olmweb.com— Ubuntu 7.04 (Feisty Fawn) arrived just a few days ago with promises of better hardware compatibility, included proprietary software and drivers, and more user friendliness. Was it worth the wait?
Apr 21, 2007View in Crawl 4
I'm in the exact same boat as you are. I just got it to something higher than "1024x768@61hz" by using a now infamous "screen not found" fix:sudo dpkg-reconfigure xserver-xorg -> rebootStill, I'm afraid of enabling the NVIDIA driver (or looking at Beryl) because I don't want to reinstall from scratch, again (not that savvy at the cp!).--------------------------For those of you who have not used a Debian-based 'package' program manager before - give it a shot! For XP users, imagine Add/Remove as your wish list instead of as a current catalog of locally installed software. As an XP user trying to stave off migrating to Vista, here's my take:I've found that online documentation for Feisty is excellent, and as long as you're not afraid of doing a little searching, the fixes are straightforward 'mouse click' or 'copy/paste.'For example - System -> Admin -> Synaptic (Add/Remove) -> search for VLC, install, open previously torrented (via Azureus) Daily Show episode. No codec! VLC finds the proper Xvid/Divx codec (actually a whole group of codecs!) and I'm off.Azureus, same thing in Synaptic, search, install - it grabs all the Java as co-deps, and you're running less than a minute. PeerGuardian is somewhat more complicated to get running, but installs faithfully via copy/paste.Flash player installs into Firefox very simply, Adblock, NoScript, ForecastFox Enhanced and others also function/install similarly to their XP counterparts. I've read about others discussing the ultimate demise of XP - Ubuntu is a more "modern" OS, there's no debate there. As casual user of Linux over the past decade or so, Feisty is polished enough to give is serious consideration if you're looking for something new/different. If you're timid, I'd say to hold off for a least a few weeks, and there may be a change to some initial configuration settings that allow everything to jive better right out of the box.
I think it's still buggy. Direct Rendering with my ATI card broke and apparently there's no fix at the moment (worked flawlessly in Edgy), and also my Creative Audigy 2ZS card wasn't being picked up by ALSA mixer. You have to install asoundconf-gtk and run it to force choosing your Creative Audigy 2ZS sound card as a workaround. There's been a bug report filed for both I believe.Feisty = Pain in the ass. Stick w/ Edgy for the next few months.
Oh and don't even get me started on trying to install Ubuntu Feisty on a RAID0 array. My motherboard's BIOS shows the array as being built, but when you use the alternate install CD to load RAID drivers, first off HDD partitioning f**king sucks (not intuitive at ALL for RAID arrays), secondly neither GRUB nor LILO will load onto a RAID0 parition and the installer doesn't tell you why. I later found out it's because they use direct disk access and require a RAID1 parition. However, when I told them to load on a RAID1 partition, the installer gave me no errors, but the PC still wouldn't boot because of a GRUB error. SO..... boot using GRUB from a floppy??? Ugh.
Also if you want all the graphics acceleration that the Nvidia or ATI drivers provide just enable the proprietary Nvidia driver.Click System >then> Administration >then> Restricted Drivers Manager and enable the graphics driver to get full graphics acceleration
++ for reading comprehension! I already said I tried to install OSX, and it installed no sweat. Unfortunately, my sound card and video card aren't supported, so I had to drop it(since I like looking at and listening to things). It was fun to try - but I'm not gonna use it. I had an XP install running an average of 20 hours a day for almost 3 years (I restarted here and there) and I eventually had to get rid of it because my hard drive went bad on me. Not the OS- hardware. I also use no virus protection, have a hardware firewall and run ad-aware about every 3 months, and I have little to no slowdown. XP takes about 30 minutes to install since you asked, and the three hours is with customizing the GUI the way I like it and all of the options. And holy f*ing lord, if it takes you 24 hours to get Windows running to how you like it, you are taking some serious naps whilst installing.
I'm not saying that Windows is great, but at least there's a graphical interface for pretty much everything in Windows. In linux there are instructions to "modprobe" this and that and edit .conf files and so on.BTW where can I find something similar to the windows device manager in Ubuntu?
We have 4 modern computers. The rest are systems like the coco and c64. Of those 4, 1 is a desktop running just xubuntu, 1 is a desktop multi booting freedos, xp, and ubuntu, is a lapto running ubunutu, and the last is a laptop dual booting ubuntu and vista. The vista machine is my wife's and she runs ubuntu 95% of the time. I think she only boots it now to update it. my 6 year old has the xubuntu machine and is quite happy with it. The linux only laptop is my wife's old one and ran xp before. The only issue with it is hibernating/suspend. But that didn't work in xp either. My desktop came with xp but I run ubuntu on it. I keep the xp install only because we have a gba linker that we can't get working in linux. Having said all of that, in my opinion if the freedom and functionality are considered, linux wins hands down. And for many things linux wins in the functionality part too. Plus, there are too many tasks that you can do for free in linux that have to be paid for in the windows world. How many times to we have to pay for the same old thing in windows? Yes, OSS is improving in the windows world, but it's still not there, yet. Linux is for servers and windows is for desktops = moron thinking.
I've been making the same exact point for years now. The average 'dumb user' couldn't install windows without issues either. Heck, we just bought a new laptop with a built in camera preinstalled with vista. Got it home and after an hour's worth of post pre installation ?! the camera still didn't work. Had to call support to get it working. The guy on the phone didn't know the problem. While I was on the phone with him I found the fix in a forum. Another example is I was out of town in a hotel that only had wireless with a wired desktop connection. I hapened to have a linksys wireless card in the car. It was my first time trying wireless in linux but figured if it didn't work, I could boot into the amazing hw recognition machine that is windows and find a forum that would help me get wireless working in linux. Turns out that windows didn't recognized the wireless card. I tried both linux and windows and neither recognized the card. I figured the issue in linux was I didn't know how to setup wireless in linux. I happened to have a ubuntu cd and guessed that maybe it would recognize my card and popped it in. Bingo! It recognized my card. I was able to find a site that told me how to install my card.So without linux I would have had to buy a new card or found someone do download the driver for me.
dilzApr 22, 2007
I'm in the exact same boat as you are. I just got it to something higher than "1024x768@61hz" by using a now infamous "screen not found" fix:sudo dpkg-reconfigure xserver-xorg -> rebootStill, I'm afraid of enabling the NVIDIA driver (or looking at Beryl) because I don't want to reinstall from scratch, again (not that savvy at the cp!).--------------------------For those of you who have not used a Debian-based 'package' program manager before - give it a shot! For XP users, imagine Add/Remove as your wish list instead of as a current catalog of locally installed software. As an XP user trying to stave off migrating to Vista, here's my take:I've found that online documentation for Feisty is excellent, and as long as you're not afraid of doing a little searching, the fixes are straightforward 'mouse click' or 'copy/paste.'For example - System -> Admin -> Synaptic (Add/Remove) -> search for VLC, install, open previously torrented (via Azureus) Daily Show episode. No codec! VLC finds the proper Xvid/Divx codec (actually a whole group of codecs!) and I'm off.Azureus, same thing in Synaptic, search, install - it grabs all the Java as co-deps, and you're running less than a minute. PeerGuardian is somewhat more complicated to get running, but installs faithfully via copy/paste.Flash player installs into Firefox very simply, Adblock, NoScript, ForecastFox Enhanced and others also function/install similarly to their XP counterparts. I've read about others discussing the ultimate demise of XP - Ubuntu is a more "modern" OS, there's no debate there. As casual user of Linux over the past decade or so, Feisty is polished enough to give is serious consideration if you're looking for something new/different. If you're timid, I'd say to hold off for a least a few weeks, and there may be a change to some initial configuration settings that allow everything to jive better right out of the box.
Closed AccountApr 22, 2007
I think it's still buggy. Direct Rendering with my ATI card broke and apparently there's no fix at the moment (worked flawlessly in Edgy), and also my Creative Audigy 2ZS card wasn't being picked up by ALSA mixer. You have to install asoundconf-gtk and run it to force choosing your Creative Audigy 2ZS sound card as a workaround. There's been a bug report filed for both I believe.Feisty = Pain in the ass. Stick w/ Edgy for the next few months.
Closed AccountApr 22, 2007
Oh and don't even get me started on trying to install Ubuntu Feisty on a RAID0 array. My motherboard's BIOS shows the array as being built, but when you use the alternate install CD to load RAID drivers, first off HDD partitioning f**king sucks (not intuitive at ALL for RAID arrays), secondly neither GRUB nor LILO will load onto a RAID0 parition and the installer doesn't tell you why. I later found out it's because they use direct disk access and require a RAID1 parition. However, when I told them to load on a RAID1 partition, the installer gave me no errors, but the PC still wouldn't boot because of a GRUB error. SO..... boot using GRUB from a floppy??? Ugh.
heiligeApr 22, 2007
Also if you want all the graphics acceleration that the Nvidia or ATI drivers provide just enable the proprietary Nvidia driver.Click System >then> Administration >then> Restricted Drivers Manager and enable the graphics driver to get full graphics acceleration
yokozarApr 22, 2007
Instead of messing around with hand-installing xine packages, you can get your DVDs working by following this official link: <a class="user" href="https://help.ubuntu.com/community/RestrictedFormats">https://help.ubuntu.com/community/RestrictedFormats</a>Things are much simpler in Feisty than in edgy.
themongoApr 23, 2007
++ for reading comprehension! I already said I tried to install OSX, and it installed no sweat. Unfortunately, my sound card and video card aren't supported, so I had to drop it(since I like looking at and listening to things). It was fun to try - but I'm not gonna use it. I had an XP install running an average of 20 hours a day for almost 3 years (I restarted here and there) and I eventually had to get rid of it because my hard drive went bad on me. Not the OS- hardware. I also use no virus protection, have a hardware firewall and run ad-aware about every 3 months, and I have little to no slowdown. XP takes about 30 minutes to install since you asked, and the three hours is with customizing the GUI the way I like it and all of the options. And holy f*ing lord, if it takes you 24 hours to get Windows running to how you like it, you are taking some serious naps whilst installing.
stealthtomatoApr 23, 2007
@aaronm67:I wasn't aware that Half-Life 2, Quake 4, and WoW were designed for Windows 95.
lautApr 23, 2007
I'm not saying that Windows is great, but at least there's a graphical interface for pretty much everything in Windows. In linux there are instructions to "modprobe" this and that and edit .conf files and so on.BTW where can I find something similar to the windows device manager in Ubuntu?
jayweeApr 24, 2007
but I really think 7.04 is better than 6.06,esp. the OS can support my wireless !
jasornSep 4, 2007
We have 4 modern computers. The rest are systems like the coco and c64. Of those 4, 1 is a desktop running just xubuntu, 1 is a desktop multi booting freedos, xp, and ubuntu, is a lapto running ubunutu, and the last is a laptop dual booting ubuntu and vista. The vista machine is my wife's and she runs ubuntu 95% of the time. I think she only boots it now to update it. my 6 year old has the xubuntu machine and is quite happy with it. The linux only laptop is my wife's old one and ran xp before. The only issue with it is hibernating/suspend. But that didn't work in xp either. My desktop came with xp but I run ubuntu on it. I keep the xp install only because we have a gba linker that we can't get working in linux. Having said all of that, in my opinion if the freedom and functionality are considered, linux wins hands down. And for many things linux wins in the functionality part too. Plus, there are too many tasks that you can do for free in linux that have to be paid for in the windows world. How many times to we have to pay for the same old thing in windows? Yes, OSS is improving in the windows world, but it's still not there, yet. Linux is for servers and windows is for desktops = moron thinking.
jasornSep 4, 2007
I've been making the same exact point for years now. The average 'dumb user' couldn't install windows without issues either. Heck, we just bought a new laptop with a built in camera preinstalled with vista. Got it home and after an hour's worth of post pre installation ?! the camera still didn't work. Had to call support to get it working. The guy on the phone didn't know the problem. While I was on the phone with him I found the fix in a forum. Another example is I was out of town in a hotel that only had wireless with a wired desktop connection. I hapened to have a linksys wireless card in the car. It was my first time trying wireless in linux but figured if it didn't work, I could boot into the amazing hw recognition machine that is windows and find a forum that would help me get wireless working in linux. Turns out that windows didn't recognized the wireless card. I tried both linux and windows and neither recognized the card. I figured the issue in linux was I didn't know how to setup wireless in linux. I happened to have a ubuntu cd and guessed that maybe it would recognize my card and popped it in. Bingo! It recognized my card. I was able to find a site that told me how to install my card.So without linux I would have had to buy a new card or found someone do download the driver for me.