Darkelve Posted August 15, 2005 Report Share Posted August 15, 2005 (edited) <snip> SUse is also a user friendly distro Ive tried but the download has practically no media support because of copyrights , patents etc. Cant see any drawbacks to a new user going to Mandriva tho... I hope that was helpful.... <{POST_SNAPBACK}> Well... not any more than Mandriva really! If you don't forget to grab the optional Media Packs then all you have to worry about are things like libdvdcss, win32 codecs, mplayer... all of which can easily be installed by adding the websites from Packman or Guru to Yast (the config & installation center), which is really a snap. I'd say for new people: SuSe (for people who don't mind a *little* bit of research and sweat / Linspire (for people who have to have *everything* ready-chewn for them Edited August 15, 2005 by Darkelve Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
arctic Posted August 15, 2005 Report Share Posted August 15, 2005 Say, Darkelve, as a SUSE user, what is your opinion on OpenSUSE? I am just keen to know. And if you use it already, how about a little review? ;) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
papaschtroumpf Posted August 16, 2005 Report Share Posted August 16, 2005 (edited) I've just installed SimplyMepis on an old-ish laptop (Celeron 650 192M RAM) and while it's on the slow side, it worked very well from the start. Automatically detected my Motorola wireless card and automatically set up ndiswrapper for it, etc... I am quite impressed with it. It's Debian based so software install is synaptic based, but the added "Mepis Touch" makes it easier to use. I had never heard of Beatrix before, does it have the following features out of the box? I personnally think that a newbie friendly distro needs those because they can be tricky to deal with for newbies: -diswrapper and most common wireless drivers (for example broadcom) - wpa_supplicant to set connect to a wireless network secured by WPA - java integrated with the browser - flash player integrated with the browser - media player compatible with windows media integrated with the browser (e.g. mplayer + firefox plugin) - media player compatible with quicktime media integrated with the browser (e.g. mplayer + firefox plugin) - media player compatible with real-audio media integrated with the browser (e.g. mplayer + firefox plugin) - can play audio CDs - can play DVDs (even encrypted ones) These are things that can quickly turn a newbie friendly distro into a nightmare. The DVD issue has legal implications and it may not be too hard to install the requried library through synaptic or whatever, but still a puzzling step for newbies. Playing media, especially embedded in web pages , especially windows formaat, is not that easy to get right (just look at these forums) yet it may make your web-brwosing experience sub-optimal. I know at leat 2 people that gave up on linux because they couldn't get wireless networking to work. Don't blame it on them. FYI, as a comparison, SimplyMepis doesn't allow you to play encrypted DVDs out of the box and setting wireless with WPA involved installing wpa_supplicant and configuring it by creating files under vim. Not exactly newbie friendly either, but at least the browser things worked right out of the box. Edited August 16, 2005 by papaschtroumpf Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
scarecrow Posted August 17, 2005 Report Share Posted August 17, 2005 Mepis is flawed by definition: A mixture of "testing" and "unstable"- the combo is guaranteed to break your system sooner rather than later (if you install to HD). Its pluses are a few naive system manipulation tools, and support for nvidia/ati drivers right out of the box- but this is done rather trivially with other Debian liveCD's as well... The best Debian liveCD is by far Kanotix, which is pure Debian unstable (Sid). But have in mind that Sid is NOT "unstable" without a reason, and that the current status of Debian Sid is a horrible mess, due to the transition from XFRee86 to xorg. SO, if you decide to install the latest Kanotix to HD (extremely easy- almost braindead) stay away ATM from things like "apt-get update / apt-get dist-upgrade", which were common sence in the past: Under the current Sid (and "testing") status, chances to bork your system beyond any repair are simply great... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
arctic Posted August 17, 2005 Report Share Posted August 17, 2005 About Beatrix: It is simply a stripped down Ubuntu 4.10 with a custom kernel. Thus it boots exrtemely fast but it is basically only useful for basic webbrowsing, emails and writing documents. Nothing else. All "important" media-stuff is missing and has to be installed from the Ubuntu mirrors, including Flash, MP3 support etc. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Darkelve Posted August 17, 2005 Report Share Posted August 17, 2005 (edited) It only just barely made it to the beta stage. Haven't tried it. Wouldn't recommend it to you either before it reaches the RC's. I browsed the Bugzilla forums for some glance into what's going on. Quite a few annoying bugs present, notably problems with the 'new' audio engine (kdemm). I'm holding my heart for this one. I'll probably give it a try. Basically (to my understanding) it boils down to this: OpenSuSe '1' (full selection of apps, minus the commercial ones and the ones with possible 'legal' 'problems' [java, mplayer, codecs, ...] - install the updates and applications from the internet and you'll basically end up with SuSe 10.0) --> Suse 10.0 will be based on this (full selection of apps, including commercial ones, the manuals and 30/60 days of support) --> Novell Linux desktop will be based on this (limited selection of apps) I *can* tell you however that I'm loving every bit of 9.3, although it does boot up quite a bit slower than 9.1 and there are some oddities with the new mounting method. It's a joy to work with. Say, Darkelve, as a SUSE user, what is your opinion on OpenSUSE? I am just keen to know. And if you use it already, how about a little review? ;) <{POST_SNAPBACK}> Edited August 17, 2005 by Darkelve Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
arctic Posted August 17, 2005 Report Share Posted August 17, 2005 Thank you. :) I guess that 10.0 will be faster thatn 9.3 because of the usage of gcc4. It made Fedora faster, too. :) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Darkelve Posted August 17, 2005 Report Share Posted August 17, 2005 (edited) Heh... just disable lotsa unneccesary services and you'll gain lots of increase in boot time speedup. Real easy with yast. I wonder with all this new technology coming together, we'll feel the difference: - Reiser4 - QT4 - GCC4 - Kernel 2.6.x - KDE 3.5/4.0 - ... (just a summing up of the latest technology, this is NOT what'll be in OpenSuSe/SuSe 10.0) I'd guess so B) Thank you. :) I guess that 10.0 will be faster thatn 9.3 because of the usage of gcc4. It made Fedora faster, too. :) <{POST_SNAPBACK}> Edited August 17, 2005 by Darkelve Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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