Switching to Linux, now what to buy?
in [Setup]
|
Prev: Building GLIBC-2.3.5
Next: Kodak DVC325 webcam driver?
From: John Howell on 23 Sep 2005 17:00 pmlonline(a)gmail.com wrote: > Hello, > > I am now switching over to linux as a workstation. I'm at > cheapbytes.com, but I have no idea what flavor of linux to buy. I see > three pages of CD's I started out looking into various websites revewing distros, then downloaded a few live eval CD's. These are great for checking if the basic install for an OS will work out of the box for your hardware I stuck with Suse Linux as the YAST util makes setting up the box fairly painless for linux, and suse can use rpm files for installing apps so you don't have to dive right into compiling source for your first. No matter what your choice, it won't be as easy as a click next..next..next install from Windows. But that is half the fun isn't it?
From: Rick Moen on 23 Sep 2005 17:36 Peter T. Breuer <ptb(a)oboe.it.uc3m.es> wrote: > Rick Moen <rick(a)linuxmafia.com> wrote: >> Probably, it has hardware-support issues with your network interface >> device. QED. > > As in "Mr. brilliant here hasn't checked that his ethernet is working > before concluding that his DHCP client/server is having difficulty talking > across the dead wires between him and his expensive line terminator". > > I like that one. It is indeed a good bet, but in the absence of > evidence, who can say? Not us. Not him. What I was actually guessing is more likely is that he's suffering the all too common combination of a too-new ethernet chipset and a too-old installer kernel. (Ergo, too old a set of ethernet drivers.) Back in dinosaur days, those of us who were _determined_ to overcome this would do insane workarounds like borrowing an old ethernet card long enough to complete installation and fetch/compile/boot a new kernel with updated drivers, but it's much, much easier -- and recommended on various grounds -- to just use a current-version distro installer in the first place. (I'm of course harping on that for the original poster's benefit. I _do_ know that you know that, Peter.)
From: Rick Moen on 23 Sep 2005 17:57 Douglas Mayne <doug(a)slackware-3.localnet> wrote: > Here are a couple of words of advice, FWIW. Paul, listen to the man. ;-> Douglas and others have been giving you good advice. As Douglas suggested, relax. Peter only growls a bit, and none of us bite. Some additional "live CD" Linux distributions to have a look at, in addition to Knoppix. Knoppix was the first really successful full-sized "live cd" (runnable from CD-ROM without touching your hard drive) distribution. Klaus Knopper based it on techniques developed around 1999 in a micro-sized (to be burned onto "credit card" sized CDR media) that I helped design, called the Linuxcare Bootable Business Card (BBC). One problem with Knoppix is that, although it includes a script (think "batch file") that you can optionally run to install Knoppix onto your hard drive, Klaus never designed it to be installed that way: It consists of about 80% packages taken from the Debian distribution's development branch, about 10% packages taken from Mandriva Linux, and 10% from somewhere else entirely. Therefore, unlike many other Debian derivatives, it doesn't "maintain" very well going into the future, after such HD installation. That is, as you pull down new releases of your installed packages, problems sometimes arise that you have to deal with. Just as the Linuxcare BBC was... well... the patron uncle of Knoppix, Knoppix has been the father and grandfather of _dozens_ of offshoots. All of the following, in addition to running well from standalone CD operation (dubbed "live CD" operation), will install to your hard drive and be easy and effective to keep in top shape thereafter: o SimplyMEPIS aka MEPIS. (Technically, the original MEPIS project got split in a beta-ish ProMEPIS variant for developers and a SimplyMEPIS one for everyone else, but hardly anyone uses the former.) This is a very advanced (i.e., has leading-edge versions of everything) KDE-based desktop distribution that runs entirely from CD-ROM. o Kanotix. Joerg "kano" Schirottke built and maintains this live CD. It's generally very similar to SimplyMEPIS (KDE-based, etc.), but tends to be particularly good on laptops. o Ubuntu Linux. This extremely popular desktop Linux is available _both_ in an installable image and in a live-CD image. It furnishes the GNOME desktop. o Kubuntu Linux. This is the Ubuntu Linux core packages, except furnished with KDE desktop-application files, instead of GNOME ones. Like plain Ubuntu Linux, it has both an installable image and a live CD one. Once again, I'll point out to you http://distrowatch.com/ as an indispensible resource in these matters. Start there. And, Paul, welcome to the Linux community. -- Cheers, Mark Moraes: "Usenet is not a right." Rick Moen Edward Vielmetti: "Usenet is a right, a left, a jab, rick(a)linuxmafia.com and a sharp uppercut to the jaw. The postman hits! You have new mail."
From: Peter T. Breuer on 23 Sep 2005 19:19 Stan Brown <the_stan_brown(a)fastmail.fm> wrote: > On Fri, 23 Sep 2005 16:53:08 +0200 in comp.os.linux.setup, Peter T. > Breuer favored us with... >> :-). Ordinary [IQ] tests only go up to 145! You must be on one of those >> pay-and-we-evaluate-you schemes! > Is the Cattell test not "ordinary"? It goes up to 178. It would be meaningless, then. IQ tests originally measured relative development in children and adolescents. The extension to adults simply measures the performance on, err, IQ tests. It would be a measured against a (logarithmic?) normal curve, I suppose, with mean 100 and SD 15. So at 178 you would be five standard deviations off the mean, which leaves too small a sample to measure against (two SDs is the 95th percentile, no?). But yes, ordinary tests "only" go up to 145. Peter
From: Peter T. Breuer on 23 Sep 2005 19:28
Rick Moen <rick(a)linuxmafia.com> wrote: > Peter T. Breuer <ptb(a)oboe.it.uc3m.es> wrote: >> I like that one. It is indeed a good bet, but in the absence of >> evidence, who can say? Not us. Not him. > What I was actually guessing is more likely is that he's suffering the > all too common combination of a too-new ethernet chipset and a too-old > installer kernel. (Ergo, too old a set of ethernet drivers.) I didn't realise that was common. I doubt I have EVER bought anything but a 3com, 8139, or eepro as a NIC. > Back in dinosaur days, those of us who were _determined_ to overcome > this would do insane workarounds like borrowing an old ethernet card > long enough to complete installation and fetch/compile/boot a new kernel > with updated drivers, but it's much, much easier -- and recommended on > various grounds -- to just use a current-version distro installer in the > first place. > (I'm of course harping on that for the original poster's benefit. I > _do_ know that you know that, Peter.) That's OK. I know you know I know that. Some of us even moved the disk to another computer. Or downloaded the entire debian archive site complete with crosslinks out of potato into hamm in order to nfs mount it as a local disk and uncompress the packages one by one via ar and tar, then run their install scripts later. Insane things that require actual thinking. Or use SuSEs multitastic install routines and pronto overwrite it with another distro by pivoting root through swap. Etc. Then we get into cute little tftp boots, or sheakernet with a floppy in hand. Peter |