My Mandriva Rant

[mystified]

[rant]I had terrible luck with 2006. It could only print sporadically, k3b couldn't detect my dvd burner, I couldn't get wireless working with ndiswrapper but I won't blame that on mandriva as I may find that to be a problem with any distro.

 

So anyway, I just worked out of windows for my school and after finishing my exams this week I thought I'd try 2007. I burned all four cd's, checked md5sum which k3b does automatically and I burned at 4x speed. All is good. Then I go to install. The first cd one didn't do anything at all. It just sat there and blinked. So I downloaded from another mirror, md5sum checks ok, this one gets to the install packages part and freezes. I tried booting with it twice. So feeling very frustrated I downloaded again. This time it worked. Then I get to cd two, package after package kept failing and they were ones I couldn't do without, like kde libraries, cups, etc. So I find another mirror. Download again and have the same problem again. Who knows what would happen with cds 3 and 4. So I'm now downloading kubuntu.[/rant]

[jagwah]

That's a shame, maybe you would have better luck with the DVD ? I've never had any problems with any ISO's I have downloaded as yet (touch wood), as well as checking the md5sum, when burning the ISO to disk I also check the 'verify written data' (something like that) box in k3b to check what was written to disk is ok.

 

IMO Mandriva2007 is very nice, I never had any of the problems I see a lot of people have, although I had a couple of small annoyances, but certainly no show stoppers.

 

I have been messing around with Kubuntu for a week or so (funnily enough originally just to check if it displayed the same issues as Mandriva) and it is very nice also, I find it faster/more responsive than Man2007, plus it is free from the 'small annoyances' I had with Man2007, I'll keep messing with it a while longer, and if all continues to go well, I'll probably switch to Kubuntu.

 

Best of Luck with it.

Edited December 16, 2006 by jagwah

[arctic]

I wonder why you didn't do an ftp-install instead of downloading the iso images over and over again. :unsure:

[mystified]

Kind of hard when you don't have a internet connection on the lappy eh?? :P

[arctic]

Oh... :D

[Ixthusdan]

I don't know if the problem is the same, but I recently began to experience oddities with any new distro I installed. Ulteo would not work at all. I then decided to run a diagnostic on my hard drive. Yep! My 40G Maxtor that is only 5 years old is going out! I have repartitioned this drive so many times, I can't even estimate the number. And, I have ran more than 20 different distros on it. I tried zeroing the drive and reran the diagnostics, but the drive returned a failure code. Sadly, check your hardware. My windows disk still works. (ugh!)

 

Oh, I used the Ultimate Boot Disk. It has diagnostics from most drive manufacturers on it. Google it, and you'll find it as a free download.

[daniewicz]

I used the Ultimate Boot Disk.

 

A great tool.

[pmpatrick]

Here's the link for the Ultimate Boot CD:

 

http://www.ultimatebootcd.com/

 

It's a great tool to have.

[mystified]

My hard drive is fine. The lappy is less than six months old. I reinstalled 2006 and this time everything seems to be working fine. Including wireless. It's all good.

[Guest sbarr]

That's a shame, maybe you would have better luck with the DVD ? I've never had any problems with any ISO's I have downloaded as yet (touch wood), as well as checking the md5sum, when burning the ISO to disk I also check the 'verify written data' (something like that) box in k3b to check what was written to disk is ok.

 

IMO Mandriva2007 is very nice, I never had any of the problems I see a lot of people have, although I had a couple of small annoyances, but certainly no show stoppers.

 

I have been messing around with Kubuntu for a week or so (funnily enough originally just to check if it displayed the same issues as Mandriva) and it is very nice also, I find it faster/more responsive than Man2007, plus it is free from the 'small annoyances' I had with Man2007, I'll keep messing with it a while longer, and if all continues to go well, I'll probably switch to Kubuntu.

 

Best of Luck with it.

 

I recently installed Kubuntu 6.06 with such success that my distro-hopping days are now over. It is fast robust and free of all the various hassles that have plagued every other distro that I've tried.

Automatix installs all the proprietory software that most people seem to need and HP Device Manager and Crossover Office installation was a breeze compared with other distros and in the unlikely event of any problems arising the forums are comprehensive and friendly.

Strongly recommended....