Should I upgrade 9.0 --> 9.1 ?

[VeeDubb]

I think a big part of the problem is that most people's expectaitons with linux are to high. With windows, there are ALWAYS many bug that go right through beta, and there's always 200 or 300 MB of patches todownload within a month or two. So for me, coming from windows, this is no big deal, but apearantly, that's not acceptable in Linux.

[DragonMage]

I think a big part of the problem is that most people's expectaitons with linux are to high.  With windows, there are ALWAYS many bug that go right through beta, and there's always 200 or 300 MB of patches todownload within a month or two.  So for me, coming from windows, this is no big deal, but apearantly, that's not acceptable in Linux.

 

Errr... I thought linux is an never-ceasing beta, since it's always in development. I mean, that's the reason we are upgrading every 6 months right? To get the latest and the newest?

 

Anyway, yeah.. you can make a production machine out of an older distro ang get it running stable, with just updates to keep your machine secure and bug free and then leave it running for months. But what's the fun in that? :)

[VeeDubb]

I'm starting to regret my upgrade just a litle. i love the new themes, and i love the new mcc and kde3.1 is a HUGE upgrade over 3.0, but my printer isn't working right anymore. After DAYS af headaches and research, I finaly got the stupid thing running under 9.0 perfectly, and then I upgraded to 9.1 and the damn thing literaly takes 2-3 minues per page to print. I've tried 3 different forums and directly emailing one of the linux hpijs engineers at HP and nbody has a clue why it won't work. Plus, since it was working under 9.0 I didn't take it back before the und of my 14 dy satisfactios guarantee so now I'm stuck with it and can't afford another one. As it was I had to sell my Dell Axim PocketPC to buy this one.

[bvc]

Well, this is linux not windows, so you have more than one or two choices.

 

-Have you tried the other cups drivers?

-PDQ?

-TurboPrint drivers?

anything not CUPS?

 

I can't get cups going in Libranet-2.8 with my hp932c, but the turboprint drivers work good...and faster than the hp driver.

[Ixthusdan]

Since I have begun to play with gentoo, I can't stress enough the benefits of compiling on your own machine. I think my next toy is to compile Mandrake on my machine. (Yes, I walk on the edge!!) I still think that 9.1 was/is an improvement. But, if you want a stable machine, building it and running security updates really is the way to go, it's just not fun. :mystismiles:

[VeeDubb]

appearantly, hpijs is the ONLY driver that will even function for this printer. You can'teven set it up through mcc, you have to set it up through the command prompt or cups www admin tool.

 

I have tried the default cups drivers and the mandrake update cups files. The one thing i still plan on trying in removing lbusb libusb-devel and everything printing related and installing all the 9.0 versions of that stuff. Worst case senario, I fry my install and have to format, not that big of a deal. Alsom it looks like I've got a couple days left on my 14 day guarantee, so if worst comes to worst, I can get a different printer, though, I can't imagine I can find a combo unit with a 600dpi scanner and 1200 dpi printer with 1 touch copy funcitons for $99 anywhere else.

[VeeDubb]

Life is good. It's working now. don't know exactly how, don't exactly care. I just uninstalled and reinstalled and reconfigured it all untill it worked.

[Deke]

I found it worked fine at first as well... But each time I did a security update it became just a little more unstable. In the end it became unusable.

 

I'd just read a really enthusiastic review of the new Suse, so I sent for that. That's even crappier than Mandrake. It took it about an hour to work out that it didn't recognize my bog-standard dial-up modem, it had no drivers for my Alcatel Speedtouch ADSL and even when I told it exactly what printer I had it insisted on calling it a 'Device'.

 

So I reloaded Mandrake 9.1, taking great care to avoid formatting the 'home' partition. When I ran it I got endless screens of error messages.

 

OK. Let's go back to Mandrake 9.0 then... Well, that went in although it insisted that I format /home, so I lost everything I had stored (Don't tell me I should back up. I know I should back up, but the stupid machine wouldn't recognise my LS120 drive or burn CDs...), but on the plus side it auto recognised the printer and had drivers for both modems... and after a few days it was getting unsable.

 

Right! So now I upgrade to M9.1! On the first attempt it froze after about half an hour's loading. On the 2nd attempt it worked, but when I ran it I got the shedload of error messages again.

 

To heck with it! I did a full clean instal. In it went, up it came. The printer doesn't work. It keeps telling me I need mgmt.o from the Alacatel microcode for the ADSL modem, and it won't let me have ADSL and dial-up modems set up at the same time. What's more mgmt.o doesn't appear to exist any more, and what IS the point of telling someone to download their internet drivers from the internet? Just how asinine is that?!?

 

And more to the point. Why can't it configure the printer when M9 could? Why can't I have dial-up and ADSL specified together? And why do I need the microcode for 9.1 when I didn't need it for 9???

 

I'm starting to think a year is long enough... If I'd spent all the money that I've wasted on Linux so far on WinXP, at least I'd have a working OS by now...

[bvc]

try RH9 :P

[iphitus]

I had no problems with 9.1 and it fixed a lot of problems i had with 9.0

 

You're lucky your printer even works. My Canon BJC-5100 is classified as a PAPERWEIGHT

 

No, it won't work, mandrake say so and there is no driver in existence for linux. None of the similar models, like BJC4100 use the same protocol so i can't use their drivers and Canon won't give us any info. I have to use an old, HP660c or reboot into windows. I normally end up rebooting into windows. Not only that, the 5100 doesn't feed paper properly, i know someonelse who has it and has the same problems. I got it before i used linux.

 

Sorry to whinge

 

James

[Ixthusdan]

{off topic}

I have a scanner that became a paperweight when I went to xp. That's right. It worked with me but not xp!! Visioneer 6100usb (They feel real bad about the problem. :roll: ) Another hole in the Windex myth.

[iphitus]

The printer i have went paperweight in XP, that's why my dad gave it to me, i had Win98 only at the time. Now MDK/LFS/Win98 all on a 6gb HDD

[Gowator]

Yeah, I had so many problems I regretted it at first.

 

The installer ... well lets just say it hung at inopportune moments like writing the partition table.

 

But in for a penny ... I'd nothing to lose.

I persevered, expoert install, test install... etc etc.

Evenutually I got a 3 Cd set off a magazine.

 

It worked flawlessly....

 

Its so pretty now .... I guess it had an updated installer.

In retrospect I feel cheated that the boxset didn't work when I paid for it and the free version did !!

Being a long term mandrake user I persevered, I guess a lot of people wouldn't. Especially those coming from Windows.

 

 

Most importantly, I didn't have internet access at home. Thats half the reason I bought the powerpack box set, the other half being becuase I wanted to support Mandrake. I didn't evcen want the paper documentation becuase its in French (since I bought it in Frence) and its easier for me to read the pdf documentation in English.

 

Anyway, the point is after doing all the updates, working round lots of bugs in Wizards etc. I now really like it.

In summary I couldn't recomend it to someone without broadband, its basically pretty much needed.

 

Having got internet now its changed the distro. 300MB of updates later and its like a new distro.

[iphitus]

Being a long term mandrake user I persevered, I guess a lot of people wouldn't. Especially those coming from Windows. 

I was coming from windows, no linux experience at all. i had a lot of problems but i persevered.

I've had about 3-4 installs in the last 3 months. I botched an mdk 8.2, something got badly stuffed, still don't know, it only lasted a week.

I tried a redhat, the installer stuffed, i tried again, installer stuffed again and i lost everything. I tried 9.0, worked great, had it going for weeks, until i made the stupid mistake of forcing a particular RPM, couldn't restore that one, i forced glibc2.3

I got 9.0 up and running the next weekend, and a few weeks later upgraded to 9.1. Still running.

 

But i may not have got this far or even be using it now if i didn't have help from everyone here. i've come a long way, and linux has become the primary OS on my computer.

Thanks all

 

James

[Gowator]

Hey seriously well done and all.

The thing is you must have been pretty determined and/or lucky.

 

Im always hearing people who tried and couldn't get it working etc.

 

The good thing is you must have learned bucket loads in the process.

:-)

 

I wouldn't regard myself as a noobie or other's like Steve Scrimpshire who had similar probs. Having reinstalled with the updated Cd's on my hardware I can see how nice the installer is when it works ....

 

I did however go through an inordinate amount of messing about until I got the updates. Probably something in my hardware but all the same ...

 

I'm starting to think a year is long enough... If I'd spent all the money that I've wasted on Linux so far on WinXP, at least I'd have a working OS by now...

Yeah sounds extreme but that's the other windows convert type. He certainly sounds like he persevered as well.

 

At one point I think it even popped intop my head for a brief second AND I DETEST windows.

 

Right! So now I upgrade to M9.1! On the first attempt it froze after about half an hour's loading. On the 2nd attempt it worked, but when I ran it I got the shedload of error messages again.

 

Yeah me to.

 

The sad thing is the fact that once I got the Magazine version disks it worked first time. If Mandrake would only have put the updates in a extra CD you get at the cash desk :-) when you buy it or the sip into the mail order edition...

 

So what Im saying is if you have 9.0 working and its critical don't upgrade to 9.1 unless you already have the updates. What mandrake SHOULD do is make the supplimental (update) Cd bootable with a fixed installer etc.

so those of us the install doesn't like can actually get the installer to run!

 

If they don't know how to do it/don't have time I'm sure the nice plf guys would do it for them !! In fact I'd be willing to bet once they do their full 9.1 install disk it will work flawlessly.