OT - Old PC - Free Operating System Ideas

[The Natural Philosopher]

Its quicker these days to install linux than most windows applications ;-)

[The Natural Philosopher]

Bless!

And I am sure that is the absolute limit of your IT competence

>

[T i m]

(less than many Linux distros will install into).

Yup. It does what you need it to so ...

I used to brew mine in those PolyPins (did they call them)? ;-)

;-)

Quite. ;-)

Ok.

I did consider replacing my Topfield but it all started to look complicated / expensive.

What's stopping me moving across to the new PC is partly because even though I built it using low power / spec components ... and it's pretty quiet compared with some machines, it's not as quiet (at the moment anyway) as the Mac Mini. Also, the Mini has my email accounts (Thunderbird) and as it's still running ok (ignoring the faulty optical drive), there is no pressure to move. ;-(

;-) When listening to some (more fanatical possibly) Linux users you would think there wasn't an hour went by where all Windows machines were blue screening? ;-(

I have all the main ones but rarely run anything other than FF.

Ok. For me ie, is probably the last browser I would use (but will if required and can of course as I'm running Windows). ;-)

I have had some devices they *require* ie because of ActiveX (I think it was).

I have another Mini that I would like to *just* run W7/10. According to the Mac boys I think it is possible with just a bit of fiddling. That said, I'm not sure I like the idea of relying on the Apple hardware, given it's not generic etc.

Ah yes, I introduced Linux to my mate in his PC repair shop and he uses it for his emails and sometimes recovering customer data (often when Windows can't see it).

My Mrs tells me 'there are limits'. ;-)

Understood. Funnily though I was asked to price up a desktop just yesterday. ;-)

Yup. I have now converted all my dual-boot laptops to Intel WiFi cards as they seem to be the most 'Linux friendly'. A while back I bought 3 x MSI 'Wind' netbooks. They came with two different models of WiFi card and all 3 worked fine with the XP they were supplied with (of course). One (well the two), worked fine under Linux but the 3rd didn't. I had to potentially invalidate the warranty by opening the main case and replacing the WiFi card on first one, then the other two (and upgrading the RAM to 2G while I was there). ;-)

Ok.

Ok. I would like to have such skills but I have long since realised that I'm not enough a programmer to be able to deal with Linux sufficiently and now at my age. ;-(

Yup, been there and had to live with that. I installed Linux on a PC for my mate to sell cheap in the shop. He sold it but the guy brought it back (and got his money back) because his only game wouldn't play on it.

I like the realism. ;-) Of course, the Linux fans will suggest they have better things to do than maintain a Windows machine but I spend hardly any time doing such on mine, far less time in fact than I might chasing solutions to Linux issues.

Often yes. However, for those friends / family I installed Linux they knew the deal. I would generally try to sort Linux issues (and often could) but I offered no guarantees on any of it.

LOL ... been there, seen that so many times. However, I'm really only interested in the machines and to me they are like unloved pets. It's 'good' for me to get them up and going at full speed again. ;-)

Well, unfortunately I am too honest. If they have got an old machine into a mess it's likely they will get a faster one in a mess faster. So, I ask, if it was fast enough in the beginning, the chances are it will be just as fast again after a fresh install (and do so for them).

I have a geeky mate who has all that sort of kit and does that sort of thing (mostly for mates and for fun). Hotplates, vacuum machines, hot air re-flow stations etc etc.

Plus it's probably stronger and cheaper to make that way?

I had that with a 13 month old washing machine I was given where the plastic drum that holds and seals the stainless steel drum had been welded together in the factory, rather than bolted together, even though it had the facility to be bolted. I carefully cut it open at the weld, replaced the bearings and managed (impossible to do with that plastic apparently?) to seal it back up and it ran for a further

7+ years. ;-)

Cheers, T i m

[The Natural Philosopher]

Because they have to sit and be insulted by people who plainly pretend to defend Windows, but are really only defending their own stupidity on buying it.

No, neither at the moment

Have you stopped beating your wife?

[T i m]

1) Windows often comes preinstalled with 'shovelware' as that is how the user gets a cheaper machine. Nothing stopping you removing all that or even doing a generic clean install (as I do). 2) (Most) 'users' have *never* been interested in what goes on under the hood *ever*, so it shouldn't come as a big surprise to you (but it seems it does) that they still aren't interested in such 'these days'?

Users are exactly what it says on the tin, just as car drivers today can actually be car drivers, they don't also *have* to be mechanics, and you can 'install' a digital TV without having to know how to individually 'tune' each channel. That's not wrong or 'dumbing down' (as some Linux fanboys are often heard to say), it's just the realisation that 'Users' can now further be what they have always wanted to be. ;-)

No, it isn't if 1) they are happy to give it a go, 2) allowed to give it a go (not their / work PC), or know where to start. Resolving a problem under Linux often involves first finding a often hidden and protected file, opening it (with the right rights), editing it (by hand using gobbledygook) and saving it again.

No, 'have a life, use what's the most common and best supported around the world'.

A while back I replaced a mates iMac with a generic PC (dual booting XP and Linux as it happens). He bought the Mac 'because it looked nice and it was ill_in_one' with no idea what OS it was running or how OSX was 'different' to Windows. I finally swapped it out for him because he couldn't properly get on holiday booking site and they grand kids couldn't play their games or do the things they wanted.

That's not saying Windows is 'better' than OSX, far from it, but it was better in ways that were important to him and his family.

Now, if,, after spending most of my life in IT support I had met / befriended ONE SINGLE PERSON who 'knew Linux' then maybe some / all of those frustrating issues that seemed to constantly plague me and my adoption of Linux may have been solved. ;-(

They still probably wouldn't be able to write Linux drivers where no driver exists or write Linux versions of programs only written for Windows or OSX (and for me there are many such examples).

Cheers, T i m

p.s. You know I'm not trying to suggest you (or anyone) use Windows aren't you? ;-)

[T i m]

Not bad.

That's nuclear for you. ;-)

Whilst I see no reason why you couldn't, although doing it on Linux is exactly the right thing for that sort of use.

Try running my OBD software and interface on Linux, or my Garmin app, or the HP auto updater, or iTunes ...

Horses for courses again. ;-)

Cheers, T i m

[dennis]

that's less than 12 per second, hardly a heavy load.

Is it a VM?

[jack]

I don't, I am happy to pay more for the hardware that allows me to run the better, more polished OS like iOS which makes things rather more convenient for doing the stuff that I do most of the time and which goes out of its way to stop apps snooping on my data.

But accept the fact that you are stuck with Apple's my way or the highway with quite a bit of stuff and that you will never be able to have the hardware auto answer an incoming phone call even if you don't mind the small risk of it doing that.

And that you will never be able to have a homogenous UI/skin across all your diverse hardware platforms unless you try to force them to look close to the way the Apple platforms do.

And it's a lot harder for the average user to get a quick answer on some detail than with Win, which means that they will normally be asking me about it instead of someone else in the house etc if I have installed it on their hardware for some reason.

[jack]

Because you decide to do something different with that machine.

[jack]

Yep, do that all the time when the OS does what I want which it must have done for me to keep using it.

[The Natural Philosopher]

Why would you need to?

OBD/Garmin- use a virtual machine.

HP auto updater? Why on earth would you need to run that?

And Itunes? good grief. If you really want that sort of crap

Except you backed a pony....

[jack]

It has actually with tablets and smartphones and not so capable smartphones.

The other important difference is that most get Win with the hardware they buy. That's true with tablets and smartphones too with linux or close but isnt with laptops and desktops.

[T i m]

Ok. ;-)

I have an iPhone (given to me and doing nothing) and my Mum (85) has an iPad and I really don't find the UI logical at all. In contrast I find Android far easier. It's probably also why I don't 'like' OSX, finding it backward and illogical in many instances (as does our daughter FWIW).

And that's not counting the inability to just right click on the desktop and create a text document (for example, I don't know if you still can't with the latest OSX as my latest is 10.6), like you can with Windows and Linux. And I found that especially strange, seeing how Apple OS's have always made big use of the desktop for volatile things.

Should you want that etc.

Quite, In all my years supporting Windows I can't remember ever having to *ask* a question anywhere, I've been able to look up an answer somewhere (and the answer be easily useable by me I mean). ;-)

Understood, that seem to be an unwritten rule for some reason. ;-)

Cheers, T i m

[T i m]

'Don't bother using Linux for that' you mean then?

You don't 'need' to run it in the same way you don't 'need' a remote for your TV or a washing machine. It's just that many people do and they see no reason why anything should stop them doing so for no good reason.

Personally, no, but that wasn't the point I was making.

"you can still try to get it to work under WINE or PlayOnLinux. These pieces of software try to add a compatibility layer so that Windows applications work on Linux, but the results are far from perfect. Therefore, not all Windows applications will run with WINE ? but it?s still worth a try."

Yup nice (not), the very experience most sane people would rather avoid ... too many uses of the word 'try' in there for most people, especially when they don't actually have to 'try' at all as it will run natively under Windows.

Nope, I backed a horse that can fit in most stables and I can buy shoes (and have fitted) and tack in every tack-shop in town. ;-)

Like I said, go into PC World and go to buy say a webcam and find one (at any price) that states on the box it is supported by Linux (and ideally your current distro and version). If it isn't mentioned specifically, see if you can get one of the sales people to take a bet with you re the chances of it working out_of_the_box (and I'm fully aware that there is a reasonable chance it will).

The point is your chosen 'horse' has 5 legs and very few ordinary people know how to shoe it or want to ride it because it's 'weird', even though it may work well in some situations. ;-)

I also know you are your like love it in spite of that. ;-)

Cheers, T i m

[jack]

It's trivial to see what happens to the installed size.

Hardly ever. Much more often special cases that produced the bug need to be handled with extra code.

And extra capability normally does need more code.

Hard to explain why he included Linux with Win on various systems he supplied so the owner could use which they preferred.

[jack]

Mine is running Win, XP.

[jack]

It was quite a bit cheaper for me, just a quad capture card that allows me to capture all 25 streams simultaneously if I ever want to do that. Leaves the dedicated PVRs for dead capability wise.

Yeah, I did build that machine with the quietest components I could find, no fan in the video card, no fans apart from the power supply fan and very quiet cpu fan and I don't have any covers on the case at all.

The hard drives are so quiet that I had to put my hand on them to check they were spinning up. Samsung greens.

Yeah, that's certainly true. I was a bit one eyed there.

Certainly worth the effort.

[The Natural Philosopher]

Like say add a new printer that the old operating system doesn't support? How many printers today come with XP drivers?

OR do you want to run a new program?

How many new windows programs today will run on XP?

This is a straw man. Windows is no better. IN fact its worse because when your windows is no good anymore you have to pay to upgrade, and chances are the computer is no good anymore either.

Which is where we came in.

You are rationalising an emotional choice. Linux scares you because you don't know it, so you are finding bullshit reasons not to use it.

[The Natural Philosopher]

Indeed it is, and when its no bigger, or even smaller?

Well yes creeping featurism is the bane of software that has actaully been developed to do all that it needs to do.

Think word perfect circa 1995. It was basically all that a word priocessor needed to be or do.

If you really wanted more, well there was Quark Or Lex..;-)

20 years later the bloated excrescence that is Microsoft Word still can't get its formatting right.

[The Natural Philosopher]

YOur website? where?