2009/11/11 Simon Royal mail@simonroyal.co.uk:
Hi.
I am thinking of moving to Linux.
I have been into computing for about 17 years. In 2000 I switched from Windows to Mac. For the past few years I have followed the Ubuntu development.
Just lately I have lost my enthusiasm for the Mac platform and have been thinking of switching permanently to Linux. I currently have a PowerBook G4 15" and love portable computing. I was thinking of downsizing to a small netbook running Linux.
I have played around with DSL, DSL-N, Vector Linux, Corel Linux and played quite a bit with Ubuntu. I dual booted it with OSX for a while and quite liked it.
My only requirements are built in wifi, built in bluetooth, built in webcam and USB 2. My current Mac is only 867Mhz and maxxed at 1GB of RAM, so most of the netbooks should run a bit faster than my current machine and I would like a higher limit that 1GB of RAM. I don't want a silly size screen like 7", as this will be my everyday machine.
I also don't want a cut down Linux distro as I would still need a machine capable of web, email, writing web pages, ftp uploading, editing pictures and Skype. I would also like to be able to hook up flash drives and external drives, my mp3 player and printer as well as possibly convert videos and music files between formats.
Any suggestions or help would be gratefully appreciated. I might be very experienced in computing, but too much in Linux.
Ubuntu Netbook Remix runs pretty well on my Acer Aspire One 1Gb 160Gb 9" screen and is heaps better than the supplied Linspire, based on Fedore Core. There are others based on Ubuntu which have interface tweaks for smaller screens. I am bias because I use Ubuntu on my desktop, laptop and servers so Netbook remix is a familiar environment for me. Most netbook manufacturers have Linux available as an option so the hardware just seems to work out of the box.
Cheers, BJ