Hi I have posted a few posting for opinions on some distributions of Linux and have still not come to any conclusions. What is the best Linux out there in terms of user interface, compatibility with 3 party hardware and general range of software available. I know more and more software developers and producing linux versions of their software but I want to run Linux on a laptop with wireless internet, any suggestions please. Kind Regards Simon Royal ---- www.simonroyal.co.uk The box said requires Windows 2000 or better, so I bought an Apple Mac
Hi
I have posted a few posting for opinions on some distributions of Linux and have still not come to any conclusions.
What is the best Linux out there in terms of user interface, compatibility with 3 party hardware and general range of software available.
Pretty much all linux's have the same hardware support, a linux kernel is a linux kernel whatever the flavour. The same goes for software, the difference being package management. Debian based systems are supposed to have the best package management via the apt/dpkg system. Depends on what software you mean though. Commercial/non-free software tend to release rpm based packages for redhat though others may be available. Of course there is almost always the option to compile your own :)
I know more and more software developers and producing linux versions of their software but I want to run Linux on a laptop with wireless internet, any suggestions please.
Wireless 54/108Mb can be a little tricky, depends on the onboard chip. rt2500 cards are well supported and im sure others are to. Modems tend to be winmodems so again check the chipset, you might be lucky. Almost all graphics chipsets are supported in one form or another. Personally i always roll my own.
Kind Regards
Simon Royal
---- www.simonroyal.co.uk The box said requires Windows 2000 or better, so I bought an Apple Mac
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Hope this helps Stuart -- The problem with the world is stupidity. Not saying there should be a capital punishment for stupidity, but why don't we just take the safety labels off of everything and let the problem solve itself?
On Thu, 2006-03-09 at 15:08 +0000, Stuart Fox wrote:
Pretty much all linux's have the same hardware support, a linux kernel is a linux kernel whatever the flavour.
I'd add that a lot of the difference in hardware support stems from the installer and default package list. This is why there can be a difference between distributions...all should support the same hardware but some will do it with less user interaction than others.
On Thu, Mar 09, 2006 at 03:08:29PM -0000, Stuart Fox wrote:
Pretty much all linux's have the same hardware support, a linux kernel is a linux kernel whatever the flavour. The same goes for software, the difference being package management. Debian based systems are supposed to have the best package management via the apt/dpkg system. Depends on what software you mean though. Commercial/non-free software tend to release rpm based packages for redhat though others may be available. Of course there is almost always the option to compile your own :)
I'd disagree somewhat, as Debian seems to remove drivers they consider to be "non-free" (drivers with binary firmwares that don't have source aiui) from the kernel and distros like Ubuntu who take a different view and add lots of patches of various drivers and binary firmwares so they can support more hardware "out of the box" (of course idealogically this makes them more "non-free"). Other distros come somewhere inbetween these points (and probably others have more polarisation). In my experience, doing a bog standard install of Ubuntu on a laptop is more likely to get all the hardware working (and generally does *much* better than Windows ever could) than doing a bog standard install of Debian which will end up with me having to do things like download drivers and firmware for the wireless card for example. Thanks Adam -- jabberid = quinophex@jabber.earth.li AFFS || http://www.affs.org.uk/ || Not a filesystem
On Thu, Mar 09, 2006 at 03:08:29PM -0000, Stuart Fox wrote:
Pretty much all linux's have the same hardware support, a linux kernel is a linux kernel whatever the flavour. The same goes for software, the difference being package management. Debian based systems are supposed to have the best package management via the apt/dpkg system. Depends on what software you mean though. Commercial/non-free software tend to release rpm based packages for redhat though others may be available. Of course there is almost always the option to compile your own :)
I'd disagree somewhat, as Debian seems to remove drivers they consider to be "non-free" (drivers with binary firmwares that don't have source aiui) from the kernel and distros like Ubuntu who take a different view and add lots of patches of various drivers and binary firmwares so they can support more hardware "out of the box" (of course idealogically this makes them more "non-free"). Other distros come somewhere inbetween these points (and probably others have more polarisation).
I hear what you are saying and dont want to be nit-picky but thats a distro issue again. Non-free/closed source drivers dont make it into the mainline kernel. There is a difference between drivers and firmware. Very few hardware companies ever open their firmware, it's where their real ip is.
In my experience, doing a bog standard install of Ubuntu on a laptop is more likely to get all the hardware working (and generally does *much* better than Windows ever could) than doing a bog standard install of Debian which will end up with me having to do things like download drivers and firmware for the wireless card for example.
Thanks Adam
Distro's tend to be aimed at different applications, they *could* all do the same job but it would be harder on some. I wouldnt run mandrake (is it still called that?) as a server for example. Distros aimed at desktops usually include extra's, things that wouldnt qualify as open license compliant but that people want. Think of when redhat removed mp3 functionality from fedora. Ubuntu seems to be the "market" leader for desktops at the moment because it is easy to setup and has excellent out-of-the-box hardware setup. Again I dislike distros because none of them do exactly what i want without all that other gumph that goes with it, LFS is king :) Cheers Stuart -- The problem with the world is stupidity. Not saying there should be a capital punishment for stupidity, but why don't we just take the safety labels off of everything and let the problem solve itself?
On Fri, Mar 10, 2006 at 11:48:36AM -0000, Stuart Fox wrote:
I hear what you are saying and dont want to be nit-picky but thats a distro issue again. Non-free/closed source drivers dont make it into the mainline kernel. There is a difference between drivers and firmware. Very few hardware companies ever open their firmware, it's where their real ip is.
All true, but given that the original question was suggestions for a distro to run on a wireless 54g laptop it is rather relevant to the question as not all distros will play as nicely as each other on the hardware. I kinda guess my original post was a "try ubuntu" as it has good (the best?) hardware support, a huge range of software and a reasonable choice of Gnome or KDE as desktop (and given that the OP has a 54g laptop it shouldn't really be a problem on the hardware front) suitable for a newbie. Of course, I wouldn't want to suggest someone to start with LFS as it isn't the best way to get going (imho) ;) at least a default install of Ubuntu should get the machine working and give a feel of Linux desktop options. Thanks Adam -- jabberid = quinophex@jabber.earth.li AFFS || http://www.affs.org.uk/ || Not a filesystem
On Fri, Mar 10, 2006 at 11:48:36AM -0000, Stuart Fox wrote:
I hear what you are saying and dont want to be nit-picky but thats a distro issue again. Non-free/closed source drivers dont make it into the mainline kernel. There is a difference between drivers and firmware. Very few hardware companies ever open their firmware, it's where their real ip is.
All true, but given that the original question was suggestions for a distro to run on a wireless 54g laptop it is rather relevant to the question as not all distros will play as nicely as each other on the hardware. I kinda guess my original post was a "try ubuntu" as it has good (the best?) hardware support, a huge range of software and a reasonable choice of Gnome or KDE as desktop (and given that the OP has a 54g laptop it shouldn't really be a problem on the hardware front) suitable for a newbie. Of course, I wouldn't want to suggest someone to start with LFS as it isn't the best way to get going (imho) ;) at least a default install of Ubuntu should get the machine working and give a feel of Linux desktop options.
Thanks Adam -- jabberid = quinophex@jabber.earth.li AFFS || http://www.affs.org.uk/ || Not a filesystem
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Totally agree, LFS def is not a good way to start :) sometimes its a PITA even when you know what you're doing. It is, howver, extremely satisfying and I would recommend it as a learning experience further donw the road. Ubuntu is probably the best choice for a newbie at the moment. Much as I dont like the bloat of RH/Fedora systems, their install routine is excellent. Mind you, if there are no drivers for his particular 54g card then no distro is going to be ideal :) Cheers Stuart -- The problem with the world is stupidity. Not saying there should be a capital punishment for stupidity, but why don't we just take the safety labels off of everything and let the problem solve itself?
"Stuart Fox" <stuart@dontuse.ms>
[...] There is a difference between drivers and firmware. Very few hardware companies ever open their firmware, it's where their real ip is.
Isn't that difference just which processor it runs on? Doesn't really change the usefulness of the community auditing, fixing and improving the code ourselves. Best wishes, -- MJ Ray - personal email, see http://mjr.towers.org.uk/email.html Work: http://www.ttllp.co.uk/ irc.oftc.net/slef Jabber/SIP ask
Simon Royal wrote:
Hi
I have posted a few posting for opinions on some distributions of Linux and have still not come to any conclusions.
What is the best Linux out there in terms of user interface, compatibility with 3 party hardware and general range of software available.
I know more and more software developers and producing linux versions of their software but I want to run Linux on a laptop with wireless internet, any suggestions please.
I'll echo earlier comments that Linus, is Linux, is Linux aside from the bundling. For a beginner I still think SuSE is the best, but here we use Gentoo exclusively. I could never really get on with Debian, for all its plus-points. The latest release of Gentoo even has a graphical installer! Cheers, Laurie. -- -------------------------------------------------------------------- Laurie Brown laurie@brownowl.com --------------------------------------------------------------------
On Fri, 2006-03-10 at 10:32 +0000, Laurie Brown wrote:
I'll echo earlier comments that Linus, is Linux, is Linux aside from the bundling. For a beginner I still think SuSE is the best, but here we use Gentoo exclusively. I could never really get on with Debian, for all its plus-points. The latest release of Gentoo even has a graphical installer!
I've been trying out Gentoo 2006.0 since it came out, and it's working very well. I even tried the graphical installer on one of my mini-itx boxes. Using the (sill masked) Xorg 7.0 I've managed to do two things I never got working before: Hardware acceleration for openGL AND hardware decodeing of mpeg2 for DVD viewing. Playing DVDs takes about 5% CPU load (I did have to up the timer interrupt to 1000Hz to get xxmc to work though). So I would still say SuSE is best for linux newbies and experience users who want a box to USE (rather than tinker with).
Cheers, Laurie.
participants (7)
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Adam Bower -
Laurie Brown -
MJ Ray -
Peter Onion -
Simon Royal -
Stuart Fox -
Wayne Stallwood