A new beginning

Hello to all who may have stumbled onto my new site. Well, as a frustrated Linux enthusiast who hates the searching and searching to find out what distro I should be using, testing and testing hours on end (which does not bode too well with my wife) I thought I might offer some help with taking my knowledge of Linux to the masses. I am not out to rule the world, offer incite not found on other sites, but rather a simpler way to communicate what each of the masses of distributions of Linux in the world down to a more usable format. This is only my attempt at bringing what I think is a great way of ensuring you are in control of your computer rather than it, or other people, ruling your PC world.


I welcome any and all feedback to what I am attempting here, which for me is a first. First of all, I love Linux and what it (for the most part) is trying to do. I am not a FSF Bible thumper who thinks that all software should be free, but rather that the owners of the hardware should be free to choose. Would I like to be able to get everything for free? Sure, I love free beer, but I also like things to work and hate when that beer is flat, bitter or plain crappy. I subscribe to the idea that there really is no such thing as a free lunch.

Remember that things found on my site here are simply my humble opinion, not intended to sell anything or get you to go along with my ideas, thoughts or rants. Have fun looking and let me know what you think. Also, I don't mind if you steal (borrow) my images, just be thoughtful enough to say thank you!!!!

My rating method will be based on Pennies (Short for Penguins, cute huh???)

1 Pennie - Basically one step above DOS 5.0

2 Pennies - Basically two steps above DOS 5.0 (hah, won't be that easy) but allows some Linux function but not to the level one would expect. Most Alpha builds and some Betas would likely be here

3 Pennies - This is where I would put the bar, the place most distros will fall into. Pieces of individual packages might get placed into higher levels, but for the most part this would be the average system. A package might get this today, but as time moves along, they

4 Pennies - A package might get this today, but as time moves along, they will likely become the 3 Pennie package. This distro has something special to it, either in feature, ease of use, feature rich, or just something that sets it apart.

5 Pennies - Simply put, this is the Windows Killer, Nirvana, the end all-be all OS that meets all needs wants and leaves no doubt that MS is on the way out. Do I expect many scores of this? Not really. Again, one might get 5 Pennies today, but tomorrow it will likely become normal, as is the true idea behind Linux.

Xandros 4.0 Review - How to do a entry level distro almost right

When I first played with Xandros back a few years, it was being touted as the distribution that actually worked and could be a Windows replacement for new users. At the time, I was new to Linux and willing to take that risk and well, wasn't impressed. I then got a hold of a 3.0 distro and loaded it on my wife's laptop so she could stop getting killed by malware and popups. She liked some things of Linux, but by no means is interested in her laptop being either Windows or Linux. Well, the wireless never worked, so she never used it. It was extremely difficult to even attempt setting up NDISWRAPPER, which is by far the easiest way to get wireless working IMHO, so I quit and now it just sits there idle.

So Xandros now has 4.0, which really is nothing super special, mainly upgrading pieces to more recent/less buggy with many of the latest (operational) offerings on the kernel, KDE and other aspects. With their "Making Linux work for you" tag line, lets see how they did...

Details:

Website www.Xandros.com
Kernel - 2.6.15 or higher (I love how they at least tell you what comes out of the box)
Desktop - KDE 3.4.2 Xandros Enhanced
Specs - http://www.Xandros.com/products/home/home_edition/specs.html
Cost - Home $39.99 Premium $79.99 (30 day free Trial) $129.95 Business
Special Features - Included Code Weavers (in Premium version), NTFS Read/Write Support

Nitty Gritty:

Installation ( )

With a distro that is touted as being a Windows replacement for newbies, the first test for me is how much gray matter does it take to install. If I have to call upon knowledge via another computer googling this and that, it will get a 1. A 5 is reserved for the fact that I don't do anything and it can read my mind on what I want.

So the test starts for Xandros and quickly it is a clean looking boot into the installer. You know what is happening all the way up to the first screen. You are welcomed in a with a very simple screen telling you what you are doing today. One thing I really like on this is that it keeps you informed all the time of where you are in the process and keeps the option of going back for the user. If you have any questions during this, there is a nice resource located here.



The next screen is the lawyer speak for this is yours and not mine, but I reserve the right to change what is yours and make it mine again. Really, the EULA here is pretty basic and nothing in there scared me.



The next step is important for new installs, in that it allows the installation to continue is newbie mode or in a mode more advanced, but not too nuts that you need a PhD in cyber speak in order to succeed.



For the sake of keeping the windows easy, I went ahead with the Custom install, but remember one can always go back and choose Express if they get lost.




What I like here is that you have two methods of playing in the Custom sandbox: One click grab it all; item by item. This allows the really picky people to hunt and peck if they like, or for the more simple minded folk like me, you can just grab the whole bag at once. The difference in the Express and the Custom Complete seems to be only a few items such as Organizer, Drivers, PIM devices (such as Palm), and the media player. While these are not all critical items to run, I would think that media player would be nice to have as a default, but with the silly licensing issues with that, once can easily tell why they kept it clear from the Express.

The next screen really is what I know is critical for folks who plan on Dual booting with Windows still alive on their PC. This is the disk screen, and it allows the user to determine what partition, if any available, to install Xandros onto. It evens tells you that trying to modify these partitions now is really something that an expert should try, rather than mere mortals. By giving the options of using free space (you won't break a thing), taking over (say goodbye to the old, hello new), resize a Windows (move over Bill, I coming in), Replace Xandros (thanks for coming back home) and then expert (Look out momma, trying to fly) I think that they simplified a step that can really put off the newbie. Again, this option is not available for the Express install, that just makes a decision based on what it could find. Using the option of Free Space is also the default if the partition is blank as in the case of my trial for the Express installation.



Take over disk still allows the user to choose where they want to install. On advanced machines where there are several partitions, this is important so that you don't over write the wrong one (been there, done that). It also asks where you wish to over write the master boot record, which is also extremely important so that you know how your system will boot. Typically I place this at the MBR rather than on a partition if I am going to be dual booting with windows.



Networking is next and Xandros found my network card and then allows me to tweak what it thinks I should be doing. I didn't have wireless on the machine I tested this with, but will test that later on and update the site with any findings (Have to get permission to break my wife's laptop 8-S)



So that concluded the Custom options on the installation and the fork in the road brings us back to where the Express would have already taken us. The only real change we made was to do a complete installation rather than the default, but realistically that would have not been noticeable in any way once we completed.




The Admin screen is extremely straight forward, providing options for the password (you can't leave it blank for the lazy people out there), a computer name for use on networks primarily, and then options for user password strength, and home folder being private (stay out of my stuff mom). I am not a huge fan of the strength option as it just makes your day longer in the end on remembering passwords.

The next window gets us to the user additions, which one should always do. By not creating a user account, and only running Linux in Admin role, well that would be like having a diamond store full of the most high tech security in the world, and not locking the front door. Just create a user account and be safe all the time. I know it can be a pain, but really, is typing SU that hard????



As always, the user name is lower case with no funky stuff, and you then can create the real name along side and the default password.

And then that is that. One Linux distro ready to be installed. Note how nicely the system warns you on a Take Over Partition option that you could be doing some nasty things, so make sure you know what you are doing.




I can honestly say that Xandros does have one of the cleanest and easiest installations on the planet. I would have to say that they are the closest to getting a 5 out there, and would probably if this wasn't my first review.
Nothing in the installation is above any user who has done anything close to install any software. I commend the Xandros team on creating a distro that can truly get off the ground running in limited time and no excess gray matter usage. Thank you, thank you and thank you for that.



Onto bigger and better things; she is quick out of the gate, but how does she corner???

Starting ( )

Well, I am not a fan of their boot selector, I mean this is exactly the same as 3.0, and doesn't do much for the eye candy appeal, and really no excitement or incite for the newbie on what is even happening. However I think I might be looking too hard for an issue as the install happened a bit too easily.



One thing you quickly notice when firing up Xandros the first time is pretty nice graphics. Nice in that they don't try and go over the top, which could slow down the process on older systems.




The boot screen is equally simple and clean, allowing the user to choose to login as the user created during installation, or the evil Admin login. Please note I am not a fan of the admin option of logging in, as it eventually makes newbies login as root, making their systems more susceptible to intrusion.



Like many KDE based distros, there is a nice First Time Run utility that allows you to setup time zones, printers, affects, etc...but is nothing new.



One new item in the First Time Run is the Registration with Xandros, which tells the user in order to get new software and updates they MUST register. Now, I am not opposed to this, and is pretty simple up front, but I do like the idea of me being anonomous to the OS provider. Do they really need to know me, especially if I paid $40 to get their OS to this point??? Getting a code is pretty simple, but I am giving a bit more data than I really would want too. Whether or not this still supports Apt-get is to be seen, which I will update later.



And honestly, that is a pretty common theme with Xandros: nothing new. It is a very vanilla distro in that there are no real bells or whistles, but I think that is the true intention. It is really designed as a packaged Linux distro that newbies can enjoy, get a PC up and running with in minimal time and effort and do what people want to do on computers, surf baby, surf. It allows for quick support with iPods, music, media and NTFS systems with Read/Write support, so you have a new Linux system that can talk to your older Windows boxes as well. It is truly a product that they intended it to be, and for that I give them credit. I doubt it will ever win over the hearts and minds of true Linux fans who live for the challenge of it all, but for mom and dad who are retired and can barely tell the difference between a mouse and a keyboard, this is definitely an option to look into.

Bonus Stuff ( )

So why should someone put out $40 for a distro when there are others that are FREE???? And realistically the only configuration that makes any sense is really the Premium at that gets up to $80. So what do you get for that? First of all (and most arguably what sets Xandros apart from the crowd) is CodeWeavers. In a nut shell, codeweavers is Wine tweaked to really work better and with a cleaner front end. So what is Wine then? Well, it stands for Wine Is Not An Emulator, and basically allows programs for Windows to be run within Linux. Do all work? Not really. So CodeWeavers has tweaked and pulled Wine for specific packages, mainly Microsoft Office, iTunes, Adobe packages and some other software that just doesn't exist in the forms Windows users would want. It is a bridge for the Windows users that just can't get rid of Word, Excel and Outlook and are affraid to work in OpenOffice, or simply don't want to try.

CodeWeavers alone is $39.95, so that covers the delta between the basic and premium costs, but there are other packages and a link in Xandros explains that. There are several key product differentiators for the $40, but the base cost of Xandros is still a mystery to me. Again, I don't mind people trying to make money in building a superior product, but the cost here is really for a convenience over superior and there are other packages out there today that offer the same level of support, quality and ease for FREE.

One feature that I am not fully in tune with is a nice to have package called Versora, which is a migration package from Windows to Linux. This type of application would work well for most newbies getting their key documents, settings, and attributes over. How well it works would really depend on the user's expectations and details that they are moving.

Another nice package in the distro is the Security Center, which really pulls together all the issues a newbie might be concerned about. Again, there is a for sale security package with Virus Checking, Firewall services (which are going against one of the current strengths of Linux) but I understand the concept in providing this in a user friendly way and applaud the centralized control and visibility of the product.



Overall ( )

So what do I think overall? (if you care, right ) Xandros has a really strong product, but I think they outprice their market. At $80 for a package that delivers what people would want, they are too near the cost of Windows which also does everything they do(and some a bit better). If they are after the orphaned Win 98 and ME consumers who are scratching their heads now that support is over, they missed by about 100 yards. I love the ease of the product, the great look and feel that KDE provides and how Xandros is sticking to what works in packages, kernels and simple software bundles. CodeWeavers is good for those who want to have the Windows packages, but Wine is also a viable option and again there is a pricing issue as to the value of what this really provides today when OpenOffice is gaining strength on its own for an Office package, reducing the need for Wine. If most of these came in a cheaper package, where it was not basically as much as MS, then no doubt this would be a 4 Pennie package. As it sits, 3 Pennies is all I can give until they offer a FREE base package similar to what Freespire is to Linspire, which to me is a direct comparison product offering (and also our next package to be reviewed)

So I will be probably deleting my install and moving on to keep the lookout for the Nirvana, but would recommend this strongly to any newbie who is tired of Redmond ways and wants the control that Linux provides back to the user, but not to my Linux friends looking for that thrill of the compile and having the cutting edge.

KnoLinuxGuy

PCLinuxOS 0.93a Junior and MiniMe - Two reviews for the price of one

So a couple of people have told me so far in my first week of this, that the one distro I need to take a look at is PCLinuxOS. I can say that I tried this distro once on referral and loaded the Live disk which is its trade mark, saw that it was basically a repackaged Mandrake distro and stopped. This is a personal issue I have, with anything resembling Mandrake. A bit of history between myself and their customer dis-service has put me against them almost as much as I hate MS. Why? Well to be fair it has to do with how I see them running their business. They offer these memberships where you pay a boat load for say a Silver level so you can have better access, then they change and offer everything to the world so there really is no benefit of being a member. If you sign up for a year, you are their pawn for that year. My fault for not paying the over $100 up front, but I like their product then as it was a good 64 bit version and I wanted to support them. But that is my issue and it affected my opinion of PCLinuxOS, that was until this week when I loaded up MiniMe and Junior and saw that these guys really get things done where Mandrake has failed.

I love Live CDs and that is first and foremost. Being able to try before I buy, which in our case is try before I wipe out some other distro on my PC in order to test something and be pained by its performance only then to re-install is sure silliness these days. Live installers should be the default and not the exception. Not only does PCLinuxOS have a Live version, they have a Live version that simply flies. I could hardly tell I was in Live mode, except for the install option icon on my desktop. This is mainly due to their skinny package, being only 300 Meg for MiniMe and 484 Meg for Junior. This is by far the best Live distro, except for the lack of wireless support that was quickly fixed with ndiswrapper and some work. My resolution was also a bit low, but I am used to that (see Freespire review).

So I then installed this onto my eMachines laptop and set out to see if I was wrong not to play with this long ago. Lets check it out, shall we???

Details:

Website http://www.pclinuxos.com
Download Here
Kernel - 2.6.16.27.tex1.lve
Desktop - KDE 3.5.3 with lots of nice default settings right in the Live version that carry over
FAQs - http://www.pclinuxonline.com/wiki/HomePage
Cost - FREE!!! But there is a link to order disks through On-Disk.com for $4.99 which helps support the project
Special Features - Live installer, minimal size that expands well and codecs included for Media except DVD

Nitty Gritty:

Installation ( )

All I have to say is WOW!!!! I just don't know a better way that is easier or more understandable than what Tex and gang have come up with. I even love the simple names of Junior and MiniMe, as they truly describe what these packages are intended to do. There really is little difference between the install of MiniMe and Junior, so this discussion covers both.



This simple Grub window allows many options including copying fully to memory which improves the performance of the Live boot, if you have ample RAM. I went the more traditional route to emulate what many PC users might have instead, but I love that there is that option.


Good simple graphics on the Splash is a nice detail and lets me know that they care about the little things.



The welcome screen provides not only the options for Guest or Root, but also in the slpash tells you what their password is. This is a great addition for those times when this is either in the boot lines or on the website, which of course at this point we wouldn't have access to. Kudos on this minor but critical detail. I installed via Guest on my system as I try to never do anything logged in as Root.



Amazing isn't it? Tex and gang took the really cool transparancy aspects of KDE to rival what MS is touting in Vista. When people see this on my laptop they are always impress and it just gives you that feeling that the desktop is bigger than it really is. MiniMe comes with a very slim package, but there is more than enough on their Synaptic to use this as a launch point. I like that this provide the user an equivalent OS to MS and then they can configure from there, rather than some of these over inflated 7 disk (or DVD) installations that are out there that put so much in the system that you end up with no memory to run anything. Junior has more and that link will take you to the listing of packages included. The list I saw seperating them for me just browsing up and down included:

• CD/DVD Burning
• Krusader
• KWifi
• Amarok
• Kaffeine
• Bittorrent
• KPDF
• KWord
• KSpread

So once you click on the Install Icon, you are prompted for the Root password (root btw from the splash screen) and enter a very efficient and concise installer. It is detailed enough to let you know what you are doing, but not overly complex so that you could get lost.



There is an option to install either to Hard Drive or to a USB drive, which to me is so cool. Having a recover USB disc today is so critical to IT professionals. I will review that in another post, so I went for the good stuff and selected my hard drive.



You are given options to take over the world or to edit existing partitions, which again for newbies and Linux lovers alike is something that is critical. It even goes as far as to explain what is needed and a good partitioner built into the installation process. Oh, and did I forget to mention that there is an installation Help icon as well???? How intuitive is that???? I mean, I don't have to worry about network connectivity, google, books or anything and I can just click and learn???? Way too much thought went into that one.




So the nice folks here at PCLinuxOS really care if you know what you are doing and made sure to include not only an installation help but also have a link on the desktop to their Wiki, but of course this requires that you have internet in order to take full advantage of.



Once you determine the hard drive over the USB (for now), then the next step is to choose which partition selection method you would like.



You can use existing, Erase the entire disk or go into custom mode. Custom mode will allow you to manage what is already there, resize and format if needed.



Once you get all the partitions configured like you wish them to be, then the next step is to choose if you would like to format any of the existing partitions. I always recommend people to format the base partition so that they know any existing file will not corrupt what they are attempting.



The next step is to verify you wish to do what you just selected the system to do, just in case you forgot. I know, I know, safety first. Once complete you will be prompted for the Admin window. Now here is the first mistep of the installation and one that really goes against what I feel is a sound practice.




Once complete you will be prompted for the Admin window. Now here is the first mistep of the installation and one that really goes against what I feel is a sound practice. You will see in the picture below that there is an option for "no password" for the admin. This is extremely bad practice and should not be an installation option. Sure, it makes life easy when doing su all the time, but this distro has synaptic for installation and a really good control panel, so time in command line should be minimal and this is your first line of defense against the Dark Arts.



Now that my rant is over, everything then is pretty simple. Add your user and choose your boot loader type and location. I myself like Grub while this tool defaults to Lilo, so I went with that, just so I would see what the typical newbie might get when selecting the defaults.



The bootloader did find my windows partition but not my debian distro on the machine, so in order to use that I was forced to manually load the information. Not the greatest, but becoming more common today in that these auto boot loaders just are not doing a great job in finding other Linux distros (could be a known issue that they like, but I doubt that).

The last thing that shows up is the obligatory "take out your disc and reboot" message that lets you know that it is time to move from Live on Disc to Live on system. I will say other than our little admin password issue this is one of the nicest live disc to install system processes I am used to date. Add that to the installation help page being part of the desktop and the quick link to the Wiki, and this is the closest to 5 Pennies I have seen yet. Excellent job so far Tex, but lets see how this bad boy works in the real world.


Starting ( )

A common them with Junior is that if there is a KDE package then that is what is installed. This then excludes OpenOffice, Adobe, FireFox, and Thunderbird, but again those are easily obtainable. The nice part of doing this is that you know everything works.



But right off the bat, nothing was really different from the live to the installed copy. Seemless is a good word for this, but honestly I never have had the greatest luck with these. I love the concept, but until now am always sceptical of what will happen. My wireless was still not operational, but again a quick NDISWRAPPER -i bcmwl5.inf from the drivers on my windows partition and boom, up she came. Next up was a pesky little alert that kept showing its ugly head stating "Sound Server fatal error: CPU Overload, aborting". Hmmmm, not the type of alert anyone would like to see. Since it was sound I went to the control panel and changed from Arts to OSS and rebooted. To date, the alarm has never appeared again and my sound is working fine. My favorite issue of my ATI settings of 1280x800 not being there was next, but I was able in the control center to add that resolution and restart KDE and once again back in business.



Next I tested the music player with some files from my windows partition's iTunes. These are non-DRM songs in m4a format that I use to test Amarok with each distro. I was excited as Bono started singing "Where the Streets Have No Names" in my speakers. DVD didn't work, but was quickly fixed by going to Synaptic and installing libdvdcss, which was in their default repository. Awesome, no searching for that either.



So my installation and initial configuration is complete in about 30 minutes. I have everything I need, so I install OpenOffice from Synaptic, just to test the OS handling a power hungry application. It loads with no issues and ran beautifully. My next test is always to load Wine. Why? Well, I happen to like a nice game of online poker and none of them support a Linux install, so I use Wine with my Pokerstars account. This works on all systems that support Wine, so this is my test of tests, because without Poker, I am stuck on Windows.

Wine was in the repository and installed with only one or two additional packages. I downloaded Pstars and installed with zero issues. The only issue I had there was that it didn't create a shortcut on my desktop nor did it create the typical Wine branch in the Start section. However, by heading into the .wine directory I was able to launch the program fine and the graphics looked great.

Once again I am floored by the ability of this tiny package to do everything I want with almost zero effort.

Bonus Stuff ( )

I would have to say that the bonus stuff on this distro is small, but when the package is designed to be small then one can't ask for much. The KDE stype is awesome and the proprietary codecs are great in that with minimal effort music and DVD plays. I wish that they would work harded on getting wireless cards into the kernel or some minimal efforts for the most common drivers in NDISWRAPPER, especially for the LIVE CD, as then wireless would work out of the box.

Overall ( )

This has been a real pleasure, playing with Junior and MiniMe. I can honestly say that this distro hits the head on 95% of my key issues and doesn't take too much gray matter to overcome its shortcomings. But when you consider that the download for this is 2/3 for Junior (and 1/3 for MiniMe) of the size of any other major distro in similar form, this does wonders. I have no doubt that if you were to give this a whirl, you too would be set back and wonder why this hasn't risen the list at Distrowatch even more than it has. I wish a couple of things were different, and that they might look at XGL in their Live offering, but I understand their niche market probably is outside of that package. I am sure it is in the works, and when Tex anounces it is available I will be right there downloading and enjoying a solid distro with amazing performance and rock solid support.

My hat is off to you Tex and gang. Being a former resident of the great state of Texas (and married to a Texan), I will toss a "Damn Good Job Pardners" your way. This distro will be on my machine now as my primary Linux, which for me is the ultimate testimate to how much I like what I see here. Remember, I have some serious issues with Mandrake itself, but nothing here even comes close to reminding me of them.