copy of one: Mandriva 2006, Suse 10.0, Fedora 5, Centos 4.2 Ubuntu 5.1, Knoppix 4.0.2 and one called "Extreme Gaming". Check out Linux Magazine and read about the distros pluses and minuses. Knoppix and Mandriva 2006 are both "live" distros meaning you can boot and run them from the DVD to test your system.

 

If you want to go totally free and are willing to work for it - check out linuxfromscratch. There you can find the files and instructions on installing only free and completely configured by you operating system software.

[karot]

I dunno, FreeBSD is pretty hard to setup for a newbie. Now that I think of it, it's kinda like installing Gentoo. If you really want to go the FreeBSD route, you should use PC-BSD. PC-BSD is FreeBSD only a lot more user friendly and nicer looking.

 

If you want linux, I'd suggest SuSE 10.1

[oshunluvr]

...is there any analysing/testing software for linux (cpu-z, speedfan etc.)?

 

I use mprime for torture testing/benchmarking but there are several superkaramba apps that will show mem use and cpu speeds. lmsensors shows a lot of data also. Also look here for lots of other more technical options benchmarks

[Squid1]

SuperPi also runs on Linux and FreeBSD.

 

Clockgen equivalent for NForce4 variants is over at 2cpu.com.

[kiikkuja]

thanks for the info guys! I will install ubuntu 5.1 soon and use it for my main OS. Windows is for games there on. Or maybe i'll get the cedega...and start using the ubuntu all along.

[Aynjell]

SuperPi also runs on Linux and FreeBSD.

 

Clockgen equivalent for NForce4 variants is over at 2cpu.com.

 

I wasn't aware of that... hrm, now my overclocking toolchest is bigger. I wonder if it's in portage... if not, I guess I'll have to learn ebuilding.

 

Anyway, I really like linux. Quick updates, updates to real problems quickly, instead of just ignorning anything that doesn't make front page on the NYTimes. Seriously, the quality of software is better, and it gets better by the day, and noticeably so. There is an update to my system at least once a day, and everyone in one way or another improves my system, rarely unnoticeably. Especially with the GNOME desktop suite... I love it when there is an update to something like Rhythmbox.