Ubuntu Dapper (6.06) - great linux distro

[IEC]

Just installed it from live/install CD on my laptop - recognized everything (including the wireless!!) and the ease of use is many times better than some other distros I've used (such as Gentoo). I'm thinking Ubuntu really has a great future as a free desktop OS. It's also good that it forces you to enter in your password whenever the system is being changed (programs installed, settings changed, etc.) - great security practice IMO.

Why I think Ubuntu will make it in the desktop market:
-Easy to use
-Snappy - much faster than some other distros I've tried... Suse 10.1 was sloooow
-Good security (although not for ppl with tinfoil hats)
-Plenty of free software available
-User-friendly, lots of documentation
-FREE FREE FREE!! Want to build an HTPC? Computer for family? On a budget? Use linux!

For all those Windows fanboys complaining about how hard linux is to use/install/maintain, you should try the distro that "just works". :thumbsup:

 

[KPACOTKA]

I agree, I think it's the best Linux distro for ordinary users. The only problem it has can't run on old computers with 128MB RAM.

 

[InlineFive]

Originally posted by: KPACOTKA
I agree, I think it's the best Linux distro for ordinary users. The only problem it has can't run on old computers with 128MB RAM.

And just how many of those do you see anymore?

 

[postmortemIA]

Okay, i'll try that sucker now

I've been using suse and redhat for a while

 

[IamDavid]

Originally posted by: postmortemIA
Okay, i'll try that sucker now

I've been using suse and redhat for a while

You'll never go back.

 

[Noema]

Originally posted by: KPACOTKA
I agree, I think it's the best Linux distro for ordinary users. The only problem it has can't run on old computers with 128MB RAM.

That's what Xubuntu is for

It runs well on the P4 Williamete 128MB of RAM I'm posting from right now

 

[postmortemIA]

Originally posted by: IamDavid

Originally posted by: postmortemIA
Okay, i'll try that sucker now

I've been using suse and redhat for a while

You'll never go back.

Yeah- very simple and fassst. The update app updated outdated packages faster than Fedora would resolve dependencies.

I wish that there's support for dmraid, this thing would be insanely fast on RAIDed Raptor drives.

 

[Shawn]

Originally posted by: Noema

Originally posted by: KPACOTKA
I agree, I think it's the best Linux distro for ordinary users. The only problem it has can't run on old computers with 128MB RAM.

That's what Xubuntu is for

It runs well on the P4 Williamete 128MB of RAM I'm posting from right now

Why do you have a P4 with only 128MB of ram?

 

[Ayah]

:beer: Yah it is.

 

[IEC]

Even better now that I've installed XGL and Beryl - and I can choose the session before I login, allowing me to use plain old Gnome or XGL + Beryl at will. I love startup scripts

 

[drag]

For older computers try Xubuntu. XCFE is somewhat like Gnome, but it uses much less resources.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xubuntu

 

[Stattlich]

Originally posted by: ariafrostFor all those Windows fanboys complaining about how hard linux is to use/install/maintain, you should try the distro that "just works". :thumbsup:

Hrmmmm... ok, I will.

Seriously, I just downloaded and burned it to CD this evening. I haven't touched Linux since RH6 in 1999 and have been looking to get back into it and get refamiliarized. Always fun to have a Linux box to tinker around with. Thanks for the recommendation!

 

[Looney]

If you love dapper, you're going to love Edgy, ESPECIALLY if you're using a laptop.

 

[Noema]

Originally posted by: Shawn

Originally posted by: Noema

Originally posted by: KPACOTKA
I agree, I think it's the best Linux distro for ordinary users. The only problem it has can't run on old computers with 128MB RAM.

That's what Xubuntu is for

It runs well on the P4 Williamete 128MB of RAM I'm posting from right now

Why do you have a P4 with only 128MB of ram?

I'm at my parents'...the PC is not mine. It's ancient, circa 2000, one of the first P4s... 1.2GHz or something; basically a PIII on steroids. It uses some old obscure RDRAM, and it didn't like the 128MB dimm I got for it some time ago.

Xubuntu is quite snappy even with so little ram.

 

[drag]

I wish that there's support for dmraid, this thing would be insanely fast on RAIDed Raptor drives.

Linux software raid (MD, for multi-device) is faster then what you would get out of dmraid. Those onboard things are mostly worthless unless you have to dual boot with Windows.

See the Linux SATA raid FAQ for more information. This would be created by the folks that write the drivers for Linux and write the stuff for dmraid
http://linux-ata.org/faq-sata-raid.html

This page has most of the relevent information on Sata raid devices and what are hardware vs fakeraid.
http://linuxmafia.com/faq/Hardware/sata.html

Here is benchmarks of Linux software raid vs Real Hardware Raid. Other hardware raid devices are sometimes slower and sometimes faster depending on how high-end they are.
http://spamaps.org/raidtests.php

The major downside to Linux software raid isn't CPU usage usually (in the above benchmarks you'll see that there realy isn't much of a difference). The trouble with it is when your running a regular motherboard with a 32bit 66mhz PCI bus your very limited in I/O speeds. Probably around 133MB/s realisticly. So it's easy when you have about 5 harddrives or so in software raid that you'll run out of I/O bandwidth and as a result performance will suffer. This is why (well one of the reasons) people still use hardware raid.

As far as your onboard stuff like, say, NVRAID, it is realy software raid and is actually quite a bit worse then Linux MD raid for a veriety of reasons, many more then just speed.

The only real upside to things like Nvraid is that it allows you to run software raid that is compatable with Windows.

If you want to run Ubuntu on Fakeraid devices aka dmraid there is a nice howto on it here:
http://ubuntu-in.org/wiki/SATA_RAID_Howto

 

[kamper]

Originally posted by: ariafrost
It's also good that it forces you to enter in your password whenever the system is being changed (programs installed, settings changed, etc.) - great security practice IMO.

Name an operating system, other than windows, that doesn't do at least that in the default set up.

-Good security (although not for ppl with tinfoil hats)

Call me a tinfoil hat wearer, but I dislike it when an operating system puts my password in a world-readable log file (yeah, that's a bit of a cheap shot)

 

[postmortemIA]

Yeah, i have Windows (duh), and it only works with soft-RAID....while Linux only doesn't work with it.

Really your post is long, and helpful, and i know most of that, but answer is simple: they haven't included dmraid, but they could have done it easily.

 

[magomago]

Edge EFt is nearly here

 

[IEC]

Might have to give Edgy a try with sudo apt-get dist-upgrade when it comes out, thanks

 

[Nothinman]

It's also good that it forces you to enter in your password whenever the system is being changed (programs installed, settings changed, etc.) - great security practice IMO.

Not really, it doesn't change anything. All it'll end up doing is training users to enter their password whenever something asks for it, if they didn't read enough to avoid the viruses, phising links, etc before a new dialog isn't going to change anything.

 

[Pabster]

Threw up Edgy 6.10 RC under Parallels tonight. Pretty decent.

Not good enough for my desktop OS but a nice sandbox.

 

[drag]

Originally posted by: postmortemIA
Yeah, i have Windows (duh), and it only works with soft-RAID....while Linux only doesn't work with it.

Really your post is long, and helpful, and i know most of that, but answer is simple: they haven't included dmraid, but they could have done it easily.

It's more complicated then you think. You have to make a generic installer that works across a massive amount of hardware and if something goes wrong it can easily wipe out your Windows installation and some support for stuff is spotty. It's a big difference to set it up to work fine on your system, but it's quite another to try to set it up so it works on ALL systems. It's safer just to allow the end user to do it themeselves.

Especially since the only real reason is for Windows compatability and using it puts people's Windows information at risk then you can understand why supporting something like that They'll probably end up supporting it eventually though.

As for Fedora it makes sense because it's more of a developmental oriented desktop and Redhat programmers are mainly the ones that work on dmraid.

And why Gentoo has it is because they don'tt realy beleive much in the way of stability. It's speed and newest or bust. They probably figure that since something called 'nvraid' and (originally) only the 'high end' motherboards have it then it has to be much faster then something as pedestrian as 'software raid'. That sort of thing is normal for Gentoo.

 

[phisrow]

Originally posted by: Shawn

Originally posted by: Noema

Originally posted by: KPACOTKA
I agree, I think it's the best Linux distro for ordinary users. The only problem it has can't run on old computers with 128MB RAM.

That's what Xubuntu is for

It runs well on the P4 Williamete 128MB of RAM I'm posting from right now

Why do you have a P4 with only 128MB of ram?

He might be stuck with one of the early P4s that used RDRAM. That stuff was, and is, bloody expensive. Man, that was not a good time in Intel's history.

 

[kamper]

I have one of those. A 1.4Ghz Dell with, I think, the i850 chipset. It came with 128Mb which I lived with and even gamed a bit with for a surprisingly long time. Finally I caved and spend over $300 CDN for another 512. Ironically, it's now in my basement running openbsd as a webserver and using well under 128Mb

 

[Noema]

Originally posted by: phisrow

Originally posted by: Shawn

Originally posted by: Noema

Originally posted by: KPACOTKA
I agree, I think it's the best Linux distro for ordinary users. The only problem it has can't run on old computers with 128MB RAM.

That's what Xubuntu is for

It runs well on the P4 Williamete 128MB of RAM I'm posting from right now

Why do you have a P4 with only 128MB of ram?

He might be stuck with one of the early P4s that used RDRAM. That stuff was, and is, bloody expensive. Man, that was not a good time in Intel's history.

Yep, that's exactly the case