XP to Linux... Advice please :D
Harudath
Great Britain Icrontian
Hello again
I've had it with XP. It's just been phail after phail after phail. I want something lighter, safer and different. I was thinking about Ubuntu - How much different is it? Would you reccomend it? And if not why not? If you have any other suggested Linux based OS's then I'd like to hear about them. Thanks again, happy surfing.
I've had it with XP. It's just been phail after phail after phail. I want something lighter, safer and different. I was thinking about Ubuntu - How much different is it? Would you reccomend it? And if not why not? If you have any other suggested Linux based OS's then I'd like to hear about them. Thanks again, happy surfing.
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Comments
Ubuntu is a fine distro, however. On the surface, Linux and windows are pretty similar these days (Especially Ubuntu), but back-end work is wildly different.
Linux is also not lighter. It is often more stable, but you can break linux just as easily as you can windows, more so if you aren't sure of what you are doing.
At any rate, give a LiveCD distro like Knoppix a whirl before you commit.
-drasnor
Spoken like someone who knows linux. Stick a linux machine infront of someone who doesn't know it and it's easy to break, and impossible to fix, without seriously scrounging help files. If your target audience doesn't even understand that in linux cd / = windows cd\ and that cd/ won't even work also cd.. won't work you have to cd .. huge hurdle should something break. An average windows user with no linux experience would find linux crippling if they had to go and fix anything.
As for modern distributions they aren't by any means light if we are talking about your generic home distro's like Ubuntu, Suse, Redhat etc.... They are all very full featured and though they run better then windows are by no means light.
--XP--
-Repeatedly crashing
-Always having to reformat due to system lag
-Alot more open to hacks/viruses
-No compatibility issues with games
-More applications
-Easy to Use
--Linux--
-Easily breakable (willing to learn how to not break it)
-Alot more secure
-Not so good for gaming (Can be fixed with Wine)
-HDD is going to be wiped anyway, and my applications are on another partition, so it's not much hassle with reinstalling if I have to
Wine works ok. It's generally better at running windows applications inside of linux. It's less compatible when it comes to running games. For games the big crippling factor is Directx which has Zero support in linux. Wine has some limited access to Directx functions and will run some older games ok. But most newer games forget about it.
Before I continue. Let me clarify a few things. I know linux well, what I don't know I can google for information, I know it as well as I know Windows or OS X. I'm also a firm supporter of linux and actively promote it when I think it's worth promoting. It's a very strong OS with very strong features. It is however not a direct replacement for Windows, in the same way that OS X is not a direct replacement for windows.
So if you want to own a computer that works like windows and allows you the exact same functionality as windows with the exact same ease of software installation, especially when it comes to games. STICK TO WINDOWS. Windows does have more security holes then most other OS's it does often go wonky more quickly then other OS's. It is however still has the lion's share of the market and if you like to be able to go to your local store and buy (or however you acquire software) pretty much any program you want and know that it'll work then stick to windows.
I would strongly suggest that if you are at all interested in linux to acquire a linux Live CD Ubuntu Live can be acquired from Here. Download it and burn it onto a cd. Then boot your computer off the cd. It will run linux from the CD and not install anything. Play around with it (keep in mind it is running off the CD so things are noticeably slower in some aspects, certainly load times) and check it out. It's a full complete system, with many tools. Check it out and if you think it's something you like click the 'install' button from the desktop and you'll be up and running after answering a few simple questions.
Just remember though regardless of wine or virtual machines or anything else Windows = Games Linux = Applications.
Harudath is obviously not the average user because he's on our forum, has indicated that he's heard of Linux before, and is interested in trying it. Certain assumptions can now be made like that he is at least somewhat technically inclined and is willing to ask questions and learn how to do the things that are suggested. I would not attempt to pitch Linux to the rest of my family unless they showed interest first. Also, Google has served me well in finding solutions to problems on Linux that are easy to follow and ALWAYS work, quite unlike Googling for a BSoD stop code that may or may not provide any usfeul information. One of the biggest strengths of the Linux platform in my opinion is that it almost always tells you what's wrong with it. Reading Linux logs is generally much more instructive than reading Windows logs.
I'm going to call :bs: on this FUD. It was true 5 years ago but not anymore. Wine has full DirectX support through DirectX 8 and at least working DirectX 9 support, enough to run the HL2 Source engine among others. What I've encountered is that the games that don't work usually have obtuse anti-cheating measures built-in that don't like not being able to find a Windows install. It would probably be a good idea for you to look up any Windows softwares you want to run in the Wine AppDB. Also worth noting is how many recent games are in the Platinum and Gold compatibility categories; anything in there will give you no trouble. Also worth noting is that games released by Id and Epic are fully Linux-native and don't require Wine to function.
Do this only after you have seriously considered whether or not you like anything that's on that hard drive. Your drive will get re-partitioned and formatted.
Err... no. :bs: Even the stock games that ship with GNOME are better than the Windows built-in games. Honestly, built-in Sudoku and Mahjongg vs. Solitaire? Matter of preference I suppose.
-drasnor
I feel like trying something new, and from the research I've done Linux seems alot more flexible and professional, true or not I'm loving the look of the visual styles and all the stuff ye can do with it. I usually learn quickly when it comes to this stuff, and if switching to Linux saves me all these cruddy Windows bugs/crashes/pleh then I don't see why not :P.
I will definately be trying the Ubuntu Live feature and making a decision from that, but from what I've seen I'm pretty sure I'll stick with a Linux OS
You've had nothing but issues with Windows XP. Format after format, time after time, again and again. While Windows <i>can</i> break out of its own cruel will, it does <i>not</i> break so repetitively and drastically as your installs have. For example, my installs have ever been cripplingly broken twice (NTLDR errors) in 10+ years of power-using Windows. This leads me to wonder:
1) Do you have faulty hardware?
2) Or is it something you're doing wrong?
Switching to Linux isn't a magic bullet if your problems are seemingly systemic.
Linux is as light as you want it to be.
Also please don't down right lie, Unless the user is root they can't break anything badly. A intelligent user will not go around as root breaking things. They will only be root when needed.
Way too much FUD in your post. Please get off my internet's and try again.
The only problem with wine is that you will spend a long time taking dll's and fonts from windows boxes to get applications working properly.
On a side note Harudath's problems are probably caused by whats in between his keyboard and chair assuming his hardware is good. Linux would solve this .. if he never becomes root or uses sudo, Same with mac os.
I don't have high hopes that Linux will totally solve the problems, but I hope that it will at least help it prevent more from occuring.
And I think it was just stating a worse case scenario that a Linux noob is likely to do, it was off putting, but more a word of severe warning than telling me it will definately happen. Better to be warned with over-exaggerated information than saying everything will be fine then coming back a week later with "wtf happened?"
True, but it's easier to recover from a broken windows install for an average user, pop in the disk repair install good to go. That's the sort of advice we hand out all the time around here. Linux, seldom is it that simple. There are many more variables involved when it comes to linux. The fact that there are still driver issues alone in linux for many common devices such as video cards at certain resolutions and wireless devices and even some newer mobo's won't work at all is enough to throw a serious wrench in a new linux user that doesn't know where to look and without understanding what to look for it's almost impossible. Windows on the other hand almost every device works out of the box or at least comes with windows drivers. I'm sure you can find some exceptions to make a point if you want but they are extreme exceptions.
I agree it's true that one user who knows one system will find another system awkward - so what's your point. This topic is about a Windows users asking about Linux.
That's a hell of an assumption. I can't even decide where to pick apart that logic. So I'll start at the beginning. Being on this forum, no offence to anyone here but doesn't mean you are an above average user. Just means you googled something and stuck around. Interest in trying linux does not in anyway imply knowledge of linux. The Internet is full of forums and topics about people that wonder why they can't just run Program X on linux, or OS X or Windows regardless of what system that program is designed for. Case in point here, Harudath came into this conversation thinking Wine = Windows on linux. It's not, not by a long shot. Further more the questions he was asking are very rudimentary and not of any insight into the difference of linux. It doesn't show any understanding of linux or the differences in. Have someone take his computer wipe it and install linux for him. He'll be back with 100 more questions on why this or that doesn't work. That's all well and good, it's a great way to learn. But it's also the primary reason why the majority of people stop using linux. They expect it to work like Windows only Different. Linux is not Windows only different. Linux is a completely different OS and should not be pushed as a Windows Alternative. Linux is not the Coke version of Windows Pepsi. Completely different beast.
Sure you can run some newer games under wine by regressing them to run under Dx8 or worse. None of them are a case of just poping in the disk clicking setup and running it. Want a refresher on how to get Half Life 2 running under ubuntu?
This is the if you are lucky version
This is the long version if you aren't lucky
Neither of which are simple or common sense if you've never used linux before. They also are making assumptions that you've got wine fully configured correctly ahead of time, which can be a big assumption. But again we are talking about some games working on Wine. There are many games that won't work. That's the reality. You can get some windows games running under linux, but it no way is that the rule it's always the exception.
Depends on the version of linux, depends on what you consider break. I've had to deal with plenty of linux installations that broke because someone picked the wrong screen resolution and couldn't get out of it because it defaulted to 640x480 and the ok/cancel prompts went off the screen. The only way to fix it is to go into shell, edit settings manual etc.... Simple things can break it. I'm not suggesting that a user can utterly destroy their system with the accidental wrong click of a button. But make it temporarily unusable certainly.
But lets skip ahead a little. Ubuntu for example, my favorite distro loves sudo. Your default username is also the sudo rights holder. So you are getting adventurous and trying to set something up in shell. You are sudoing here and there working in VI or another editor save the wrong command and it's broken. Sure it's usually a simple fix, if you know what you were doing in the first place. But not always and when users with no understanding of what they are doing are blindly following a how-to the wrong syntax can mess a system up entirely.
This is also true of any OS. But a comfort and understanding of windows doesn't translate to linux.
Ummm yep, that's pretty much exactly what I'm addressing here. Running most newer games under wine require work if they'll even run at all. Wine does however run most standard applications pretty well and if not there are fortunately linux alternatives for many of them. Again linux performs much better as an application driving OS then as a Game machine. To think anything else is to be delusional.
I agree. But as he also mentioned he installed Vista and that cleared up the problem also.
I did think Wine was basically a windows apps on Linux too, I'll admit it. But now I know that it isn't, and the more I understand about this the better I'll be able to make a decision when it comes to the time when I want to decide: Windows or Linux?
Bingo. As I said I love linux. But there are way to many people that say 'Oh Yeah Switch to Linux and all your problems will go away' it's a bs line that gets passed around far to freely and often. It's a falsehood that can often lead to many, many more problems.
I highly support and encourage you to check out linux. But check it out and know what your getting into, live cd's are fantastic. Just be informed first and understand that what you currently find simple to do and take for granted in windows is not necessarily the case in Linux. This is especially true when it comes to off the shelf software.
I think it's easier to cripple a Linux Distro than it is Windows, tbh. Many's a time I've messed in the Konsole only to have the thing not boot (LMAO)
I've been using PC Linux OS 2007 for a couple of months now, slowly getting to know it, have been using it a fair bit for Office, Graphics (Gimp) and Net surfing.
I like this Distro, many others do not, it's all a question of taste, I suppose.
I also used Suse 10.1 for a while, that looked pretty but imo it was bloated and having to source all the codecs for media playback was a pain.
So some where in your cd burning software there will be the ability to burn a cd image to disk. Then you tell it the image you are burning is .iso (there are various formates of disk images but .iso is the generic standard). It will then take that .iso image and burn it's contents to the cd making a copy of the original that the .iso is made from.
It's that cd that you then need to boot your system with.
The iso <i>is</i> the image.
http://www.weethet.nl/english/cdrw_usingnero_iso.php
http://shipit.ubuntu.com/