Linux......Come of age!!!!!

Dread

be_alright wrote: »

You do not need to disable your antivirus to have XP running well. There are guides available to strip down the services that are running in the background to make it more efficient and you can also get programs that do it for you. Windows XP will run more than fine on a six year old machine that meets it's requirements.

Sorry, almost missed this bit...............So I pay a small fortune for Windows XP (and I know you can get it for £50 now) and then I have to start buying books, searching the internet, buying more software or taking my PC to someone who can charge me to strip down the background services just so I can continue to run Windows XP?

Why on earth would I bother when I can download Mandriva/Ubuntu, burn it to CD and have it install itself for nothing. I have access to a catalogue of thousands of free programs from my desktop that serve the needs of the majority of business or casual users. I don't really have to worry about viruses etc., my home PC network is a doddle to network, I can still use perfectly servicable machines that I would otherwise have to trash, I get almost unlimited support from innumerable forums, and I don't have to worry about copyright infingement if I lend/give someone a copy of the OS or App. Quite how BillScarab considers this as saving money "at any cost" is beyond me because as far as I'm concerned Linux offers far more advantages than Windows. Like I said, you may not think it's any good for your needs but you might at least support the ordinary user instead of demeaning Linux because it's not quite good enough yet for a software engineer.

superscaper

Dread wrote: »

at least support the ordinary user instead of demeaning Linux because it's not quite good enough yet for a software engineer.

Last thing I wanted to do with Linux:
Install on an old spare pc and connect wirelessly or use ethernet to browse the web

Hardly the confined for the use of a software engineer. The outcome was that it couldn't be done with any of the networking hardware I had, and that was after trying all sorts of workarounds and fixes that required knowledge of command line in linux. Still wouldn't work. In the end I installed a spare copy of windows 98 and worked perfectly. Wasn't that long ago and I think it was the last version of Ubuntu I last tried. I liked using Ubuntu and every distro I've tried but the hardware and software support just isn't there yet in my experience for even the most basic everyday things. I'm hardly a technophobe but I found it quite technically challenging to do the normal things. Fine if it works, but if it doesn't it's a complete pain to fix or find a solution for and suddenly becomes very user unfriendly.

[Deleted User]

I have never demeaned it, infact I did say that it was a fantastic operating system just that's just not matured enough to be a direct competitor for the home desktop market as Windows is. I did also state that I was going to be installing and running the new version which is released today so I can see how it has advanced.

The points I have been trying to make in my posts is that it's not the silver bullet solution for everyone's problems and if someone is tempted to change then they should not go blindly into it.

I've pointed out errors in what people have said to keep the discussion balanced, but at no point have I slated Linux into the ground as a poor choice or bad software.

cowbutt

I've been happily using Linux as my main desktop for the last 13 years. It works better for me than Windows, but I know that isn't the case for everyone, particularly if you need your PC gaming fix, or are dependent on certain proprietary applications.

The main trick is to buy your hardware to suit the OS, not the other way around. Some hardware works better than others with Linux; prefer Intel chipset motherboards to others, prefer Intel video to nVidia, and that in turn to ATI and others. WiFi is a bit of a mess right now, as the best-supported cards (Prism) are no longer in production, and the drivers for the best-supported in-production cards (Ralink) don't have the necessary hooks for WPA2 to work transparently. I'm confident that everything that's currently a problem will get fixed eventually (it has in the past), but by then, some people will have found other things to judge it inadequate for their needs. So be it.

Dread

superscaper wrote: »

You shouldn't base your preconceptions on stereotypes. The average age of a gamer is well over 20. Percentage share of female gamers is more than 40% in every age group.

Yes, quite right, from your quoted material the average age of a gamer is actually 28 but it qualified by:

"What they play on?
We wanted to know what the preferred platforms were for each age group. This includes consoles, Internet and PCs, but also more casual games platforms such as handheld devices (Game Boy Advance/SP, Nintendo DS, etc), mobiles/PDAs and interactive television."

For Pete's sake, even I'm included in this lot as I fiddle with my phone and games whilst I'm waiting to pick my kids up from school, but then perhaps they mean only playing games on a daily basis or something.

Wrong!

"How often they play?

We were interested in how often the gamers played and how long they played for in an average session, and how play sessions compare with other media. Furthermore, we wanted to establish whether length of play depended on the content and platform. We asked our gamers how often they played, split into the following divisions:

Every day 2-3 times a month
5-6 times a week 1-2 times a month
3-4 times a week Every couple of months
1-2 times a week less often"

So there we are, the research includes ages between 6 and 65 and includes every games medium available across a time scale that conservativly includes those that might fiddle with their mobile phones games "less often" than every couple of months. Furthermore it includes every type of game including simple puzzles, crosswords, and mental exercises. And you expect to influence people on this thread that PC gamers are driving software development and that 40% or so are females? Give us a break!

Did you either read or understand this research or just pluck some juicy looking figures from it? If this is the extent of your analytical ability it's no wonder you don't use Linux, it's obviously too much trouble to get past the first page.

Dread

cowbutt wrote: »

I've been happily using Linux as my main desktop for the last 13 years. It works better for me than Windows, but I know that isn't the case for everyone, particularly if you need your PC gaming fix, or are dependent on certain proprietary applications.

The main trick is to buy your hardware to suit the OS, not the other way around. Some hardware works better than others with Linux; prefer Intel chipset motherboards to others, prefer Intel video to nVidia, and that in turn to ATI and others. WiFi is a bit of a mess right now, as the best-supported cards (Prism) are no longer in production, and the drivers for the best-supported in-production cards (Ralink) don't have the necessary hooks for WPA2 to work transparently. I'm confident that everything that's currently a problem will get fixed eventually (it has in the past), but by then, some people will have found other things to judge it inadequate for their needs. So be it.

Do users need a better recommendation than this?

superscaper

Dread wrote: »

Did you either read or understand this research or just pluck some juicy looking figures from it? If this is the extent of your analytical ability it's no wonder you don't use Linux, it's obviously too much trouble to get past the first page.

Where's the sudden personal insults come from?

It's quite obvious you don't even know the first thing about me.

Also did you actually read my posts, I never at any point said I don't use linux (I first started using it 10 years ago, about the same time I started using Windows ish). I didn't even say I didn't like using it. I merely gave my experiences of it not working the way I wanted to. (I'd tried everything I could with the ndiswrapper etc). If you can't disagree without resorting to personal attacks, maybe you're on the wrong forum?

superscaper

Dread wrote: »

And you expect to influence people on this thread that PC gamers are driving software development

I've never said any such thing.

[Deleted User]

ahh.. this reminds me of the old Amiga vs Atari fanboy zealous arguments of the mid-90s

If i wanna use UNIX, i'll use my trusty AIX mainframe. If I want to play games, i'll play on my Wii.

If I want to do work, i'll use my Windows machine....

but that's me, here's a kicker - OTHER PEOPLE HAVE DIFFERENT IDEAS TO YOU THAT AREN'T NECESSARILY WRONG

So, go and use Linux, well done on finding a new free O/S you're happy with.

Conor_3

foofi22 wrote: »

My example wasn't meant as a dig as MS - despite you taking it that way - it was intended as an example to show how widespread Linux really is and that everything doesn't just run "xp".

It isn't as widespread as you think. People often quote webservers running Apache as being Linux ones but Apache also runs on Windows. When Unix was being phased out a few years ago, more servers were being migrated to Windows than Linux and Windows Server has continued to eat into the *nix server market share. With the new Server 2008, this may increase their share even more as there's a CLI only version to keep the geeks happy.