Distros that did not make the cut

I’ve been downloading and previewing several distros.  A lot of them have done surprisingly well.  Others have done not so well.

I think Linux has really arrived at a place where the average computer user can handle it.  And a lot of people will like Linux.

Distros that have not made the cut:

1.       Open SuSe 11.0 – Went black after the splash screen and never returned

2.       Sabayon 3.4 – Same as #1

3.       Mandriva 2008 – Same as #1 and #2.  These were all disappointing but made those that made the cut look a lot better

4.       Damn Small Linux – This one did load but did not find my Ethernet  connection

Distros that made it:

1.       PCLinuxOS 2007 – It’s taken everything I’ve thrown at it in Live CD mode.  It’s real close to getting installed.  I’ll put Minime 2008 behind this as it does work off a flash drive but has a few niggling issues like not using the 8G of space I’ve given to it to expand out like I’d like.

2.       Mepis 7.0 – This has been my distro of choice for a long time, but one slip up and it will be replaced by #1.  It really does work well, but PCLOS seems to work better with more features.  It’s a tough choice.

3.       Ubuntu 7.10 – Killer graphics make this one very appealing, and it is a very mature distro very much ready for the desktop.  For business users, it could be a Vista killer.  Unlike its predecessor, this one is distinctive and out front in many ways.  I can respect people who choose this one over my choices, which was not the case a year ago.

4.       Puppy Linux 3.01 – This has been another one of my pet favorites the past year, but is falling from favor now that I no longer rely on a modem.  It can not connect with my Ethernet and is unreliable as far as wireless.  I found the look and feel of 2.15 to be better than 3.01 but that may be just me.  I’m ready to look at some other lighter distros for older machines.

5.       Linux Mint 4.0 – I need to give this one some more play time.  It did work well for me, but I chose Mepis mostly because of the familiar interface.  Now that I’ve been playing around with other distros, I can make a fairer comparison here.

Ubuntu 7.10:Just About Worth the Hype

I’ve was critical of Ubuntu 6.06 Dapper Drake and the hype surrounding it and wasn’t terribly anxious to try the Gutsy Gibbon 7.10 release.  However, since I’ve been trying out various distros, not trying Ubuntu would be an embarrassing oversight.  So I downloaded and burned the live CD and booted it up.

If you’re a Windows user and get one of these CD’s, you can put it in the CD tray and install MS versions of Firefox, Abiword and Thunderbird, but these are not the unknown or fancy applications that they were back when Dapper Drake first came out.  6.06 also came with GAIM and the Gimp but I’m guessing the newer version didn’t have room for too many Windows toys.

Ubuntu succeeded where other distros failed to even get anywhere past the splash screen.  But that is not all.  Once loaded, I began playing around with Ubuntu.  Even without Compiz, this distro was clearly targeting a Vista-type of graphic experience.  And it was faster and superior to anything I’ve ever seen on a Vista machine that had more hardware than this one did.  Ubuntu has arrived and I’m willing to give it the respect it deserves.  And there’s more.

Unlike other distros I’ve tried, Ubuntu detected and connected to the ethernet connection right out of the box with absolutely no configuration necessary.  It also detected and was able to read my hard drive which I had not previously tasked other distros to do.  And with Open Office 2.3 it was able to open and read Office 2007 documents.  That was a big plus!  It was able to detect the Microsoft networking neighborhood, which others had not seemed to be able to handle.

This edition of Ubuntu has a lot going for it and a lot to like.  So is this a contender for my home desktop?

No.  Ubuntu is at the top of its game, especially with the ease of use in working with the various types of hardware.   But it is a very basic distro with very basic features that look very nice.  It does things no other distro I’ve tried can do.  But those things are not especially critical to my present needs and desires.  The synaptac repository seemed a bit on the shallow side, especially compared to what PCLinuxOS is offering.  But even compared to Mepis, it is looking like I might have to do extra work to get Picasa, Google Earth and Stepmania on and running.  I’d be willing to try it, if Ubuntu had anything else that sufficiently grabbed my attention and interest.  The appearance and speed is clearly an attention-getter, but it is the applications that are going to compel me to stay with an outfit for any length of time.  Ubuntu came very, very close this time around and perhaps a future release will win me over.  If my work machine didn’t have a NTFS hard drive, I would have been sorely tempted to partition it right there and then and give the dual boot a whirl.  But my home needs are a bit different and more eclectic than my work needs. 

For my money, PCLinuxOS still has earned its way to the top of Distrowatch, but Ubuntu has definitely earned its way into the top 10, especially compared to 6.06.  The features are there and they are unique but the targeted audience seems to be more business oriented than home desktop oriented.

 

PCLinuxOS 2007: It really is as good as the Hype!

Oh my. I may have found myself a new favorite distro.

I nearly overlooked this one because of my difficulties with PCLOS Minime 2008 on the flashdrive. I will say one thing about Minime: it does work and works well. I do like the look and feel of it and if I could get the package manager to work, I would be all over it.

I downloaded and burned the live CD of the 2007 version and must say that I really like it. The latest PCLinux 2007 is the Gnome version, but the default is the KDE version. If you don’t understand what I just wrote, don’t sweat it. I have always preferred the KDE but that’s just me.

PCLinuxOS has been riding very, very high in the Distrowatch charts, toppling Ubuntu from #1. Ubuntu sat there for about a year, until PCLOS knocked it off. And it’s for a very good reason, because this is a very good distro packed with a lot of good, attractive features that just work. One doesn’t fully appreciate the “just works” aspect until they try a bunch of things that don’t work. I’ve been trying several distros on my work machine (2.66 Ghs Dual core P4 with 512 RAM and ATI Radeon 9500 graphics card, DVD/CD-RW) and have run into a few that are not working as of yet.

PCLinuxOS found all my hardware, the Ethernet and booted up just fine. In fact I decided to go ahead and work on this post using it, and I”m really liking the look and feel of it. It will seriously give Mepis a run for its money and may seriously end up replacing it. It’s that good.

Aside from simply working, there’s other things I’m discovering that I like. For instance, when you open a new distro’s Firefox, they often have some generic bookmarks. PCLinux actually has some interesting and helpful bookmarks, like PCLinux, PCLinux Extra, PCLinux Hardware data base, something called Lortal and LinFX.com. If you can’t find help and answers in these places, you’ve got some serious issues!

I like how easy it was to find things and the richly populated Synaptic libraries of goodies that the Mepis library seemed to be sparse with. Mepis didn’t have Picasa, Google Earth or Stepmania. PCLinuxOS has them all.

Ksnapshot was right there.

Pretty cool, eh? I don’t include many screen captures because I’m such a nOOB but PCLinux made it just so easy!

dick