Testing Out Linux. Part 1
A windows users' journey into the world of Linux
Thursday, May 19, 2005 by thedon808 | Discussion: OS Wars
I've known about GNU/Linux , and the whole open source thing, for sometime now.
About a year ago I bought the 'Dummies Guide to Fedora Rore1' book. Hoping to
get more into using Linux and also as my girl friend worked on Saturdays
(the only day I could go to visit) I spent a lot of time in the town, so
this book gave me something to do. I spent a few weeks flicking through
it reading bits and pieces I then decided to try it out. I installed it on
my test PC an old PII 350Mhz 128ram 3Gb drive. The install process of
Fedora is quite easy with a nice GUI installer guiding you through what
packages you want installed etc. After it had done its business installing,
about 45-60mins install time, I was thrown into the deep end, with a
rather dated looking desktop theme, my first mission was to connect to
my main XP PC.
'Ok, how do I do that? Ah ha network tool. Oh, no card installed! Humm ok!
Well I tried, where's my XP CD?'
After getting married and moving house I thought it would be great
to have a file server for our music etc. I had already set up a network
between my PC, my wife's, and her Mac. So adding a file server should be
easy enough. Again out comes the old PII install Fedora on it again.
This time I was more careful what I installed as I needed more space
rather than toys, after the install I checked the space left on the
3Gb drive, only 400 or so Mb. Well there goes my conception that Linux
was a smaller operating system than XP.
So now I'm on the hunt for a smaller distro, so google for 'lightweight
Linux distro' all I come up with are the tiny distros eg50Mb. What I
was after was something a little more fuller but not bloated. Then I
came across
Distrowatch.com in the packages list Ubuntu had all I needed, apache,
php, samba, etc. and its on one CD (Fedora Core 3 is 4 CD's).
So set it up downloading overnight. The next night I had planned to install
it (as long it downloaded ok, which it did). The next night I burnt it to
CD and then got carried away designing a cover to print onto the CD. That
was a week ago, last night I actually did the install. Even though it
hasn't got a fancy installer like Fedora I actually found it easier than
I thought to install. The only hard bit would have been disk partitioning
but as it had Fedora on it previously I just reformatted the partitions
that were already there. The only down side to the installation was the
time, over 2 hours later I eventually had the login screen in front of me,
(my only worry was I didn't remember putting the root password in?)
anyhow login fine.
First objective, check root password, 'Great the same as my login password,
really secure!' So promptly change it and then have a little nose around,
the GUI still isn't as nice as XP or OSX it still needs some work, I then
check the network, well the internet works so looks hopeful.
Next objective set up shared folder on the network. 'Oh, samba isn't
installed'. At that point I decided to leave it for another day, as it
was an hour later than I was expecting due to the lengthy install time.
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MasonM
Reply #22 Saturday, May 21, 2005 8:23 AM
Reply #22 Saturday, May 21, 2005 8:23 AM
The best and in my opinion only way to learn Linux is to install it and use it. SImply reading about it without actually having it installed is nearly useless. I've been using Linux since 1995 so am tad biased but in my OPINION once you have learned how to use it Linux is a far more powerful OS giving you total control over your system.
Fedora is a very bloated distro, there are many that have little/no bloat including LiveCD versions that fit on a 50Meg credit card CD.
They both have their place and Windows is a good choice for someone who doesn't want to learn anything new, have more control over their system, and is willing to put up with virus, adware, and spyware problems and all the extra software needed to deal with them which I consider unnecessary bloat.
But that's just me.
Fedora is a very bloated distro, there are many that have little/no bloat including LiveCD versions that fit on a 50Meg credit card CD.
They both have their place and Windows is a good choice for someone who doesn't want to learn anything new, have more control over their system, and is willing to put up with virus, adware, and spyware problems and all the extra software needed to deal with them which I consider unnecessary bloat.
But that's just me.
kona0197
Reply #23 Saturday, May 21, 2005 2:22 PM
If you ever get a chance time Fedora Core 3 vs Windows XP. Even with all services turned off - those you really don't need - XP wins hands down. My XP system boots in less than a minute and a half.
I don't consider one aV scanner and one active spyware scanner and 2 adware/bot scanners as bloat. I have never gotten a virus or adware or malware while employing the proper programs to fight them. The programs do not take much space or memory.
As far as Linspire - forget that distro unless you like paying for programs and packages that others offer for free.
Reply #23 Saturday, May 21, 2005 2:22 PM
| linux speed ---- ive timed both OSes on startup time, application loading, and staight up numbers crunching and yes linux wins all of them. |
If you ever get a chance time Fedora Core 3 vs Windows XP. Even with all services turned off - those you really don't need - XP wins hands down. My XP system boots in less than a minute and a half.
| They both have their place and Windows is a good choice for someone who doesn't want to learn anything new, have more control over their system, and is willing to put up with virus, adware, and spyware problems and all the extra software needed to deal with them which I consider unnecessary bloat. |
I don't consider one aV scanner and one active spyware scanner and 2 adware/bot scanners as bloat. I have never gotten a virus or adware or malware while employing the proper programs to fight them. The programs do not take much space or memory.
As far as Linspire - forget that distro unless you like paying for programs and packages that others offer for free.
MasonM
Reply #24 Saturday, May 21, 2005 2:38 PM
One man's bloat is another man's necessity. I've never gotten a virus or adware or malware either, and I also don't need to run those extra programs which DO use resources.
Sounds about right, but then my Slackware boots in just about 30 seconds. There are ways to easily speed up boot time besides just turning off unneeded services. Hotplug can really slow down the boot process. If you configure for the drivers you need to be loaded, disabling hotplug can shave a pretty fair amount of time off booting.
I would also point out that if one wants to honestly time the differences between windows/linux boot times you have to take into account the fact that windows presents a desktop before it has finished loading all apps and services. This gives many the false impression of a faster boot, which is what was intended.
If one wants to try a pretty easy to use Linux distro that handles pretty much everything automatically and requires less manual interaction check out SimplyMepis. It's a LiveCD distro which can easily be installed on your HDD with a mouse click.
Reply #24 Saturday, May 21, 2005 2:38 PM
| I don't consider one aV scanner and one active spyware scanner and 2 adware/bot scanners as bloat. I have never gotten a virus or adware or malware while employing the proper programs to fight them. The programs do not take much space or memory. |
One man's bloat is another man's necessity.
I've never gotten a virus or adware or malware either, and I also don't need to run those extra programs which DO use resources.| My XP system boots in less than a minute and a half. |
Sounds about right, but then my Slackware boots in just about 30 seconds. There are ways to easily speed up boot time besides just turning off unneeded services. Hotplug can really slow down the boot process. If you configure for the drivers you need to be loaded, disabling hotplug can shave a pretty fair amount of time off booting.
I would also point out that if one wants to honestly time the differences between windows/linux boot times you have to take into account the fact that windows presents a desktop before it has finished loading all apps and services. This gives many the false impression of a faster boot, which is what was intended.
If one wants to try a pretty easy to use Linux distro that handles pretty much everything automatically and requires less manual interaction check out SimplyMepis. It's a LiveCD distro which can easily be installed on your HDD with a mouse click.
Ka806
Reply #25 Saturday, May 21, 2005 4:38 PM
Reply #25 Saturday, May 21, 2005 4:38 PM
Dont forget recompiling the kernel with less modules 
My gentoo start up is somewhere along the line of 15 seconds. (From selecting it on my bootloader to loading up enlightenment and being ready to go. It effin zooms!! You really gotta work at it to get boot times like that though.
In fact I would recommend slackware for beginners. just stick it in, fdisk, do a full install, and put the bootloader in the mbr. Its install is really simple. You get a lot of software and its smaller then 3 gigs for the install. It will start you off in a console, which is intimidation, but just type in startx and your good. Yes it is a linux distro for advance users, but i would recommend it to newbs more than anything else
My gentoo start up is somewhere along the line of 15 seconds. (From selecting it on my bootloader to loading up enlightenment and being ready to go. It effin zooms!! You really gotta work at it to get boot times like that though.
In fact I would recommend slackware for beginners. just stick it in, fdisk, do a full install, and put the bootloader in the mbr. Its install is really simple. You get a lot of software and its smaller then 3 gigs for the install. It will start you off in a console, which is intimidation, but just type in startx and your good. Yes it is a linux distro for advance users, but i would recommend it to newbs more than anything else
MasonM
Reply #26 Saturday, May 21, 2005 4:51 PM
I have to disagree with you there. Firstly, Slack doesn't configure X automatically so "but just type in startx and your good" isn't correct. You have to configure X yourself before you have a usable X environment. You also need to configure alsa.
While Slack is my distro of choice (and I've used MANY), I don't recommend it to newbies because it doesn't use a lot of auto-configure tools, or much in the way of "auto" anything and manually editing config files can be daunting for a newbie. I always recommend something more "automatic" for them to get their feet wet and start learning Linux.
Gentoo is good, I used it for a while, but I found some of the packages a tad unstable at times, and the compile times tiresome (if it moves, compile it), but over all it's very good. And yeah it booted about the same as my Slack. I guess if counting time from bootloader menu to ready for work, I'd say 15 to 20 seconds is probably about right. I normally time from power up.
Reply #26 Saturday, May 21, 2005 4:51 PM
| In fact I would recommend slackware for beginners. just stick it in, fdisk, do a full install, and put the bootloader in the mbr. Its install is really simple. You get a lot of software and its smaller then 3 gigs for the install. It will start you off in a console, which is intimidation, but just type in startx and your good. Yes it is a linux distro for advance users, but i would recommend it to newbs more than anything else |
I have to disagree with you there. Firstly, Slack doesn't configure X automatically so "but just type in startx and your good" isn't correct. You have to configure X yourself before you have a usable X environment. You also need to configure alsa.
While Slack is my distro of choice (and I've used MANY), I don't recommend it to newbies because it doesn't use a lot of auto-configure tools, or much in the way of "auto" anything and manually editing config files can be daunting for a newbie. I always recommend something more "automatic" for them to get their feet wet and start learning Linux.
Gentoo is good, I used it for a while, but I found some of the packages a tad unstable at times, and the compile times tiresome (if it moves, compile it), but over all it's very good. And yeah it booted about the same as my Slack. I guess if counting time from bootloader menu to ready for work, I'd say 15 to 20 seconds is probably about right. I normally time from power up.
Ka806
Reply #27 Saturday, May 21, 2005 6:06 PM
Reply #27 Saturday, May 21, 2005 6:06 PM
The slackware vs gentoo choice for distrobution was one of the hardest choices ive made in computing. I went gentoo many because of the philosophy (Start with nothing and building the system from scratch)
I would recommend slackware because it teaches people faster than any other distro. I remeber X being usuable but not fully configured on my system. But hey doing xorgconfig is not that complicated to do.
I thought alsa was configured also (guess its been a while since I installed slackware) That should be simple also. I think a simple alsaconfig should do it all. Doing things like dmix is plenty difficult though (who knew playing 2 sound files at once was such a daunting task)
Yeah theres a lot of crap you gotta do with slackware next to suse or something but Im the kind that will throw a user into the linux lake, then let them get their feet wet.
My first distro was mandrake. And that is probably the best rpm based distro out there. I guess if a newbie refuses to slack, then they should use that.
I would recommend slackware because it teaches people faster than any other distro. I remeber X being usuable but not fully configured on my system. But hey doing xorgconfig is not that complicated to do.
I thought alsa was configured also (guess its been a while since I installed slackware) That should be simple also. I think a simple alsaconfig should do it all. Doing things like dmix is plenty difficult though (who knew playing 2 sound files at once was such a daunting task)
Yeah theres a lot of crap you gotta do with slackware next to suse or something but Im the kind that will throw a user into the linux lake, then let them get their feet wet.
My first distro was mandrake. And that is probably the best rpm based distro out there. I guess if a newbie refuses to slack, then they should use that.
MasonM
Reply #28 Saturday, May 21, 2005 6:30 PM
I know how you feel. I built my Slack system the same way. I liked Gentoo ok but evetually went back to Slack.
True if you know what you're doing, but for a newbie who has no idea what he's looking at it could be very daunting.
Yes that's it. It's knowing you have to do it that comes with experience.
Yeah and a lot of newbies quickly go back to Windows because they are left with a system they can't use. I feel it's far easier to ease someone into Linux with something easier and more automated. But it varies with the person too. Some are more technically inclined and do quite well, most have a lot of bad habits from years of using Windows and just can't make that radical a transition. It's all about the learning curve.
I've taught a number of introductory Linux classes. I always used Slack for the teaching, but to just throw someone to the wolves usually results in a quick return to Windows.
I'm not much for distro bashing, but I found Mandrake far too buggy to be of any practical use.
Reply #28 Saturday, May 21, 2005 6:30 PM
| I went gentoo many because of the philosophy (Start with nothing and building the system from scratch) |
I know how you feel. I built my Slack system the same way. I liked Gentoo ok but evetually went back to Slack.
| But hey doing xorgconfig is not that complicated to do. |
True if you know what you're doing, but for a newbie who has no idea what he's looking at it could be very daunting.
| I think a simple alsaconfig should do it all. |
Yes that's it. It's knowing you have to do it that comes with experience.
| Im the kind that will throw a user into the linux lake, then let them get their feet wet. |
Yeah and a lot of newbies quickly go back to Windows because they are left with a system they can't use. I feel it's far easier to ease someone into Linux with something easier and more automated. But it varies with the person too. Some are more technically inclined and do quite well, most have a lot of bad habits from years of using Windows and just can't make that radical a transition. It's all about the learning curve.
I've taught a number of introductory Linux classes. I always used Slack for the teaching, but to just throw someone to the wolves usually results in a quick return to Windows.
I'm not much for distro bashing, but I found Mandrake far too buggy to be of any practical use.
Ka806
Reply #29 Saturday, May 21, 2005 9:33 PM
Reply #29 Saturday, May 21, 2005 9:33 PM
Yeah I guess people should take your word over mine. Its been a while since I went through a Linux installation. Yeah and mandy might have changed since last i used it
MasonM
Reply #30 Saturday, May 21, 2005 9:43 PM
Not at all. We all have opinions and experiences to share and our own way of doing things. That's the greatest thing about Linux; choices.
Simply sharing my own opinions, not trying to start a debate.
Reply #30 Saturday, May 21, 2005 9:43 PM
| Yeah I guess people should take your word over mine. |
Not at all. We all have opinions and experiences to share and our own way of doing things. That's the greatest thing about Linux; choices.
Simply sharing my own opinions, not trying to start a debate.
PurrBall
Reply #31 Sunday, May 22, 2005 5:52 AM
My new system boots from power off to the fully loaded XP desktop in less thn 15 seconds, right out of the box!!!
Reply #31 Sunday, May 22, 2005 5:52 AM
| My XP system boots in less than a minute and a half. |
My new system boots from power off to the fully loaded XP desktop in less thn 15 seconds, right out of the box!!!
MasonM
Reply #32 Sunday, May 22, 2005 7:39 AM
You must have an impressive machine. The fastest Xp boot times I've ever seen have been in the 30 second range, and then only after some serious tweaking.
Keep in mind though that with Windows, just because you can see a desktop doesn't mean it's finished booting up. There are still apps and services being loaded so from power up to desktop realy isn't the correct measure of boot time. It's from power up to everything loaded that needs to be loaded.
Reply #32 Sunday, May 22, 2005 7:39 AM
| My new system boots from power off to the fully loaded XP desktop in less thn 15 seconds, right out of the box!!! |
You must have an impressive machine. The fastest Xp boot times I've ever seen have been in the 30 second range, and then only after some serious tweaking.
Keep in mind though that with Windows, just because you can see a desktop doesn't mean it's finished booting up. There are still apps and services being loaded so from power up to desktop realy isn't the correct measure of boot time. It's from power up to everything loaded that needs to be loaded.
sos
Reply #33 Sunday, May 22, 2005 8:40 AM
Reply #33 Sunday, May 22, 2005 8:40 AM
Anybody interested in checking out Linux should try the Xandros distribuion. Based on Debian and granted not for advanced users, but out of the box the easiest way to see how Linux compares to XP for a newbie.
werewolf
Reply #34 Sunday, May 22, 2005 11:57 AM
Reply #34 Sunday, May 22, 2005 11:57 AM
Yesterday, I did the Knoppix thing and was fairly impressed. It found all my hardware and everything worked great. I ended up with, I guess, a KDE desktop? It was all running from my CD, but what if I did want to try a full installation?
Which installer installs and finds all the hardware and networks and etc automatically and finishes in a working state, ready to go.
Which installer installs and finds all the hardware and networks and etc automatically and finishes in a working state, ready to go.
MasonM
Reply #35 Sunday, May 22, 2005 12:47 PM
As I mentioned previously, SimplyMepis is a very good newbie distro with auto-config and hardware detection. It's a LiveCD like Knoppix but specifically designed for ease of installation if you choose.
Reply #35 Sunday, May 22, 2005 12:47 PM
| Which installer installs and finds all the hardware and networks and etc automatically and finishes in a working state, ready to go. |
As I mentioned previously, SimplyMepis is a very good newbie distro with auto-config and hardware detection. It's a LiveCD like Knoppix but specifically designed for ease of installation if you choose.
paxx
Reply #36 Sunday, May 22, 2005 1:54 PM
Reply #36 Sunday, May 22, 2005 1:54 PM
Just did the test on my rather outdated computer.
From cold boot to completely loaded, XP: 4 minutes; Linux: 2 minutes.
And I have disabled already all the unneeded services in XP, but it does load a bunch of apps that I consider invaluable such as Windowblinds, mySQL, PHP, antivirus, anti-spyware, etc. On the other hand, pretty much the same kind of apps are alos loaded in Linux, except the antivirus and antispyware which aren't needed.
From cold boot to completely loaded, XP: 4 minutes; Linux: 2 minutes.
And I have disabled already all the unneeded services in XP, but it does load a bunch of apps that I consider invaluable such as Windowblinds, mySQL, PHP, antivirus, anti-spyware, etc. On the other hand, pretty much the same kind of apps are alos loaded in Linux, except the antivirus and antispyware which aren't needed.
PurrBall
Reply #37 Sunday, May 22, 2005 5:56 PM
Brand new.
3.2 GHz Intel 640 EMT64
It was upgraded alot from the base model, but the link to the base model is here:
http://www.gateway.com/products/GConfig/proddetails.asp?system_id=9310x
The upgrades:
-SB Audigy sound
-17" Flat Panel
-Media Card reader and Floppy Drive
-Separate DVD and CD-RW drives
Reply #37 Sunday, May 22, 2005 5:56 PM
| My new system boots from power off to the fully loaded XP desktop in less thn 15 seconds, right out of the box!!! You must have an impressive machine. The fastest Xp boot times I've ever seen have been in the 30 second range, and then only after some serious tweaking. Keep in mind though that with Windows, just because you can see a desktop doesn't mean it's finished booting up. There are still apps and services being loaded so from power up to desktop realy isn't the correct measure of boot time. It's from power up to everything loaded that needs to be loaded. |
Brand new.
3.2 GHz Intel 640 EMT64
It was upgraded alot from the base model, but the link to the base model is here:
http://www.gateway.com/products/GConfig/proddetails.asp?system_id=9310x
The upgrades:
-SB Audigy sound
-17" Flat Panel
-Media Card reader and Floppy Drive
-Separate DVD and CD-RW drives
PurrBall
Reply #38 Sunday, May 22, 2005 6:31 PM
Reply #38 Sunday, May 22, 2005 6:31 PM
Of cource, the only startup proggies are Trend Micro PC-Cillin Internet Security 2005 and Norton GoBack 4.0.
werewolf
Reply #39 Sunday, May 22, 2005 6:36 PM
Thanks MasonM...Sorry, I did read that, but I've been reading a lot lately about linux (and there is a LOT to read about linux) and my head is a bit spinney. I'm not even sure I want to attempt this, but I've got this 120g hdd and it's practically empty. Thought about a dual boot thing. I just hope I don't screw up my xp installation.
Reply #39 Sunday, May 22, 2005 6:36 PM
| As I mentioned previously, SimplyMepis is a very good newbie distro with auto-config and hardware detection. It's a LiveCD like Knoppix but specifically designed for ease of installation if you choose. |
Thanks MasonM...Sorry, I did read that, but I've been reading a lot lately about linux (and there is a LOT to read about linux) and my head is a bit spinney. I'm not even sure I want to attempt this, but I've got this 120g hdd and it's practically empty. Thought about a dual boot thing. I just hope I don't screw up my xp installation.
MasonM
Reply #40 Sunday, May 22, 2005 6:50 PM
Reply #40 Sunday, May 22, 2005 6:50 PM
werewolf; What I always tell people who want to find out about Linux is to just pick a distro and try it. Try as many as you want to try, most are free to download and only cost you the price of the blanck CD-Rs.
Mepis is Debian based so installing apps, doing upgrades, etc., is pretty easy. Once you get the hang of Linux, give Slack a try.
Mepis is Debian based so installing apps, doing upgrades, etc., is pretty easy. Once you get the hang of Linux, give Slack a try.
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Reply #21 Saturday, May 21, 2005 8:22 AM
For business use or power users, my picks are SUSE 9.3 and Sun Java Desktop Release two, both of which use the SUSE core, and Gnome desktop, SJD alos run on solaris. Currently I run Sun Java Desktop, SUSE and SJD come with many Novel and sun products as part of the package, which make networking relatively easy, working with Windows is no problem, even the likes of Zen application server and group wise are now shipping with these distros, and the evolution email client is now at a stage where it a strong rival for Lotus notes and Outlook.
I still run windows XP on all my systems, mainly because of the fact that many industry specific applications will not run on linux, even with wine and other windows emulation packages. I also have a mac for similar reasons, and because my brother gave it to me, and I can sayeach has its good points and uses, One rerason I still use XP is my addiction to skinning, and in this case due to Object desktop still being the king of this market. Having said that I am still able to work with skinning products on linux, just takes a little more time learning the different applications and where to find them, with OD its already there. As for skinning sites for linux Freshmeat is a great site if not the best. So if you love skinning and want to try linux, go for it , just don't throw away you xp.
I find Fedora release 3 impressive, as is ubuntu, and Xandros, mandrak and...... although they are not as polished overall or as easy to use as SUSE, SJD and LINSPIRE. I have just set my mother up with a reconditioned PIII laptop, and have loaded Linspire, mainly because it has all the software she wanted, and she found using on my system very easy to us, plus if she needs some software, she goes to click and run and Linspire does the rest, with windows I have to run with her over the phone. So as the add says Linspire is so easy my granmother can install and use it.
Hope this helps guys.