How does Mandrake compare to Suse?

[mistinthenight]

Hi,

 

I'm looking for a faster and more stable distro than Mandrake, and since I'm a KDE user, Suse -one of the largest supporters- is a good option.

 

Have you tried the new Suse 9.1 ? How does it compare to Mandrake 10 ?

 

A good side effect from the move is that I'll get all the KDE releases faster than with Mandrake :)

 

Thanks !

[Darkelve]

They both have their advantages and disadvantages.

 

It all depends on what you want to do with it and how much time/effort you are prepared to put into it.

 

A good start would be to visit the SuSe product pages:

http://www.suse.com/us/private/products/su...prof/index.html

 

This is very detailed and you can already learn a lot from it.

Of course, version 9.2 will come out soon, you can read of the improvements over 9.1 here:

http://www.suse.com/us/private/products/su...view/index.html

 

Also, I would ask this question on this (SuSe) forum as well:

http://forums.suselinuxsupport.de/index.php

 

 

I've switched from Mdk to SuSe a few months ago, but my situation might not be the same as yours (e.g. I had troubles getting wireless to work in Mdk).

 

 

Darkelve

[ac_dispatcher]

I have used both - Like both. As once said to me "fast, Pick a Distro"

 

Meaning there is not much difference between botjh. But some notables:

 

Mandrake is more bleeding edge so your packages will be more advanced but at a cost of possible instability.

 

YAST and MCC are very common in there functions but YAST has been around a bit more.

 

Mandrake seems to have more 3rd party repositories / outlets.

[arctic]

I'm looking for a faster and more stable distro than Mandrake, and since I'm a KDE user, Suse -one of the largest supporters- is a good option.

have you ever taken a look at Yoper? it is currently the fastest KDE-box you can get your hands on. and it has KDE 3.3. ;)

[gmac]

Thanks for the lonk, looks very similar to this forum was that hero worship om their part?

 

Do you know how they compare on hardware compatability?

[DragonMage]

It's all about what you have and what you need.

 

1. Suse is better if you buy the box set. not only the manual is good, but the box usually contains all the apps you will need/want, including something like epsxe (psx emulator). However, it is more closed than Mandrake in terms of development and patches. Until recently, they don't give you free ISOs (I think they still don't) like Mandrake does, so if you don't want to spend a hundred dollars for the box set, the only way is ftp install (or use the 1 cd GPL version to install basic suse and get the rest from ftp).

 

2. Mandrake is much more open in terms of development and patches availability. However, their box sets and business need work. They provide free ISOs so you can get a working desktop with full applications without spending a lot of money.

 

Since I live in a nation where a hundred dollars can feed a family for a week or more, and broadband penetration is very very limited, suse is not an option for me. However, I can buy a Mandrake downloadable ISOs for about 5 dollars (complete with a book). Also I can use the broadband located at work to make a mirror of the patches repository and burn them to a CD, so I can pretty much keep all my Mandrake installations up to date, no matter where that computer may be located.

[gmac]

thanks for that. I've been looking at getting a server and have been swayed towards suse because I can get the tech help if i need it but intend to keep that isolated from the internet just for added security so i might keep mandrake on one for regular use and to play with where it wont matter if i cock things up and suse on the server where I need to be sure I wont lose any information through my own stupidity.

 

The only thing I am sure of is I would like to get away from windows but it looks like I shall have to upgrade to xp at some point. I would like to think I could acquire the expertise to do it all myself but i need to keep my computer going

[mistinthenight]

Thank you for the info. Looking for that GPL CD, I found a Suse Live 9.1 CD (I don't know if this is the one you state). It gave me a chance to use it without any intalling.

 

My first experience is:

 

- Everything KDE (I love this). You have DIVX and MP3 support out of the box.

- Faster WEB browsing (in terms of screen redrawn) but slower when there are a lot of PNGs in the web page (you can see how it scrolls down smoothly and then there is a slow-down when there are several images.

- I'm using the latest propietary driver from ATI in Mandrake and with Suse I used the default driver. Suse allowed me to change my resolution up to 2048x1512 (my monitor supports it) and working at 1600x1200@106Hz. This is something that even the official ATI drivers don't allow easily.

- Faster desktop, KDE is more smooth: I can move windows with the content without problems, it was a bit slower with mandrake.

- Nice fonts. Just like Mandrake (but bettern than FC2)

- More or less recent packages correctly configured. Example: kaffeine was in its last version, completly configured (you only needed to put the win codecs in the directory) and working. Samba correctly detected my home network, etc.

- For a Live version, Knoppix is still the best: I had to manually configure the sound card, and it has far less software than Knoppix.

 

I'm a bit picky about smoothness and font quality, but I want a system _at least_ as smooth as my XP machine at work. In this sense, I think Suse is better. But I see two problems: one is the one you say -It's more closed- and the other is that I don't want to leave this forum :). On the other hand they are promising a even faster version with the next release next month. They will be using the kernel 2.8. and they already have the KDE 3.3.1 packages. I'll wait for that version to decide.

 

About not releasing a full version in CD or DVD, but allowing to download the full server to your harddisk, it's completly insane: I've seen places selling 2 DVDs with the entire FTP for +/-6 Euros.

[Darkelve]

Thank you for the info. Looking for that GPL CD, I found a Suse Live 9.1 CD (I don't know if this is the one you state). It gave me a chance to use it without any intalling.

 

My first experience is:

 

- Everything KDE (I love this). You have DIVX and MP3 support out of the box.

 

Not entirely correct. You still have to install some video codecs and install the libdvdcss package to watch (encrypted) DVD. Packman's website is your first stop for this.

 

- Faster WEB browsing (in terms of screen redrawn) but slower when there are a lot of PNGs in the web page (you can see how it scrolls down smoothly and then there is a slow-down when there are several images.

 

Perhaps it is because you are using a different browser? I suggest you check out FireFox as well.

 

- I'm using the latest propietary driver from ATI in Mandrake and with Suse I used the default driver. Suse allowed me to change my resolution up to 2048x1512 (my monitor supports it) and working at 1600x1200@106Hz. This is something that even the official ATI drivers don't allow easily.

 

Can't really comment on that. No experience with it. I had some problems with my nvidia card myself.

 

- Faster desktop, KDE is more smooth: I can move windows with the content without problems, it was a bit slower with mandrake.

 

Me, I had the opposite feeling. But it is a few months ago since I use Mandrake

 

- Nice fonts. Just like Mandrake (but bettern than FC2)

 

Fonts in SuSe and Mandrake are comparable, yes.

 

- More or less recent packages correctly configured. Example: kaffeine was in its last version, completly configured (you only needed to put the win codecs in the directory) and working. Samba correctly detected my home network, etc.

 

Configuration modules are a plus, I agree.

- For a Live version, Knoppix is still the best: I had to manually configure the sound card, and it has far less software than Knoppix.

 

Mepis and Slax are quite good too.

 

I'm a bit picky about smoothness and font quality, but I want a system _at least_ as smooth as my XP machine at work. In this sense, I think Suse is better. But I see two problems: one is the one you say -It's more closed- and the other is that I don't want to leave this forum :). On the other hand they are promising a even faster version with the next release next month. They will be using the kernel 2.8. and they already have the KDE 3.3.1 packages. I'll wait for that version to decide.

 

Yes, I think it would be wise to wait for 9.2. Also, there are SuSe Forums? you can visit (volunteer-run, like this site)

 

About not releasing a full version in CD or DVD, but allowing to download the full server to your harddisk, it's completly insane: I've seen places selling 2 DVDs with the entire FTP for +/-6 Euros.

 

 

Cheers,

 

Darkelve

Edited October 18, 2004 by Darkelve

[Windependent]

i went to SuSE 9.1 Pro as a migration path from Mandrake 9.2. i had a tough time with it.

 

the main problem was that on my systems, neither SuSE 9.1 nor Mandrake 9.2 did a very good job supporting a dual/triple video card system. there were always problems. my only solution was to pull all of the video cards except the one built into the motherboard. Windows 98 definitely had both distros beat in this regard.

 

while I was fighting with the Control Center in Mandrake 9.2 (which was frought with problems) i obtained a free promo copy of SuSE 9.1 Pro from Novell as part of their Technical Resource Kit. the plan was to switch everything over to SuSE 9.1 if it worked properly.

 

from the outset, I had problems with Konqueror misbehaving in SuSE. it never crashed, but it constantly displayed KDE crash error messages. the pop-ups were so frequent that it made web surfing a real PITA.

 

the recommended solution, of course, is to try FireFox. I had the infamous problem in SuSE 9.1 of having FireFox spontaneously close due to segmentation errors. This was a problem with Mozilla too. So for me, there was no truly functional browser in SuSE 9.1.

 

for me, SuSE 9.1 also had the problem of being totally unable to see an HP LaserJet shared on a Windows network, in spite of the fact that Samba Client and Server were properly configured for sharing all other resources on the Win/Linux boxes.

 

out of the box, SuSE had problems with k3b. copying a CD took about 4 hours. in SuSE, there's no k3bsetup program, even though the popup error messages told me to use the k3bsetup program to fix the problems in k3b. it turns out that SuSE ships with a proprietary patched version of k3b. i ultimately tracked my probem with k3b down to SuSE's failing to implement DMA on the DVD and CD-R/W drives, even though the popup messages directed me elsewhere.

 

then there's the issue of SuSE 9.1 being SLOOOOOOOOW. i got so frustrated with it that I wiped my system out yesterday and installed Mandrake 10.0. much to my delight, Konqueror works. Firefox works. Mandrake found my LaserJet, so now I can finally print.

 

I worked with SuSE 9.1 for a period of at least 6 months, and I always had problems with it. Mandrake 10.0 download edition installed on my PC without a hitch, and I had a totally useable system on the first day.

 

Fwiw, I really liked SuSE, I just had to do alot of manual configuring, and I still couldn't get everything to work properly. If you're interested in giving it a try, my recommendation would be to wait for the release of 9.2 next month. Hopefully they'll have alot of the problems fixed.

Edited October 18, 2004 by Windependent

[Gowator]

I never had any probs with exotic mutlihead setups in linux and I don't see how one is better than the other since the both use the underlying XFree or upcoming releases on X.org.

 

All GUI config tools are crap for anything not 'the norm' but 5 mins with a text editor is 5 mins well spent on exotic setups... indeed my setup is...

 

1x TFT , a VGA and the third head is a widescreen projector...

its just a matter of not using YAST or harddrake at all (once you do they fill the files with crap) .. however xf86cfg actually does handle this and lets all the parts be tweaked seperately....

 

should be on the install CD's but its 'hidden away' to try and force you to use MCC!

[Michel]

This is in fact a separate topic, but did you get that native resolution of your projector Gowator .. if you remember ?

If so, is there some info about it ... I'm just curious ..

 

Michel

Edited November 2, 2004 by Michel

[Windependent]

i would now like to withdraw everything negative that i said about SuSE 9.1 Pro in my previous post. although i had one hell of a time with the live CDs (never got them to work), when i finally got the DVD from SuSE, it was simple to install and set-up. as easy if not easier than MDK.

 

i had problems with printing to windows shares, problems with samba, problems with konqueror and firefox, but the browser problems were not specific to SuSE.

 

after about a month of wrangling, i wiped my hard drive and resinstalled SuSE and it magically worked like a champ. EVERYTHING that had been broken before was now fully operational, including printing to windows printers. After the complete reinstall, setting up the printers was TRIVIAL. i had to have had a really borked package or two on my previous installation that made everything work so poorly.

 

As others have mentioned, the KDE in SuSE is great. in many ways i think SuSE 9.1 is superior to windows from the user standpoint. PNGs are painfully slow, and the overall speed of execution leaves a bit to be desired on, for example, a P3-800. but as an out of the box setup, SuSE 9.1 is a great distro. i think that YaST is a bit better than Mandrake's version, as it allows a little more fine-tuning control on the part of the user.

 

If I had to pick a distro that was easy to get up and running, both SuSE 9.1 and MDK 10 would be good choices. but the configurability of SuSE seems to go a little farther, imho.

[JonEberger]

i have used both suse 9.1 (the one you can download) and all the current mandrakes. no dout about it, the mandrake install is way easier. as far as applications off of iso's....no doubt mandrake. (you get three disks instead of 1).

 

i never had stability issues with either. bugs and quirks...well yeah. but no stability issues. one big problem was that suse didn't come with alot...and so to go get it required time. not a luxury i have (although i'm posting on a website).

 

however one really nice thing for me was that suse didn't have an issue with hardware. mandrake 10.0 and .1 still won't recognize a serial port that i know works for other linux distros and windows. ugh.

 

prettiness out of the box....suse. but it isn't worth the work and i couldn't tell that it was any faster.

[jlc]

IMHO, they both suck. :P