Re: Distro Eval

On Sat, 02 Feb 2008 10:53:08 -0600, Dr. Deb wrote:

I just got an AMD Phenom and thought I would share a few experiences and
observations on getting it up and running.

Buying the latest hardware seems to lead only to hassle and pain, no
matter what the OS.

It's like volunteering to be the guinea pig :-)

I tried an install of the distro (PCLinuxOS2007)I was using and that is
when the fun began - and it is not over yet. :-)

PCLOS hasn't been updated for over a year, it's unlikely to run well on
newer hardware if it works at all. It doesn't work at all well on any of
my machines, even the older ones.

Observations/Experiences
PCLinuxOS2007 "almost" ran.

LOL. See above.

OpenSuSe 10.3 seemed like a good choice, as I had run SuSe from version
7.0 to 10.1. Downloaded it and it installed like a champ. HOWEVER,
some really brilliant person at SuSe decided there was no need to give
any choice in installing wireless cards (no ndiswrapper option or even a
chance to install a card manually). This was a nice looking distro that
did run but no internet capability made it a non-starter.

This is MS quality FUD, albeit that I believe you are mistaken rather
than malicious. Suse runs fine with a variety of wireless setups. The
forums or the newsgroup next door would have helped you out if google
couldn't provide the answers.

MintLinux is all I have been hearing from a friend of mine for sometime
so I thought I would give it a shot. It ran through the initial install
fine, but when it came to loading the user window all I got was a black
screen. That is a killer for sure.

Kubuntu 7.10 seemed like a likely candidate. Same story as MintLinux,
which is no surprise as Mint is built off Ubuntu as Kubuntu is.

The Mint and Ubuntu forums have several threads explaining how to avoid
the black screen, which is to do with an interaction between the X server
and some display cards. Ctl-Alt-BackSpace will often do the trick to
kill and restart the X server.

Sabayon was a distro someone on this NG suggested. ...
Then I rebooted and
it would not reload. I messed with it and got it to reload after about
five reboots and tweaks. Then it would not load off a reboot - again.
Obviously NOT the system one would want.

Many people are very happily running Sabayon. Did you set up the boot
system with enough care and attention. I wonder.

Sabayon MiniEdition LiveCD, ... It works well, but I am still getting
used to how the retrieval/install app "Portato" works.)

If the mini edition worked, you probably made an error setting up the
earlier install.

So, for now, I up on the bastardized PCLinuxOS version and learning
Sabayon, which may well become my preferred OS.

Thanks for the report, and glad you found something to keep you happy in
the end.

I would suggest, in a positive spirit, that a little patience with Google
and reading through a few forum postings would have enabled you to get
any of OpenSuse, Mint, Kubuntu, or Sabayon going at the first or second
try.
.

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