Whats in the works to compete with Vista?

[R3MF]

Well unfortunately, I work with computers, so I will have to have a copy of windows installed some place just so I can keep up with it. I'm not thrilled nor in any hurry to install it. I think a lot of people around here will be sticking with XP. I'm going to hold off for as long as I can.

agreed, i am a gamer, and love hardware tech, so i can keen to see what a Geforce 8800GTX and DX10 will bring, but until i need the above to play the latest AAA titles, i'll stick with XP and linux dual-booted.

[epsilon]

search in youtube.com for vmware fusion
http://www.youtube.com/results?search_q ... rch=Search

and see this video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xF_CoXsXtk4

its my prefered one, it shows how can windows xp with directx 8.1 be run on a mac os system.
Some day will be for linux, and some other day will support directx 9.
Windows xp will no longer be needed as OS, it will just be installed on a VM to install other programs, new driver for windows can be developed to maked windows programs under a VM comunicate with vmware to be drawn by linux native X. It could be not as fast as a native program for linux, but it will make things easier to intercomunicate linux programs with windows programs. (of course, this is just a dream, i dont know anybody working on this)

also note that vmware server is costfree. So, now, with a highend PC you can run most of programs which doesn't exist for linux, like Mathematica, MatLab, Protel, Proteus, Orcad, AutoCad, Corel, Macromedia, etc.

[raffraffraff]

I just installed Sabayon 3.3 in dual-boot configuration with XP. A few days previously, I had installed XP. Let me give you a comparison between the two.

XP:
Before I started installing XP onto this PC I had to do some preparation, as I don't have a floppy drive, and intended to install onto an Areca 1210 RAID controller. I used nlite to strip out the bits I didn't want, and to integrate every driver I could onto the CD, and make the install completely automatic. I also had to find my old PS/2 keyboard and mouse, since the flashy bluetooth desktop wouldn't work out of the box. The CD building & burning process took about 2 hours, from collecting drivers & software, to testing the image in VMWare and burining the final CD. The actual install took about 45 minutes, but it took another 2 hours to get the other bits and pieces installed.

Sabayon:
I put the Sabayon DVD into the drive and booted up. To my complete shock, EVERYTHING was detected; sound, graphics, fancy-pants bluetooth keyboard and mouse, and the Areca RAID controller. The installation took about 30 minutes and on bootup I didn't have to do anything! It all 'just works', and has almost every application you could need.

A note on Vista: I think it's a dud upgrade. I can't think of one reason to install it. I still find a properly tuned XP, with the useless crap ripped out and some good apps installed, works fine. Sabayon rocks. I'm still keeping both for the short term, but I finally believe I've found a Linux that will enable me to leave Windows behind.

[ould]

Might be lenghty. My first post here, I am new!

Like some others posting in this thread I too am a fairly recent convert from the world of windows. And I switched too due to Vista. I had decided to try installing it as I was due for a reformat anyways. I installed it on my main PC(I also have a HTPC in the basement, will get back to that in a moment). At first I was kinda impressed by the fancy graphics and such but quickly grew bored with them and also how slow the whole system would run(on a P4 2.53ghz w/ 1 gig ram and ATI 9700 so not too bad a system). I began noticing alot of programs running like utter crap, Media Player and iTunes seemed to conflict and the tags were overwriting each other making my large music collection into a convoluted mess. I was really getting fed up with the Windows world and had always wanted to run Linux but hadn't really looked into it for quite a few years.

So I went ahead and started researching a bit, came across some youtube videos of Compiz and thought even though not that useful that they were pretty neat. I began seeing alot about Ubuntu so decided to give it a whirl. I ran the LiveCD and let it boot up, everything seemed to work more or less so I decided to install it as a dual boot system(with Vista). Once I got everything setup I began learning all I could about Linux and the command line(brought me back to my old DOS days), loving the command line, use it quite a bit even though I don't need to. I haven't even looked back at Windows and only booted into it if I needed something that I couldn't run in Linux which was only one thing(a Satellite program). But I only needed that once or twice. So basically I have been windows free on my main PC for a few months now and am loving every minute of it. I am still on Ubuntu at home at the moment. I used this setup just to see what I like and don't like and have installed and removed lots of packages. Went from gnome to kde and prefer KDE. My system is in a bit of a shamble from going back and forth and such so I began to look for a new distro for my fresh install. I wanted something Gentoo based but without the really lengthy install and this brought me here!! I have downloaded and burned both the Full DVD 3.3 as well as the MiniCD 3.3. I played around with them at work on my Laptop and have settled on the Mini version for my desktop at home. Planning to install at some point this weekend hopefully if all goes well.

I mentioned I have a HTPC as well. Well that too was running Windows albeit XP. I have an ATSC(OTA HD) and a DVB-S(Satellite) installed in the system along with an nVidia card, it's an AMD based system. I was using a combination of SageTV and MyTheatre(both costing $$$$$). Well it worked fairly well I had quite a few BSOD's and hard lock situations which pissed of the girlfriend to no end. It doesn't bother me so much but really aggravated her. My initial plan with this system was to be a MythTV based system and I originally tried that route but having never run Linux I was in over my head so I settled for the windows based setup. Fast forward 1 year and I had been running Ubuntu on my desktop for a month or so and felt pretty comfortable with Linux now so I took another shot at installing it on my HTPC with MythTV. I ran into a few problems along the way but got some help by searching forums and such and managed to get it all setup and working and it has been running beautifully for about a month and a half or so now. I am very happy with the setup and the girlfriend loves it too, especally the autoskipping of commercials when watching recordings.

So basically I am windows free now for the most part and am on the verge of installing Sabayon on my main rig. I will be leaving Ubuntu on the HTPC as it is working beautifully and is a very minimal install(I used the alternate install disk and installed everything I needed by hand from the termial) with OpenBox as the window manager and this is a dedicated HTPC with nothing else running. I may switch it to Gentoo somewhere down the line but for now it is working well and I will leave it be. I do still have a windows install on both machines but never need to boot into them and contemplate just removing them altogether.

My conclusion Vista sux!!

Kevin

[tekwyzrd]

I fear for the future of Open Source as well. Lawsuits will start to fly and all those wonderful "free" distro's we all have come to love so much, might not remain free for much longer as the temptation of the almighty $$ starts to gnaw away at those who stand to gain from selling service for them... Perhaps things are best left as they remain.

Novell/SuSE is a prime example. They're basically using the free version as a test for updates to their enterprise version. I'm running 10.1 on my dual P3, and the computer locks up once a day for no apparent reason. The more updates I install, the worse it gets. The fora are no help. I've asked about problems I've encountered and watched for months with no answers or solutions offered. My opinion is they use the free version (openSUSE) as bait and try to leverage people into buying their enterprise version (SLED) and paying the yearly fee for support including a more complete update scheme.

I'm still unable to get anything after sabayon v3.1 to run on this computer so I'll probably give Mandriva a try next week.

[davbeck]

in my opinion, gaming is not all that important.

if we fix the other problems the gaming problem will be resolved by its popularity

what really is important is the lack things just working
I personally can't suggest linux to anyone besides super programmers because you have to really try to make linux work (especially sabayon).
the majority of the population (even those who are considered computer literate) will give up and go back to what they know as soon as it takes more than half an hour to get their wireless working.

things also need to be self explanatory. the average user won't read a thing to use a computer.

as far as the software support, this is not a HUGE deal. default linux programs (firefox, openoffice, gimp, amorak) are close enough to the windows counterparts. the only thing major that is missing is quikbooks. software support is already getting cleared up. I was amazed a few months ago to find that there was an AIM for Linux, and that kind of thing is getting more common, and like the gaming issue, will be cleared up if linux ever becomes popular.

I installed sabayon yesterday. this experience has really made it obvious how hard it would be for a non computer genius to get it working.
I am very disappointed in this particular distro. it has a lot of potential for attracting people, but it is wasted due to nothing working, and the lack of dummy graphic tools. I know that it is still new but we need to take a que from ubuntu and include some of its tools.[/i]

[Darksurf]

??? What do you mean "is wasted due to nothing working, and the lack of dummy graphic tools?" and "it takes more than half an hour to get their wireless working" ???? and Ubuntu... yuck, don't even start with the stupid Ubuntu crap. You may prefer Ubuntu, but this isn't Ubuntu. Why compare sabayon to ubuntu?? totally different leagues. Ubuntu gets more like winblows all the time with their updater. We have Live help. We could help get a wirless card working in less than half an hour.... I'm not even a programmer and I use linux. I have friends who are completely computer illiterate who are using sabayon and learning just fine. They actually prefer it over using the new vista. There is no reason to "dumb things down". If people want to take the effort to move to sabayon, they'll take a small amount of effort to learn a little linux or go back to windows. It's linux, not windows... not everything is GUI, slow, and unreliable half the time. We don't want to be another windows, or have automatic updaters, and what exactly does Sabayon lack at 3.4 gigs an iso??? It has portage, if you want it, you can emerge it. Its easy to use. Much easier than using slackware. I went from windows to slackware and didn't know a thing about linux or computers all that much. I learned quite a bit of linux thanx to slackware and I got mad, but I was just as mad with windows as Slackware. Sabayon does work. I don't know how you get "nothing working". It boots up on computers that wont even boot up winXP. And what do you mean by dummy graphic tools??

[davbeck]

first of all, I do not like ubuntu. I was making the point that we need to include some easy gui tools for some less computer literate people. so that they don't need an advanced user sitting over them to help them out every five minutes. I am not implying to dumb down sabayon, that is ubuntus bigest mistake. we need to include both easy and advanced tools.

[wolfden]

the average user won't read a thing to use a computer.

and this is why people struggle and fail, it would be one thing if there was no documentation, but the documentation is plenty. I am amazed at how people can't effectively search, they come to a help room and you can tell them exactly what to search for and they get mad cause they want a link. There is only so much one can do for someone.

[Darksurf]

I agree completely wolfden. Now the latest post from davbeck sounds more accurate. I do believe it would be nice to have more advanced tools, but I think we'd need a manager of some sort. The more tools we have to clog up the menu, the more it becomes a problem to find them and use them properly. Now I'm not saying we NEED more tools, I'm saying it would be nice for a newer user of linux. But keep in mind if we get more, we'll need a sabayon configuration manager or something.... I do think that people should read documentation though. You don't get through school without reading a single book, so how else do you expect to learn?? Without reading and practicing there is no learning.