On Sun, 27 Oct 2013 22:26:46 +0000 Mark Rogers mark@quarella.co.uk wrote:
I'm being asked quite frequently now for Linux options to replace XP.
What would people here pick?
I approached this from the other direction. I asked the 'user' to take a look at the various distros online and see what they thought should be used.
Back came the reply, Parsix. I thought I'd grab a copy and see how it ran for me. I'm running it in VirtualBox and already I don't like it. Yes it looks pretty - that might appeal to some XP users - but when you tell it to install, it fires up GParted. While I might be able to cope with that, I suggest that the average XP user won't so I've already removed the VBox install and deleted the iso file.
I saw in another reply that you have a Pi. Would it be possible for you to lend that to one or two of your XP users and ask them to try out the various distros available for it? That might give them a clearer idea of the things they liked and disliked. That might help frame your ideas of a replacement.
The other possibility is to ask them to try out the various live CDs/DVDs (if necessary, you might have to write the distros to CDRW/DVDRW). That's what I did with Parsix but as they won't try the install option, they won't encounter the pitfalls of things like GParted. But again, it would give you some idea of their likes and dislikes.