Anybody ever went fullbore into Linux and then went back to Windows?

[Zelmo3]

I think I've gotten into Linux and went back to Windows again a couple of times. At the moment I'm back into Linux again, but I don't see myself leaving at any point. Things are so much better for Linux now than they were seven years ago that I'm able to do just about anything I want with very little trouble.

Concerning support from the user base, I've found that a good percentage of people who use Linux are quite competent with it. If I ever hit a snag, I can get online and find the solution or see that the problem is known and a solution is being actively worked on. Compare that to the technical savvy of the Windows user base, where people can really only guess at what the problems are because the OS is closed, and the solutions are therefore often iffy. TGS had some good comments in that respect.

I'd like to add that Linux probably isn't for everyone. I know that as I've used it, a whole universe of computer applications ranging from C compilers to Windows compatibility layers has opened up to me. It's like stepping through your computer into a much larger world, where practically anything is possible. That's exciting for me, but I can't even talk to my girlfriend about it because she just doesn't care. She uses whatever software is given to her for whatever purpose it's designed, and that's plenty good for her. I think most people are that way, and as long as Microsoft keeps pushing their software on people through OEM deals, advertising, and established user base, that's what people will use and it will be good enough for them.

 

[Nothinman]

This will probably get angry replies (or suggestions that I am dumb or incompetent) but I found linux distros to be buggy, require a lot of admining, have a lot of hardware incompatibility issues, and finally not to be able to play as many games.

Everything will have bugs, but I can't believe that anyone would consider a Linux distribution (except maybe Mandrake or Gentoo) to be buggier than Windows and all of the shareware you would need to get the same functionality. And the level of admining varies, I've had the same Debian install at home for ~6 years and it pretty much "just works" with every update.

 

[R3MF]

i have never gone 'full barrel' into linux because i am a gamer, that said i love linux and keep the latest SUSE as a dual boot with XP Pro.

and i make sure all hardware i buy is compatible with linux before i buy it.

 

[Nithin]

the only reason i'm using windows at home is because my wireless card is not supported. 🙁
its a netgear wg311 but the acx driver does not work with wep.

 

[bjc112]

Originally posted by: Nithin
the only reason i'm using windows at home is because my wireless card is not supported. 🙁
its a netgear wg311 but the acx driver does not work with wep.

That is the biggest thing that pisses me off..

I have searched for older Broadcom / Prism chipsets, but it's just a pain in the ass.. I wish some of the distros had better wireless support..

I have used ndsiwrapper as well with no luck..

🙁

I like Linux, but have very FEW complaints about XP as well..

OS X is growing on me quite a bit too..

 

[gwarbot]

I just recently ditched windows, But man setting up drivers getting all the software so you can a different peice of software, it's a friggen nightmare. But once that is done linux is pretty nice. But I have bounced from linux to windows a couple of times. I always go back to windows when i get frustrated.

 

[Nothinman]

I have searched for older Broadcom / Prism chipsets, but it's just a pain in the ass.. I wish some of the distros had better wireless support..

RAlink is the way to go, GPL'd drivers with no firmware to mess with. I don't think they're included with any distros by default yet, but I doubt it'll take long.

http://ralink.rapla.net/

 

[BujinZero]

DOS was the OS I learned on, so I've always had a thing for the command line, which Linux does WAY better than MS. I switched to Slackware from Microsoft and never really wavered at all. Regrouping after failure is very quick. I still have Windows XP installed for Rome: Total War, however.

A big part of a successful 'switch' is knowing somebody who knows what they're doing. After stumbling on my own to solve a problem and using Q&A forums, I would ask my Slackware guru buddy for help. His help was often overly technical and I'd have to decipher it, but I'd work out the gist of his answer and end up with what was for me a more practical way of doing things. I'm very ad hoc about computers, and yet over a relatively short time, I picked up a hell of a lot of useful, practical Linux and computer information. I knew I was a true nerd when I successfully compiled my first kernel.

And it's perfectly OK for people to jump back into Windows. Most of my friends don't understand why I like Linux when I explain it to them, so screw em. I comprehend Linux better than I do Windows, so I use Linux.

As far as setup/configuration goes, once I 'got it', Linux became orders of magnitude easier to set up and administrate than Windows. Type a little of this, type a little of that. Updates? Type 'slackpkg upgrade packagename" or a similar line depending on your distro. Drivers? Can you type 'alsaconf'? Can you type 'sh NVIDA', press tab, and hit enter? Follow instructions edit a text file, and it's over and out of your face until you uninstall everything or mess with it. Even ATI's drivers aren't too terrible, certainly not impossible, although they should be thrown back on the dung heap that bore them. To get the printer working for everyone on the network, I copy a few CUPS related files I edited long ago to the appropriate directory, restart CUPS and it's all back online, configured properly, and out of my face where it belongs.

The first time I installed Windows XP after using Slackware for an extended period I was very frustrated. So much clicking, sooo much clicking, so slow. I am not a visual person. I think Windows simply serves the majority better.

 

[Shamrock]

If Linux would be able to execute games (natively, WINE weighs the games down with extra CPU cycles)), I would switch over Linux and never look back. I just completed downloading MEPIS 3.3.1 Linux last night, and it is the best I have used yet, it PROPERLY auto detected my Audigy 2, and my NVidia 6800GT, AND both my 56k modems. It did detect my router(it's wireless AND wired) but not my wireless card. It is also a Netgear WG311T.

But I am a happy camper with Mepis. (and it's from USA!)

I've used Debian (not updated enough, and you have to configure EVERYTHING)
RedHat 6.2, 7.2, 8, and 9 (all sucked, I hate RPM dependencies)
KNOPPIX 3.2-3.7 (yes, 32, 3.3, 3.4 etc)
and now Mepis, and BY FAR, Mepis is the best one for "linux dummies" To me, Mepis is "desktop ready" It even has a video editor ready to go on the CD.

Can you tell I cant stand Windows? And what Nothinman said is absolutely 100% correct

What's even more fun is upgrading Windows on someone's machine and watching them get all confused because MS moved everything around for some unknown reason. 200->XP is entertaining but XP->Longhorn should be even better.

When I had Win2k Pro, and switched to XP (hey, it was free, ok?) I said WTH, where did everything go, but after 45 DAYS of fiddling with literally hundred's of windows and tabs, and checkbox's I now know where the Win2k stuff went, they re-named it and placed it in a totally different location.

 

[Beiruty]

I also download a copy of the latest Mempis. It was nice to boot from a live CD, Can widnoz do that? 😉

It boot fine on my Compaq Presario V4005CL. However,
The video chipset Intel Media Accelerator 900 was detected as i81x chipset with only 1024x768. Native resolution of my notebook is 1280x800. I gues it would not support any of the advance Hardware acceleration for Videos and forget about 3D as it is too slow for anything useful.

The Audio was detected fine Analog Devices AN 1980A, but no sound. After couple posting on the friendly support forums, I run alsaconf and still no sound. I guess I need to install to HD to get the Audio working.

I did not bother to get my wireless card working, The 100 Mbps wire card was detected fine though.

Finally, the hardware support is the weakest point in linux. Heck I may even return my notebook to Costco since it does not support linux!

There is 0 support from HP for linux othere notebooks.

 

[drag]

Try using something very modern on your laptop. Such as the latest Ubuntu or Fedora Core version. Or Gentoo, even, if you like the suffering.

Kernel-level support for Intel GMA has been added very recently to mainstream 2.6.12 linux kernel. The latest X.org versions should support it very well, too. You'd want to use DRI and the i915 (or just 915, not sure) driver.

The resolution thing may be related to a funky bios bug that makes it hard for non-windows systems to get the laptop to use non-VESA standard resolutions. (like if you have a widescreen lappy) There is a program to allow you to monkey around with the BIOS and get non-standard (your native resolution may be non-standard) resolutions. Originally called 855resolution, for the "Intel Extreme Blaster" style chipsets, this guy ported it to 915 GMA style and it's called 915resolution. http://www.geocities.com/stomljen/

BTW the GMA is much much better then the old Blaster extreme crap. Should be good enough for 3d applications, desktop acceleration (when it becomes aviable) and games around the Quake3-level graphics.

If your laptop is a sonoma-style 'centrino' model, then it should have intel-everything. With that model your wireless stuff should work since Intel has GPL'd drivers for it. (at least I think that is correct, I don't have a newer centrino model, so I can't say for certain)

However if your unlucky enough to get a model with a broadcom or conextent wifi chipset, then you should return it if you have a chance and get a centrino model. (if you can't do that then there are ways to get it working using Linuxant or NDISwrapper, but these are by-far inferior solutions to a well supported chipset)

As far as I know NO major computer reseller has support for Linux on laptops. You can get support for Redhat or Suse on many models of worksations or severs, but no consumer-style lappys or desktops.

HP, however, is one of the more Linux-friendly shops. Time to time they do offer Linux preinstalled on certain models of business laptops, and they had a program with Ubuntu being sold in Europe or Africa or something. If you go to their website they mention offering various Linux distros with a couple laptops, but it's near impossible to find one configured that way online, or get a model with a configuration that includes a option for Linux.

So mabye you can have better luck by calling up sales and asking them if they have any models that they offer with Linux or similar models, then even if you want Windows pre-installed instead then you know you have a laptop that has likely got good support.

Also check out linux-laptops.net for people's experiances with various laptop models.

 

[Beiruty]

Drag,

Thanks for the lengthy and informative reply.
I guess I have a broadcom 54g Wireless PC Card in this laptop. The CPU is a 1.3 Ghz Celeron M.
In couple days, I will decide if I will be returning this laptop.

Thanks again.

 

[Nothinman]

If Linux would be able to execute games (natively, WINE weighs the games down with extra CPU cycles))

Depends on the game. I've heard people say that Linux/wine performs better than Windows in several games like WoW.

It was nice to boot from a live CD, Can widnoz do that?

Sure, google BartPE.

Finally, the hardware support is the weakest point in linux. Heck I may even return my notebook to Costco since it does not support linux!

Notebooks are special beasts since there's a lot of non-standard hardware in them, but if you google around first you can get good support in one. I have an Alienware Area-51m and just about everything works fine. There's a few things like the modem and SD reader that I've never had a reason to try though. Also IBM laptops are supposedly supported well, but they usually come with ATI video cards.

 

[nweaver]

IBM pushes most of their laptops through the "linu ready" cert program and the Novell Linux Yes (suse) Cert programs. They are well supported in linux.


And quit talking about us masocistic gentoo users that way!! (Stage 1 on a P2 400, all the way up to xfce4)

 

[Zelmo3]

Beiruty:
Broadcom wireless chipsets have basic functionality with ndiswrapper.
My laptop also has a Broadcom, which I got working with Linuxant driverloader. When I switched distros most recently ndiswrapper was available in the software repository, so I installed that and it works exactly the same as Linuxant but doesn't cost $15.

 

[Nothinman]

Even if ndiswrapper works I would ditch whatever card it is and get one that's actually supported. Using ndiswrapper just lets manufacturers think that's it's ok to ignore Linux because Linux users will just find a way to use the Windows drivers.

 

[manly]

I did. 🙁 After building an AMD rig 2 years ago, I couldn't get SuSE Linux to recognize my PC Card bridge, which I use with my Orinoco WiFi client. I guess I could go out and buy some cheap, supported 802.11g gear and try again sometime...

I'm also considering downloading the latest SuSE Linux to see what Novell's been doing with it.

In the meantime, Mac OS X is fitting the bill nicely.

 

[n0cmonkey]

Originally posted by: manly
I did. 🙁 After building an AMD rig 2 years ago, I couldn't get SuSE Linux to recognize my PC Card bridge, which I use with my Orinoco WiFi client. I guess I could go out and buy some cheap, supported 802.11g gear and try again sometime...

I'm also considering downloading the latest SuSE Linux to see what Novell's been doing with it.

In the meantime, Mac OS X is fitting the bill nicely.

Tomorrow maybe I'll have a quick review of an USB based ralink adapter, and I've already recommended a $25.50 PCI one several times. Cheapest 802.11g upgrade I'd seen, and it works beautifully with OpenBSD. 😉

 

[drag]

I'm interested in the Ralink USB adapter, also... Looking forward to that, it could solve a lot of problems for me.


edit:
holycrap. I wish I seen this page earlier.

http://ralink.rapla.net/

It's a list of devices that use the RT2500 chipset.

<3

 

[n0cmonkey]

Originally posted by: drag
I'm interested in the Ralink USB adapter, also... Looking forward to that, it could solve a lot of problems for me.


edit:
holycrap. I wish I seen this page earlier.

http://ralink.rapla.net/

It's a list of devices that use the RT2500 chipset.

<3

OpenBSD keeps a list too. Probably not up to date or anything, but... 😉

OpenBSD doesn't support WPA, so I can't test it here. I've got to find an open wireless connection. :evil: Will provide a thumbs up or down tomorrow.

Probably not much more than that for a little while. At least until I can get to a bigger computer. 😀

 

[Nothinman]

Tomorrow maybe I'll have a quick review of an USB based ralink adapter, and I've already recommended a $25.50 PCI one several times. Cheapest 802.11g upgrade I'd seen, and it works beautifully with OpenBSD

I recommend the same thing, when I bought mine (Hawking PCMCIA card) the thing was like $35 and CompUSA had like a $10 instant rebate and a $20 mail-in rebate so it was like $5 plus tax if you did the paperwork.

 

[n0cmonkey]

Originally posted by: Nothinman

Tomorrow maybe I'll have a quick review of an USB based ralink adapter, and I've already recommended a $25.50 PCI one several times. Cheapest 802.11g upgrade I'd seen, and it works beautifully with OpenBSD

I recommend the same thing, when I bought mine (Hawking PCMCIA card) the thing was like $35 and CompUSA had like a $10 instant rebate and a $20 mail-in rebate so it was like $5 plus tax if you did the paperwork.

The USB one was more (I'm impatient 😛). It's actually not working at the moment too. I'm not sure if it's defective, or if the zaurus can't produce the power this thing needs. That'd be a big bummer...

 

[drag]

If your using the Linux version of the rt2500 (the ones released from ralink) drivers, I don't know how well they support USB devices. It was a sticking point for rt2x00 driver developers since they didn't have access to the correct specs (the received the information they needed for full usb support on march 25 of this year).

I am not sure about all of that though.

If it doesn't work yet, try the cvs code for the rt2x00 driver. If it doesn't work, it shouldn't take long for it to work. The rt2x00 people have new forums for support stuff at http://rt2x00.serialmonkey.com/phpBB2/

edit:

I beleive that the rt2500 should work fine with usb stuff on x86 linux. The branch is actually called rt2570 because the USB chipset is different slightly from the others. There is endness problems for other platforms, unfortunately, like PPC.

 

[Tbirdkid]

biggest problem, we have been spoiled by the mindless means of maintaining and operating a computer with an operating system that just does it for us.

xp is easier to understand because we are used to it. its also better for gaming because, face it, there are more games that are supported. windows is all about just working and not having to recompile any drivers or anything to get it to just work.

the majority of computer users arent power users... its novices that just want sh1t to just work. thats why the apple market seems so good to alot of people.

i have tried at least 4 to 5 different distros of linux, as well as freebsd. although i liked all of them, they all seem to be too much work for the normal person to use. not to mention, my wife, prefers windows because she just wants a pc that works. im not spending more money on a pc that she uses just so she can run windows.


i do like the fact though, that there is competition. i will eventually, change back to linux when it becomes more mainstream and supported with games.

 

[drag]

The vast majority of people never ever have to mess around with drivers and such on Windows, not because windows is wonderfull or easy to use, but because Windows comes pre-installed on their computers.

It's the same thing with OS X. Apple controls the hardware, only a very small amount of hardware will actually work with OS X.. Linux's hardware support is almost infinately better in that regard.

The average person isn't going to be using a OS that they have to download off of the internet and install on their computer. It's just not going to happen.

Go and find a computer with Linux pre-installed and tell me how much compiling you have to do to get it working. Like say the crappy POS lindows stuff from sub300.com, or a laptop from http://www.emperorlinux.com/ were somebody else already uninstalled windows on various laptops and installed linux on them for you.

As long as you select good/well supported hardware installing Linux is often easier then Windows. For instance my system never suffered any nasty side effects from my Audigy like many people experiance in Windows. Hell my tv capture card refused to work properly in Windows XP, period, because I happen to be running a Nvidia card (that was a while ago though). It ran by default in Linux irregardless of what video card I was running at the time.