Re: Questions from Someone Considering Linux
From: Ohmster (bigbigkitty_at_ohmster.com)
Date: 02/20/04
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Date: Fri, 20 Feb 2004 00:02:19 GMT
> I'm a bit confused with your reasoning here.
> First, what do you mean by "sleek multimedia"? And how is Linux multimedia
> is not as "sleek" as the other one ???
> And about gaming, since when Doze became better at gaming? Maybe you mean
> that game companies don't write as many games for Linux as they do for
> Doze? My Unreal runs much better on the Linux box then it ever did on Doze
> (same hardware). You need to rethink your "better"!
Perhaps "sleek" was not the proper term. Easier might be a better word. True,
linux can do multimedia as good as any OS, as long as the programs and codecs
to play them are readily and easily available. Windows gets my vote on this,
although I do use mplayer and gmplayer and have installed the codec packs for
it and it really does work just as good as any Windows based player or
perhaps in some opinions, better. Can't play the Media Player 9 stuff on it,
but perhaps I have not found the proper codecs for it yet. This is no fault
of linux, it is that Microsoft is so darned closed about everything. If you
want everything to work right, you really got to hunt around for everything
you need and make it all work and this takes a bit of skill, not too easy for
a total newbie, at first.
> Indeed, you must be kidding me! Since when Doze became "drop-and-go"? What
> about downloading all the drivers? What about all the "unknown device" and
> lovely yellow exclamation marks? What about annoying reboots? What about 2
> hours of downloading and installing all the updates and SPs?
Really have not had much problem with all of this for Windows XP Pro. Windows
3X and 9X were totally different animals and yes, they really did suck the
big one. Yeah, I went and got the new nvidia drivers and my old Adara scanner
had no XP drivers, I found some other brand drivers that actually work, sort
of. But had I purchased a new USB scanner, I don't really think that drivers
would have been much of an issue. I have no yellow exclamation marks but for
the old scanner that uses the wrong drivers because new XP ones are just not
available. Automatic updates takes care of most of the pathes to the OS,
quite painless, although in defense of linux, Gnome updater for Red Hat has
pretty much done the same thing. Reboots, for XP? Nope, not necessary, it
runs all the time, I only reboot for the updates, when it is necessary. True
that linux rarely requires a reboot for updates, barring the kernel, but this
is not a very big issue for me. Using an ADSL connection, no updates has ever
takend 2 hours, although the intitial update for Red hat did require a long
time, same thing for XP, first time it updated.
> Linux install is challenging? You mean for a monkey, yes, just a bit.
> You need a little competition to change your mentality. You install XP and
> I'll install Mandrake or SuSE, we'll start at the same time and we'll see
> who can stay longer in a separate (away from the computers) room drinking
> lager and watching Matrix. After that we'll see who finishes the install
> first and only after that we'll see whose computer is more usable ... LOL.
> Mine will be ready-for-everything machine and yours will be a pile of
> useless and expensive hardware and the only thing you can do is stare at
> the green field ... LOL, ah, almost forgot, you could play solitaire and
> type "Hello World" in your note pad and maybe, just maybe, you could open
> some video files if you had the right codecs which you don't, of course.
> (you can stick another "LOL" here)
Heh heh. LOL. Yeah sure, we can both get a working linux system up pretty
quick now, but when I first started, this "linux stuff" was pretty daunting.
Disk druid and fdisk, home, root, boot, and / partitions, what in the heck is
that stuff for? Who the hell knows how big they should be or do I really need
these things? Compile the kernel, who, me? Tarball, make, make install, where
did the program go after it "installed"? How come this "make" business did
not work, what does this cryptic error mean? What is glibc5 anyway? Gotta be
root to install or fix anything but don't use root after that? Oh crap, I
"broke" it, what now and how do I fix it? Windows runs right out of the box,
although, to give credit where credit is due, linux is really getting much
better at this. Many of the new distros really do work, with connectivity,
right out of the box nowadays.
>> Not linux bashing at all, I love my Red Hat server/gateway/firewall/router
>> box. Wouldn't want to be without it but it sure did take a long time to
>> get it setup the way it is now,
>
> It was long time because you didn't know what you were doing. Try it second
> time and you'll be faster, try it 10 times and you'll be extremely fast.
> Anyway, I thought we were talking about a desktop?
Agreed. But most Windows users really don't know what they are doing at
first, anyways. Most Windows users have no idea of what is "under the hood"
nor how to fix it when it breaks, call the IT guy!
>> but hey, it is fun and making it the way I
>> wanted it was also fun. Still have a ways to go though, getting some kind
>> of decent despammer/virus stopper for sendmail is the next big challenge.
>
>
> We don't need the friggin' virus stopper if you need it for Doze machines
> feel free to buy one. As for spam learn how to use available tools - they
> are perfect, better then anything M$ could come up with.
Hmmm, how true. But I still use a "doze" box myself and my wife also uses one
and they are fed by the linux box, for internet, and for mail server. That
God Dammned stupid self replicating virus "bombs" my email box and server
like 100 times a day and I am so freaking sick of it. "Critical Update",
yada, yada, yada. Yeah, there are way better tools and I will get around to
putting some kind of milter on my sendmail server. It is pretty freaking hard
though. Already have milter support built into sendmail, will have to find
some kind of stuff to make this work. This actually looks pretty good:
http://www.rudolphtire.com/mimedefang-howto/
Problem is that this will take some sorting out. I already use ipop3 that
comes with imap so it should not be neccesary to use qpopper. All of this is
very complicated and time consuming, not just "put in the disk, install, and
you are done". What with work and trying to pay for a new house, there is not
a lot of free weekends for this kind of stuff. Will get around to it
eventually, but for now, there is always Spamkiller for Windows and it does a
pretty darned good job.
> Anyway, I begin to think that your post was humorous kind of irony if yes
> then I'm beginning to lose my sense of humor :).
>
I am not a fanatical hate M$ or hate linux type, take it all in stride and
enjoy the humor where you find it, my friend. ;>)
-- ~Ohmster
- Next message: Seth: "Re: Dish 501 DVR file system type?"
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- In reply to: Molchun: "Re: Questions from Someone Considering Linux"
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