Guest Chadd Posted July 23, 2003 Report Share Posted July 23, 2003 I agree with Gowator. Customer support needs to be #1. I wont buy anything else from them in the near future, if ever. I bought 9.0 and 9.1 to the tune of about $110.00 and they cant answer an email from me???? I guess I'll just buy the burned isos then for $15.00 or so as they come out. Then spend the money on another distro. No different than anything else I buy and dont get support on. New car, new computer or new software. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tyme Posted July 23, 2003 Report Share Posted July 23, 2003 http://www.mandrakeusers.org/viewtopic.php?t=6686 ;-) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest anon Posted July 23, 2003 Report Share Posted July 23, 2003 Think its a bit early yet. See??? I know nothing :lol: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gowator Posted July 23, 2003 Report Share Posted July 23, 2003 Now I have broadband its working great :-) What Im saying is even though they know they are selling a product with 300MB of updates they continue to sell it when they could have a update CD given out at the cash desk. (edit: it costs about a cent per commercial CD and they could ship with the box sets, they sell a prodcut they know is flawed and can in some circumstances result in loss of data/damage to hardware) What tyme is doing is good, no criticis but its what Mandrake should be doing. If they can't handle the mail stuff then as a minimum it wouldn't hurt to give a whole set to the department stores retailing Mandrake and give it out when someone buys it. To be honest I don't know what would happen to Mandrake's image pos or neg if they did this, probably it would balance out but it is the responsible thing to do. (edit: Ive now thought about this.. see below) Ive paid for retail copies since 8.1 and now Im faced with what to do for 9.2..... download or buy. Everyone who thinks this is harsh ... try living without ANY internet for a few weeks and the official box set. In fact I'd be surprised if anyone who actually says this is harsh is running 9.1 without the internet at all. Dont forget we are biased here, everyone has some form of internet or they wouldn't be here! (edit mtweidman: you still have some form) edit: Those that have internet at work/uni fall into 2 categories... Those who have full access, can burn CD's etc and those like me who's only method of transferring things out is a 1.44 MB floppy, not to mention officially I have no ftp access ! A few of those updates can be critical, the RPMDRAKE and the installer are I think core for any installation. I don't really think my hardware is that exotic, but it hung the installer. When the installer hangs it just runs the CPU continually at 100% - (this resulted in my temperature alarm going off for the first time EVER) If Mandrake thought about it they could issue a update CD with something like the new Gnome as a bonus, that way it wouldn't hurt their image too much. what I'm trying to say is if they are going to sell retail in consumer shops the 300MB updates are not an option. If you download your 3CD's and then need the updates, that is a different story... you can obviously download ISO's so applying the bug fixes is no big deal. To me their version strategy is: 1 Sell product make money 2 Fix bugs and develop new version 3 Let users with Internet access download bug fixes 4 Forget about anyone without internet 5 Sell new version along with bugs ... 6 back to 1 They have no concept it would seem that people buying a retail product in a music store may not have access to the internet. To me it is two different products... before and after the update ... the crazy thing is they don't make any further money out of the updates, its not to make money off us (except your referred to Mandrake Expert/Club) its just that they can't be bothered with their customers. Basically I think they need to make a decision: Are they a mass market OS/distro providor selling in bulk through retail stores or are they a niche geek distro where you expect to have lots of downloads/fixes and rely on 3rd party User Boards for support. If theyu choose the latter they need to be more responsive to their geeky customers .. if they choose the former then they need to sell a solid product that doesn't need a second PC or windows dual boot with working internet. Personally: I don't mind which but they need to make up their mind. I wouldn't have bought the boxset if they had actually written on it '300MB of updates on the internet, some ofthem critical' Why? I was happy with my 8.2 and 9.0 installs. I've seen no indications for the new boxsets, do they contain the updates or not? I don't think so. Even more annoying is when I got my 5$ Mag CD's they were updated and the Installer fixed.... Don't get me wrong ... my urmpi'd/updated 9.1 is brilliant... lots of good work by their technical guys but this sort of decsision isn't being made by the technical guys .... perhaps why so many high profile ones have left recently .... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mtweidmann Posted July 23, 2003 Report Share Posted July 23, 2003 Dont forget we are biased here, everyone has some form of internet or they wouldn't be here! Not entirely true. Over the summer I can only access the internet while at work, but I still brought my laptop with me (with Mandrake installed of course). I'm doing an industrial placement as part of my Uni course. Yes the updates are important, and I think it would be great is MDK sold update CDs. But I don't think that not having internet connection makes my Linux install useless. A lot of the updates are security patches, which as I'm not connected don't affect me anyway. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gowator Posted July 23, 2003 Report Share Posted July 23, 2003 Erm instead of a new post ill edit the one I left before going to work. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
aRTee Posted July 23, 2003 Report Share Posted July 23, 2003 Sorry, don't agree with lots of the comments here. Look at RH. They are getting out of the boxed stuff. Why? 6 months is too short for retail channels, but very long in linux/ FLOSS land. So there's a problem: your product is outdated once it hits the shelves. BTW I have passed plenty of 9.1 with just some plf and texstar extras to friends with dialup or no internet. Why would they care about these updates? Apache patches or whatever?? Really, you don't need all those security updates if you're not on cable/adsl. So 400MB of updates are really only necessary if you're using all that Mandrake provides and are connected permanently. In which case it is also no problem to get it. Since I always install with urpmi --noclean I have all downloaded stuff in the usual dir, which now has about 200MB worth of stuff, 80% of which is from plf, texstar and contrib. So really, when talking about updates worth of 400MB: IT IS NOT THE PROBLEM. The problem is the 6month release schedule, but all others have that (RH, SuSE being the big other players that Mandrake has to compete with), so I'm not sure if they can really change that. Also, did anyone ever try to get a system running with no proper mobo chipset support of the distro? I did with Mdk 8.2 on my A7V333. *necessary kernel compile for DMA* mean anything to you? How does that look for beginners? Well, they couldn't care less, so let's start at the beginning: dvd playback shaky, and even for experienced users hard to find it is the dma that's not working... Now, how does that look for beginners? Think they'll be impressed?? So with no new Mdk in September, any newbie with a mobo chipset from after March this year: better don't switch!! Or you have to compile the kernel!!! And if something scares newbies off it's words like 'kernel' and 'compile'. Yeah, I know it's not hard, but they don't and it's their perception! BTW same for all other new hardware that may well be supported but that's not in the 9.1 database. Beginners would have trouble setting up their monitors (max H, V refresh??? Huh??)... Wait for 2.6? It would be nice, and for all of us that have working systems (as I mentioned before, the only thing I can't do on my system is get the cpu-fan speed readout, the rest of my complete setup is fully functional), that would be the big plus. But Linus has already mentioned that it may be until December or so for the 2.6 final. We may be willing to wait for mdk9.2 until then. But for all others, especially those with new hardware looking to switch, Mdk9.2 in September is going to be the first choice if all goes well. Besides, the improvements in the draketools etc will be welcome, and we all know there is plenty to improve in 9.1. Let's help them fix the remaining problems in 9.2beta and rc's so that the final in September, even without 2.6kernel (I hope that will be added as an option, a 2.6rc or test kernel), will be something goodlooking smoothworking that you can get your remaining windows friends hooked on! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
static Posted July 23, 2003 Report Share Posted July 23, 2003 Let's help them fix the remaining problems in 9.2beta and rc's so that the final in September, even without 2.6kernel (I hope that will be added as an option, a 2.6rc or test kernel), will be something goodlooking smoothworking that you can get your remaining windows friends hooked on! I'm with you!! CHARGE!! Damn, 2.6 is sweet though. I'm using it in gentoo... Anyway, mandrake 10 I preume (I would call it that if it's the first one with 2.6) will be AMAZING. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tyme Posted July 23, 2003 Report Share Posted July 23, 2003 static: Mandrake has almost always held to the .0, .1, .2, .0 cycle, so the one after this will most likely be 10.0 ;-) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gowator Posted July 23, 2003 Report Share Posted July 23, 2003 Thats more or less what Im saying ... they need to make a decision on retail packs which should work OR FLOSS releases. Combining the two isn't working..... Its not just the cycle time, its the quality of the product as shipped. If they want to sell mainstream then the product really should work from the box. The installer bug was critical to me. I know lots of others didn't have the problem but quite a few did. The endless loop thing could have wrekced my CPU .... the problem is the thing hangs onm install so you think hey Ill be patient, go off and make food/drinks then i hear this stange siren noise..... It was the CPU temp warning.... THis is a difference for me ... like tyme points out they stuck to the .0,.1.2.0 cycle so this isn't any different but I think they would be better working on a bug free 9.2 rather than adding new features with new bugs. This is just my opinion as a consumer ... although perhaps also profesional experience from software companies who can't wait to release the new buggy version with different bugs ... I found 8.2 very stable - however although I bought it I actually used a DVD from a mag to install it. Mandrake has copies of 9.1 WITH BUG FIXES.... I don't know if these are what you gave your friends but I can guarantee they aren't what was in my box set. I just invested another 10Euros in two more copies of 9.1 from the magazine ... to save me making backup copies.... I haven't tried the download version, maybe that is the updated version too.... Again: Is anyone running the Powerpack boxset bought retail not mail order without updating it ??? What I do know is the version I got off the shelf at FNAC wouldn't install and even the physical CD's themselves are crap. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pmpatrick Posted July 23, 2003 Report Share Posted July 23, 2003 Couldn't have said it better myself: So 400MB of updates are really only necessary if you're using all that Mandrake provides and are connected permanently. In which case it is also no problem to get it. Way to go aRTee :wink:. The updates are largely irrelevant, so let's please get off that rant. 9.1 has generally played to great reviews and for me it's been so stable, it's almost boring. Have taken to compiling gentoo in my spare time for intellectual stimulation. That doesn't mean there won't be hardware configurations that are problematic; it doesn't mean that there aren't bugs; and it doesn't mean that they could have done a better job debugging. These are growing pains, symptomatic of the rapid pace of development for linux in general. It's also part of what makes linux fun and exciting. I'll probably renew my mandrake club membership and take a look at 9.2. However, I don't see a lot of reasons to update. I imagine that a lot of 2.6 features will be patched in to whatever kernel they wind up using. However, util 2.6 or a significant upgrade to kde comes out, I don't see a lot of reasons to upgrade. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tyme Posted July 23, 2003 Report Share Posted July 23, 2003 /me bumps the needle again point releases are ment to be upgrades and bug fixes. full number releases are where major changes - like kernel, major updates of DE, etc. - are intended to occur. now please, i want to keep my records as scartch free as possible! :-P try to understand this ;-) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest mkbiyer Posted July 23, 2003 Report Share Posted July 23, 2003 mandrakesoft will just get slammed again if they released a point-point release as some people will just say "and they expect us to fork money again when we dont get anything new in return?". Hey, why should we blame Mandrake for those updates ? They just put it all together & give to us as a Distro, simple installation & stuff like that. In the Open Source world you are going to have updates / patches etc etc since applications are going to be evolving & improving all the time. & well ! no one is going to be forcing anyone to upgrade right ? God grant me the serenity not to be seduced into another point release upgrade :wink: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tyme Posted July 23, 2003 Report Share Posted July 23, 2003 well, there was a ton of updates to mandrake-specific tools...and i mean a ton... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tyme Posted July 23, 2003 Report Share Posted July 23, 2003 locking this thread in an attempt to consolidate 9.2 beta discussions. Please continue in this thread: http://www.mandrakeusers.org/viewtopic.php?t=6686 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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