Linux anyone?

Anyone here running any version of Linux? Since I have a 64 bit system, I went with the 64 bit Vista. Well, there is no sound driver for my laptop yet and that made me sort of mad. Well, I ended up talking to a buddy last night for a while about Ubuntu Linux. I downloaded it over night, and I installed this morning. So far, I am really liking it but its going to take time to get used to. When they get the kinks worked out of 64 bit Vista and Ubuntu can be successfully booted from a hard disk with Vista on it (they're having problems now), I will probably leave a Linux partition on and go back to Vista. Until then, I finally get text editing software, sound, and suprisingly a much faster computer. I can already tell my internet is faster using Firefox and Ubuntu, even right now I am installing the OS but I can be on the internet at the same time :D. Anyway, sometime Thursday or Friday when I get a chance, I will do a further review and get some screenshots thrown up.

Sweet another linux user. I use linux full time. I've tried the following distros but ubuntu is the best (make sure you use the 32 bit version!)

Gentoo
Fedora
Ubuntu
Suse
Mandrake.

I used each for about a year. I've been on ubuntu for a year and a half and it's by far the nicest to maintain.

If you have any questions drop me an IM. The system will be even faster when you aren't running off the live cd anymore. You can run both windows and linux on the same computer. I have to keep windows XP installed for work incase I'm required to telecommute in a crisis so it's on another partition. I can just pick if I want linux or xp when I boot up.

The 64 bit version of linux doesn't have alot of essential software ported to it yet (like flash!). So stick to 32.

I do everything I do on windows, aol, mail, web, play world of warcraft, starcraft, counterstrike source, ut and doom 3 and quake. I can help you set any of it up if you like.

http://www.novaslp.net/e17.jpg Thats a screenshot of my ubuntu desktop. I use enlightenment e17 instead of gnome. It's less of a system hog (not that gnome is bad compared to windows with antivirus loaded.)

Ha ha, well, I found out about the Flash dealy a few hours ago. Fuck fuck fuck, now I have to reinstall it again. Oh well, its only like the 7th time :rolleyes:. Yeah, back in the day, Mandrake was the shit.

I wish I didnt get out of computers like I did, my buddy Derrick wrote his own ghetto version of Linux. If we would have worked on it together, maybe it would have blossomed into something useful.

Well, now I have a choice to make. Since 64 bit shit for anything isnt all the way finished yet, I am forced to stay 32 bit for a while. Where I like Linux, I like Windows better because I am more familiar with it. I think I am going to just reinstall the 32 bit Vista since I like Vista the best. I've heard of people having problems trying to boot Ubuntu with a Vista partition on their hard disk so I dont think I want to risk it. Oh well, until 64 bit Ubuntu and Vista are both good to go, I think I will just have to be on 32 bit Vista.

out of curiosity what is your reason for needing 64bit precision on anything? I have a solaris box at home that I use specifically for 64bit calculations but it's only 600mhz (which is fine for me and fast for a sparc!)

Most poeple tend to run 64bit stuff because well their processor supports it. Hoever, there is no real reason to, for 99% of users. Most of this is why developers are slow to support 64bit. Yes it's the future.. It was just forced on us now my processor manufacturers and marketers love it without realizing 99% of users will see no benefit. In the server world processors have been 64 bit and larger for quite some time. All 64bit does for 99% of users is take up more memory if developers incorrectly allocate storage as 64bit when they really only need 32 or even less.

I've yet to see someone justify the use for 64bit on a home machine for home purposes. For work, and complex calculations in research yeah I completely see and understand needing 64bit.


Mandrake use to be a nice starter distro but it kinda dropped off the radar now the Ubuntu is here.
Fedora - They still havn't figured out their rpm problems. It's a mess to manage packages with it.
Gentoo - While nice and it did what I need and managed packages well and all. I actually have no compalints but you have a to be pretty decent with the command line as 80% of the programs you install you most likely will have to compile from scratch and have to tweek. It's a tweakers and bleeding edge lovers distro.

Ubuntu - The best of both worlds for me.. right now It manages packages well, does all I need for development and maintains itself. When I need to patch the kernel I still can myself (like in gentoo) and when I just need to work and get a new piece of software it can do that.

I write trading applications for a living for a large power company and in my free time I'm working on writing a linux based car computer so I'm pretty fluent in linux and very familiar with the kernel.

Well, the main reason for using the 64 bit versions was A) because I could and B) to see if there was a difference :). There was a difference between the Vista's but it was because the 32 had more shit piled on. Both were faster than XP in my case, but none touch Ubuntu.

I never did do shit with Linux. I was getting good in basic and C++ and mom kinda cut me off from the computer world. She caught me with the computer apart one day and flipped. All I was doing was cleaning the dust off of it, but she still didnt want me to do it anymore so I didnt. What language do you use for doing stuff like that? I would sorta like to get back into the computer science part, of computers again.

Here is a funny article I found that sorta pertains to this thread. I never posted it because I wasn't even sure if anybody would understand it...

http://www.zyra.org.uk/os-air.htm

In school we were taught c/c++ which is what I use for kernel drivers and low level stuff. At work we use a combination of Java and .Net stuff. It depends if the apps run on unix servers or windows boxen.

My app that I'm writing for the car computer runs java. I'm interfacing DSM-Link, my car stereo and a gps system into 1 touch screen device. It's going well so far. I'm still working on merging link in. I'll have to take pictures of it mounted in the car sometime. Perhaps when I post the pictures of the car build (if I ever get my camera from my friends place!)

Btw that link reminded me of the gentoo is for ricers page. It would be amusing to car/tech geeks. It's unfortunate it seems to be down.. :/

Ubuntu is light on the system resources and linux multitasks much better then windows (IMHO) which is why things seem faster. If you install xp without all the shit extra stuff and virus scanners and stuff it's actually very quick. I applaud Microsoft for that. The problem is the moment you load a virus scanner and extra firewall stuff, and the sound card toolbars, and all the crap that runs in the background. Then It's hard to touch linux..

But I digress games on linux if you run them emulated don't run as well. But they are perfectly useable. Linux games however run comparable to the same game on windows. But I bought a wii so outside of world of warcraft I don't game much on the PC.

<-- nerd

Back in middle school I alway wanted get into linux, but never have a change so I stick with window all these yea.

I played with it for a few months in both 10th, 11th grade but I wasn't sure I would be smart enough or have enough use for it back then. In 12th I went to college at night time and we used solaris. I learned unix fast and so then I started using it about a month later. At first it was a huge burden to not have games and really the technology to do so wasn't mature enough. Today it is and I've been happy with it since then.

We have 7 comps in the house, 1 runs osx, 1 windows (for taxes and stuff soon to be osx) and the others run ubuntu.

Wow....

Well, I am back to Vista and loving it. I did however, take advantage of Open Office that I stumbled upon with Ubuntu. Its a great setup and though I dont like it as much as Microsoft Office, I dont have scratch for Microsoft Office so some is better than none right? I left a 15 gig partition on the internal hd for Ubuntu, some day when I am not busy I will install it again and dink around with it a bit.

Back in middle school I alway wanted get into linux, but never have a change so I stick with window all these yea.

In middle school? lol why the hell did you care about Linux that young? Computers barely ran Win98 back then, let alone open source software.

I've ran suse,ubuntu,and OSX *mac* all forms of linux i love them all.

osx is unix, not linux. OSX is based on BSD the berkley systems distribution of Unix. Linux however was originally published by Linus Torvalds (one of the maintainers now) and updated by the community. They have lots of similarities and often have most of the same software ported but they are different.

Just a fyi.

Btw the mach kernel for osx is open source too. But it's just the kernel not the interface.

wow I never ever thought Id be having this discussion on autoforums.

Nova, what server do you play on WoW? I have several characters on several servers. But my main is a 70 horde shammy on Malfurion.


I also know very little about Linux, will all the programs I have currently installed on my computer work with a Linux O/S as well?