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? And more importantly - Is it finally time to “Make the Switch”? Read my review of Ubuntu 7.04 to find out!
Each time there’s a new version of the Linux distribution Ubuntu I ask myself - is THIS the version which will make we want to switch. With both Dapper and Edgy the answer was clear to me: Yes, Ubuntu is great but NO - it’s not yet complete. Edgy, the previous version of Ubuntu (6.10) was in fact so broken I couldn’t even install it on my mainstream Fujitsu-Siemens laptop. Like… at all! The installer wouldn’t even run. Dapper (the older version) worked better, but support for graphics card, wireless LAN, Flash and even simple video and sound playback was horrific. I got some of the components to work after some serious fiddling around but it was very agonizing.
When I read that hardware and 3rd party proprietary software support would be in focus for version 7.04 (Feisty Fawn) I thought that maybe this could finally be it. Stuff like flashplayer for example, is proprietary software and is often greeted with great suspicion from the open source community. The Ubuntu team has, however, finally understood that allowing proprietary software ‘in’, like flash and ATI graphics driver, is a crucial part of making the Ubuntu solution tempting enough to make people want to “make the switch”.
Shitey new Boots
Well Feisty is now finally here, and I tried it out. First off I had (and still have) some issues with dualbooting Vista and Feisty. I can only blame myself however - since I didn’t follow the instruction book. The result was that Vista cannot boot anymore. I can however access files stored on the Vista partition - so all hope is not lost. If one were to do it the right way and follow the instructions one would not have problems with this. Ubuntu (and Vista) is designed to be able to dualboot with other OS:es. So no one should think that dualbooting is impossible, or even difficult with Ubuntu and Vista because it isn’t - It’s in fact very easy if you just follow the instructions.
EDIT: Many have made their concerns heard based on the paragraph above. I do want to stress, one more time, that dualbooting Ubuntu and Vista is NOT an issue if you install Ubuntu according to the instructions (which can be found by googling the topic or visiting Ubuntu’s forum.)
Hardware issues almost resolved
The WLAN was a bit of a problem at first. My WLAN adapter (a Broadcom 43XX series) was recognized by Ubuntu right away but wouldn’t initialize properly and thus it wouldn’t find any networks to connect to. This was easily fixed by downloading a small app using the phenomenal repository system Synaptics (bcm43xx-fwcutter). Once I did that WLAN was up and running and I think it works even better than in Vista. The signal is strong and, more importantly, continuously strong. In vista I have some serious problems with the connection speed constantly dropping to zero for a moment before rising again - which makes for a very unsmooth internet usage.
Next issue was the graphics card. I have an ATI Mobility X700 and Ubuntu is supposed to install drivers automatically for it. It didn’t and I had to use a piece of software called Envy which made it work by pressing a few buttons. It also works for nVidia cards and is a great tool!
Sound and Video support is also improved. Although Ubuntu is supposed to be able to find codecs for movies automatically, it didn’t really seem to work for my Futurama or Battlestar Galactica episodes. But a quick search for VLC using Synaptics set things straight. No issues whatsoever with video quality (like there was in both previos versions of Ubuntu) nor with sound. The sound worked out of the box with no problem at all.
EDIT: I gave the built in system for searching codecs another go, and although it didn’t find all codecs straight away, it eventually did and everything worked fine. Still, I like VLC better since it eliminates ALL codec issues.
Flash - savior of the universe!
Ubuntu has always been known for it’s great software bundles. They are plentiful and useful. And thanks to Synaptics it’s easier to get much much more of them. Ubuntu now comes with Firefox 2.0 (unlike previous versions of Ubuntu) which is great. What’s even greater is that installing Flash is as easy as it could ever be! It’s done using Firefox’ own plugin installation wizard! I know it’s simple and stupid to put so much weight on this but I think it’s a testimony to how much better Ubuntu really has become! I was able to do my daily YouTubing in a matter of seconds! Wonderful, wonderful stuff!
Ubuntu also comes with the entire OpenOffice2 suit as well as preinstalled with GIMP. Neither admittedly as good as their Windows counterparts MS Office and Photoshop but on the other hand not bad at all. Maybe using GIMP just takes some time getting used to. There are also plugins that make GIMP look more like Photoshop so that old farts like myself will have an easier time using it. By the way - the Ubuntu-logo on the top of this page was manipulated using GIMP 
Do it - do it now!
So is it time to make the switch? Well, taking into account that Vista doesn’t boot anymore - I don’t really seem to have a choice. Not at the moment at least, since my Vista DVD is at my other apartment which I wont be going to until next week. Until them I’m stuck with Ubuntu and you know what? It doesn’t feel half bad. In fact it feels kinda good. I’m using my laptop and doing all the stuff I’d normally do in Windows - for free! It’s amazing actually! There’s nothing I’d have in Windows that I miss right now. Ok, Photoshop and InDesign are issues, but I can use those apps on my desktop if I need to.
With the great advancements that’s been made in the user friendliness in Ubuntu 7.04 - I believe I’m finally, after all these years, to at least make a partial switch to Linux. I don’t think I’ll install Vista on this laptop ever again. My hat is off to the Ubuntu team! Switch now and never regret it 
So say we all!
EDIT: To all you who thought this review sucked hard: You are probably right! This was more a testimony of my trials and tribulations with Ubuntu than a full blooded review.
Thanks for the nice review
Where I can find the instructions for dual boot Vista & Ubuntu 7.04 (Feisty Fawn)?
Maybe by going into the safe mode and then reboot again would make
your Vista alive again.
To go to the safe mode, just press F8(if i’m not mistaken) during
the bios booting.
Hope that will help.
Cheers !
@sushil sharma
Check out the dual-boot guide here: http://apcmag.com/node/5162/
Thanks for the review. My experience was better than yours on an old Abit UL8 motherboard! I don’t upgrade as much anymore. Even got my Minolta 2400W up and running in blazing color.
Just installed beryl this evening. Useing the proprietary ATI driver (R350) on a Radeon 9800 and everything is working wonderfully. I love it.
My only complaint - ongoing too - font rendering in OpenOffice. I have the freetype hacks applied that give Gnome fonts the quality of cleartype but OO.o is just hideous. There are patent issues I guess.
Bob
Check out the package
ubuntu-restricted-extras
for flash, java and some fonts.
I am a bit scared reading that dual boot with Vista is an issue.
I ‘ve already installed Ubuntu 7.04 on my Desktop computer( Windows XP Pro SP2 Windows Vista Premium, and then Ubuntu 7.04 ) I had no issue at all for triple booting
- I confirm that the hardware sup. is better in 7.04. Ralink wireless
( but it was in earlier versions too ).
just works out of the box
Install Window Xp first, then Vista, and then Ubuntu at the end.
What I am really pleased with Ubuntu 7.04 is its responsiveness ( fast ), Desktop Effects with Compiz by default( installed ) with NVidia works faster than Beryl for me - I dunno why - and finally since I love Gnome more than KDE for the WM, I still need KDE stuff such as KDevelop and Quanta. So the KDE repository is updated with KDE 3.5.6 and KDevelop 3.4.0.
I can’t be more happy !
I am waiting for the Vista premium free upgrade from Toshiba for my laptop and that is where I am scared of the issue…
Happy coding
If the purpose is to say ‘try it’, then try feisty. I did, and have lots of problems with my hp pavilion dv6000 to set everything up (and I am not the only one, see the forums).
I take another machine (vaio vgn-t2xp), and after spending 2 days in order to set it up, I am always fighting with sound and wlan.
In my opinion, ubuntu takes me more time from each version to each version to be set up, which I don’t fine very encouraging as an introduction to linux. Moreover, feisty doesn’t seem as polished as dapper was, as if they were in too much hurry to bring feisty on the servers.
Finally, when you say
“The Ubuntu team has, however, finally understood that allowing proprietary software ‘in’, like flash and ATI graphics driver, is a crucial part of making people want to “make the switch””
it sounds to me like a bit optimistic. I would agree with you, but look at the experience of ATI users with feisty, and you would see that they also encounter important problems to set up their ati.
Does feisty worth the switch? Surely not now, maybe in a month or two.
sil
Great review. I agree that switching from Windows to Ubuntu might not be the time with this version. However, if someone is willing to give it a go, there are great helpers on tap in the www.ubuntuforums.org who can answer questions and help to solve the little niggardly little bits. I gave it a go and got help from the forums and now it feels like Ubuntu has always been my home. I even forget that I am in Ubuntu when surfing the net and blogging.
Maybe i would agree with this.
But i’ve tried 7.04 version also. It seems to be a bug related to some x1K ATi cards, that won’t allow you to successfully boot the LiveCD.
You can say many thing about Windows, and i will probably agree, but to let a major release with thins kind of bug (many Dell laptops use x1K cards) kinda puts things in perspective for me.
So i think i will skip Linux, and just stay with my XP.
… maybe in another year or so ….
What about the scanner issue?
No one seems to be aware of that:
A lot of common scanners don’t work and it seems it is not even considered a priority.
https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/sane-backends/
I’m triple booting Vista/XP and Ubuntu, didn’t have _ANY_ issues at setting this up.
Feisty found my Vista partition, even asked me to import settings (thou the settings importer didn’t work for me) and after installation I was able to select Grub to boot to Ubuntu or Vista/Longhorn bootloader.
I love how everyone’s favorite os reviews only focus on how many drivers, bundled apps, and useless retarded crap comes with the default install.
You might want to try booting a virtual windows partition from within ubuntu, by using for example qemu or vmware. Also, the people above who complained about Ati driver support, that’s ATI’s responsibility! Their drivers are notoriously unpolished, but I was actually able to run Beryl/Compiz with my X300 mobility (or something). So don’t whine too much, the drivers work fine if you put some elbow grease and a lot of teh google in it, ATI just sucks for releasing them in a crappy proprietary way.
Good article, gonna upgrade.
Maybe try this one: EasyBCD from NeoSmart
…tweaking the new Windows Vista bootloader..Automated MBR and BCD backups, boot sector restore… etc etc etc.
http://neosmart.net/dl.php?id=1
7.04 is nice, but still no match for Windoze.Mabe next LTS release, or openSUSE 10.3, but only maybe…
Still my Agree systems winmodem on my Acer TravelMate 2480 doesn’t work
Why must hardware manufacturers insist on supporting hardware vendors that only work with Microsoft? Oh well, for now, if I don’t have wireless or ethernet to access the internet I’m rebooting to dial up from Vista.
Apart from that, its a much better OS than Vista. Especially with Beryl installed if you like eye candy.
I don’t think it is time to swith until OEM hardware manufacturers will support linux (of any flavour) on their machines.
I think a smart person should be able to install the OS, without any particular IT knowledge. Without the resources of the internet and prior experiance installing linux I couldn’t have installed it.
Problems on my Notebook computer:
Still unresolved: Cannot get my Agree Systems winmodem to work
Resolved: needed ndiswrapper and fw-cutter to get wireless (Broadcom) working
Resolved: needed 915resolution to get the 1280 * 800 resolution
Problems on my Desktop computer:
DVB tuner driver front end not automatically installed in 2.6.20-x kernel in use on Ubuntu 7.04, had to modprobe cx_88 to get it to work. This was working on the 2.6.17-x kernel in Ubuntu 6.10!
Please OEM manufacturers, support linux, not because its free but because its better! Next time I buy a laptop I take my dollars to a manufacturer providing linux support.
Using VMWare you can boot virtual windows partitions from ubuntu and run all windows specific programs in their native platform. Who needs a windows partition then.
I had XP on my machine and installed Feisty Fawn a few days ago on my Fujitsu Siemens (Centrino Duo) Laptop. I must say I was really amazed by its ease of use.
Martin Varsavsky (http://english.martinvarsavsky.net/) made a post on how easy was for him to install ubuntu on his system (before feisty was released) and I decided to try it up. 6.04 didnt’t work very well for me since it didn’t detect my drivers and so on… But I saw that Feisty was going to be released and decided to give it a try.
Installing Feisty on my PC was really easy. As easy as: burn the .iso image, boot it as it works as a Live CD and go to a desktop icon called “install”. Every time I boot my computer it asks me to choose the operating system. It let me choose how much space I wanted to put into ubuntu partition and where did I wanted to take the space from… Great!
It detected my wireless card instantly! Its even easier than using the automatic driver installation CD that came with my Amilo Pi!!
Connection was also easier… Just chose a connection from the drop down list, put a password and it recorded it automatically!!
Graphically I didn’t like it so much at first but it is so easy to change the color scheme! It does so automatically, without the screen going gray and waiting 15 seconds!
I also installed Automatix2 (http://getautomatix.com/) which is an ap that lets you automatically many others including all propietary drivers required in one click! (I installed this one after reading Michael Dell was using it)
Anyway… This is getting too long! Conclussion: If you were planning to try out ubuntu, this is your moment!!
I was a linux user from 97 to 99 (till windows 2000) came out.
I regret to say it but:
linux users still go for the ‘almost’, and ‘thats good enough’.
Well wakeup, you only live once, theres no time for being in the middle. Use the best things that you CAN in order to be more productive. Go OSX, go Vista.
And with photoshop CS3 in the horizon, the Gimp never EVER looked that stupid.
very stupid review
Buggy buggy buggy buggy loads of keyboard and mouse issues
The only thing keeping my current computer running Windows (XP, not ‘WinME with DRM’ Vista) is the significant library of PC games I’ve built up, none of which will work with Cedega, Wine, or any other workarounds for Linux’s lack of game support. Before people start shouting ‘dual boot’ at me, yes I tried it and no I won’t be doing it permanently because it was a pain in the ass.
PC gaming is dieing though - even PC stalwarts like C&C are getting multiplatform ports, so the next PC I get will be for non-gaming purposes, and I will not hesitate to use Ubuntu.
One word: Wine
“It’s” = “it is”
“Its” = possessive
When the hell are people going to learn to spell properly? It did finally dawn on me what fenomnal meant.
How the fuck am I supposed to take you seriously?
LEARN TO SPELL.
So say we all!
@Dave:
How is your Finnish spelling?
Give him a break man, he is from Finland…
Great article!
Sounds good. I only had 1 issue when I installed 7.04, and that was with my Intel 945GM integrated graphics card. While it detected, I couldnt change the resolution on it. Luckily, Synaptic came up with a program called 915resolution which fixed it automagically.
As far as your woes of leave your Adobe products behind, may I suggest trying to run them in Wine? Or maybe go get VMWare Server (freely downloadable from their site), and set up a good ol’ WinXP VM to run them from. This works good for me when running MS Visual Studio .Net for my windows programming.
Anyway, enjoy!
I made the switch in Edgy and i started with a few issues but after getting used to the repositories I soon corrected them. I upgraded to 7.04 the other day and havn’t looked back. In fact the only reason I run Windows on my desktop and Ubuntu on my laptop is because the rest of my family doesn’t believe it’s as good. Nice article though. I still think Ubuntu has a couple more steps untill it really is time to switch for mainstream users.
You suck at reviews. Your review sucked. You are an illiterate idiot as well.
phenomenal is a word.
fenomenal is not a word.
NOT REALLY,I mean”fenomenal”(sp).
The reviewer is no more competent to review than 7.04 ubuntu is ready for 64 bit boxes.
I have tried many 64 bit distros and SABAYON is the only polished,STABLE,64 bit distro.
Except I have been using 64bit Ubuntu for a year and have yet to find a problem, and for every user who is running a oem install of windows *cough* 99% of you buy a xp/vista cd from the store and install it and then install Ubuntu see what ones harder to configure…, and god damn learn to read it was a nice review.
Thanks a lot for your comments people. It’s all greatly appreciated. For those thinking it was a crappy review: maybe you’re right
I’ve never reviewed much in my life, and never an OS. It was mainly a piece written about my own experience with ubuntu. As my as my spelling and language goes - humor me! English is not my mother tongue. I’m a Swedish speaking Finn 
Thanks to you all! I’ve had over 15 000 hits in one night because of this article and the server tells me the traffic is waaay to high
Ubuntu brings good karma!
Bob,
Could you be more specific about the font problem in Open Office under Linux (and Windows)- the reason for it and also the cure.
Thanks,
Paw42
I had the same problem with my Vista install, it is a very simple fix, all you do is run ntfsfix off of Linux, and it sets everything straight.
You MUST MUST MUST use Vista’s Shrink Partition tool to shrink your Vista partition. Once you use that to make room for Ubuntu (or any other OS) you will not have any problems. Microsoft changed NTFS with Vista, so all of the open source partitioning tools out there are broken for now.
Man, you’re lame… You are judging this (free) distribution from only 1 point of view - your laptop. I was using Ubuntu Edgy and few days ago easily upgraded to Feisty Fawn with no problems. Even my Nvidia card was detected immediatelly in both distros. Especially in Feisty it worked without any additional software installation. Same goes to every other piece of hardware.
Even with Vista or OSX are issues, when some hardware isn’t detected properly or some driver is missing.
In Ubuntu everything is simply done with GUI tools it provides. I wish you try installing some older distributions of Slackware Linux by example. Or Gentoo. Practically no GUI at all. Everything is done through console - now that’s the real pain in ass!
I am in the same boat, several times attempted to make the switch, but never could due to issues with hardware.. Now though, maybe its going to be different.
Ubuntu installed just grand on my M90, its fast and seems stable..
Wonderful job Ubuntu community.. shame that there are some spelling nazi`s spoiling this blog, oh well who cares as long as you can get the message across!
In case you were wondering why proprietary drivers “were not installed although they were supposed to.” Ubuntu Feisty has a neat tool known as the Restricted Driver Manager. Proprietary drivers in Feisty are not used by default, but are easy to activate. The Restricted Drivers Manager can be accessed in Ubuntu 7.04 Feisty Fawn by going through the administration area. If for some reason it is not installed (like you are using Kubuntu not Ubuntu), then you can install the package restricted-manager through Synaptic, apt-get, Adept, etc.
See: http://www.michaellarabel.com/index.php?k=blog&i=114
As a second note, Ubuntu Feisty has a Migrant Assistant. It makes it easier to move your documents and settings over to Ubuntu from other operating systems. Among the areas being worked on for the migration-assistant is transporting instant messenger settings, bookmarks, address books, user accounts, e-mail messages, fonts, desktop backgrounds, and even Internet connection settings.
See: http://www.michaellarabel.com/index.php?k=blog&i=83
Y A W N
I’ve been a windows user/power user/installer for 20+ years. I’ve had MORE than my fair share of serious problems with the operating system during that time. I worked for one company building them and installing windows. Another working with software on windows platforms and helping users with their problems.
Last week, I put together a bunch of old parts I had lying around and installed the beta of 7.04 Feisty. The only problems I had were the ones I made for myself. For example, when I copied over my Thunderbird folders from XP to Ubuntu, I copied all the extensions, too. Linux DOES NOT like some of those extensions!
Then I waited until Distro day to install on my Dell Inspirion 6400 laptop. I had couple problems there. One was with the ATi graphics card. But a look at the Ubuntu Forums told me exactly what I needed to do to get around this problem. http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=414194
After that, it automatically detected my wireless card (I have the Intel 3945abg card) on my machine and I was good to go. It dual boots with windows XP, although I haven’t been in XP but once since I installed Ubuntu on it.
Let me say this about my experiences with those installs. While I have had easier installs on SOME windows boxes than the second install I had, it is EXTREMELY rare when I have an install as easy and pain free as my first install was.
I have had true terror projects with some hardware configurations. Back before the internet was as used as it is now, I recall arguing with hardware vendors about their driver support and how they REALLY needed to work on getting it to work in windows!!! Some times the case would be where we would just change that particular piece of hardware to another vendor and all the problems would go away. This was on WINDOWS. Not some lesser known operating system.
Driver install on windows? If you were a clueless desktop user and tried to do it, used to be you messed up your system. I’ve never had an easier time than with Linux.
I’ve been using Linux now for all of a week I have my systems set up on my network and am good to go in most respects. Still looking for more software, as I have time to do so. For the most part, I actually like the Linux counterparts in the software area BETTER than what I was using in windows. Not in all cases, but in most.
Not to totally undermine my experiences with computers, but that 20+ years of experience means squat when using Linux. When I was first told to use the Terminal to do a couple tasks, I was like, huh? You want me to type in commands that I have no clue about at all? I was told all I had to do was copy and past a couple things I was presented with. Pretty easy as it turned out, and I’m figuring out what all of it is now as I do it. Just to ease your sense of trepidation, you may not have to use the terminal at all, and once your system is set up, you may not have to ever do so ever again.
Anyway, I appreciate this particular ‘review’ because it shows what a normal person goes through getting this operating system up on a particular system. As noted, it’s far from impossible.
Can I say the same thing about windows? If windows WERE so easy to set up, I would NOT have a job right now. Some people just can’t figure out how to get out of 800×600 mode with their new install, or they can’t get their network going, or their sound won’t work. (Sometimes that’s nothing to do with the operating system, but merely the wires are plugged in wrong.)
Doesn’t matter what operating system it is. Until it does everything by itself, with NO USER INPUT at all!, there will be problems with installs. And then, and only then, will I be out of a job.
I have a Lenovo(IBM) Think Pad, T60p, and when I try to install the DVD version the X server fails.
What should I do as a newbie?
It was the same with me on that one computer. It wouldn’t even install, giving me a blank screen during installation.
He had trouble with dual-booting Vista and the new Ubuntu (7.04). I had the same problem. Vista uses a different type of bootloader, not compatable with the current Linux. Maybe for that reason? I wouldn’t put it past Microsoft.
With the computer I installed Ubuntu on, I used an older, smaller, harddrive, putting it on as a slave drive. when I’m booting, on my computer holding down the “Escape” key will bring up a screen asking which physical drive I wish to boot with. I simply choose the slave drive and it goes right to the Linux. If both are on the same drive, I have no idea how to do it. Well, I can guess at a couple of ways, though not that easy.
And,as most of you no doubt know, always make certain you have at least one win32 partition. Linux won’t write on a NTFS drive, now Windows recognize an ext3 one from Linux. To share files, you need that old win32.
Oscar Rat, the famous rodent writer.
@Joshua
Be aware if you use winblows in vmware you will see a big performance decrease… that is my experience anyways.
Runs too slow in vmware
maybe the the new dual cores help with that??
@silverglade00 - I should have done my homework
@cirks - Maybe I am lame. But that’s beside the point. The point with my article was that now - after all this time Ubuntu has finally become a suitable option FOR ME. Maybe it’s worked for thousands of users before for years but not for me. I only have my own experience with linux to share. I’m sitting on a Vista machine right now and it feels… well, not worth spending 500 bucks on!
@G - Very good comment there!
@Everyone else - Thanks a lot for your comments once again. I apologize for my hosts inability to cope with the traffic this website currently has!
I liked your review but as I saw in my Ubuntu experience is that you don’t need any special packages to install the nVidia or ATI drivers. Just enable “Desktop Effects” from System Tools and Ubuntu will automatically install the driver if needed.
It seems that there are alot of ignorant F@#$tards, your comparing a free OS compared to one where billions of dollars have been spent over five years, we spent less to put neil armstrong on the moon for god’s sake.
Your comparing an OS that has less than half the security, with 100% more DRM.
WAKE UP PEOPLE !!!!!
stop S@#$king Microshafts P3ni5! If you don’t like it don’t use it, or check the documents and faqs out BEFORE you install!
I upgraded to Feisty last weekend without too many problems. Very nice and runs great. The main problem I had was my Nvidia card, but that was due to my errors, not software/hardware.
For your vista problems, you could use VMware player. I haven’t tried it yet, but it’s supposed to let you use an already installed OS. currently I’m using VMware server for XP Pro and Vista, under kubuntu. No performance drop that I can see or feel.
For all of you who are looking for a way to Dual/MultiBoot diffent windows with ubuntu down below there is a link which could be helpful, if you digg more you could find that there are other links to make different dualboots
http://apcmag.com/5046/how_to_dual_boot_vista_with_linux_vista_installed_first
Enjoy Ubuntu is wonderful
Had the same problem as you regarding my windows install not working after installing kubuntu. I fixed mine without a Windows CD by editing my boot.ini file on the Windows partition to point to where the windows installation was located. problem was after installing kubuntu my drive letter for XP changed..
After using Linux as the sole OS on all our family’s six computers for the last five years I’ve just done my first ever OS ‘upgrade’—usually I install the new version from scratch, but it was worth the risk. 6.10 to 7.04 went flawlessly on my Latitude C600—well done the Ubuntu team. Haven’t done the rest yet though!
As far as I am concerned Linux has been a completely viable alternative to Windows for a while; but it’s definitely horse for courses—doesn’t suit everyone so use what does.
Some people have mentioned the install/live CD for Ubuntu (and other distros) not booting. Apparently one solution which can often help is to add some ‘padding’ to the the start of the CD when you burn it. If you’re using CDRecord in Linux try -pad padsize=63s you can set the padsize in some GUI apps too, like K3B. I think this is a solution that really applies to people who are trying to boot on a system where Linux is already installed.
Thans for the ‘review’—good to learn of someone else’s experience and thoughts.
Cheers, adair.
Some interesting comments, the usual group of Windows haters, and Command line lovers..
Personally speaking, i’ve been using a Linux PC for about 5 years now, tried all the main distros, and I lik Ubuntu, however I don’t know if its just me, but each version of Ubuntu, seems to promise more, and deliver less. I think most people would just like a linux distro, which installs on thier PC, lets them view Flash, MS Codex, use thier hardware etc. It really should be that easy, the bar has been set by Microsoft and Apple, and the Linux communicty at a desktop level needs to reach that bar, don’t get me wrong, HUGE, GIGANTIC strides have been made with desktop linux in the past 18 months, and this is down to distros such as Ubuntu.. leading the way.
One particualr comment that i liked above was the guy who says is windows were easy to install he’d be out of a job. Windows users seem to think that windows is easier to install.. its not, its actaully harder to install, and try installing it on an HP, Dell, Compaq without the drivers CD which it came with, sure some stuff works, but other stuff like sound cards, proper graphics etc just fails.. because Windows doesn’t have the drivers either.. it worked the first time because it was installed for you..
As a Gentoo user, i like making life hard for myself.. so i’m not one to talk, but having had the same problems with Feisty on my Dell Laptop, and HP Desktop that i had with Edgy, with the same fixes resolving the problems, i figured that the lack of innovation in Gnome was more to blame for the lack of “whats new” than Ubuntu itself..
Most moder hardware aged about 6months is pretty well supported in Linux, and just like hunting down drivers for that old Scanner to work on Visa or CP was a nightmare, it can also be on Linux..
I agree Ubuntu is a usable OS, and have setup an office using it, in the UK. with 20 happy users..
Anyway, thats my 2 cents worth..
Ubuntu Edgy comes with FireFox 2.0. In fact, I’m writing this right now on an Edgy machine running FireFox 2.0.3 that was installed by default.
It’s an experience related article, not a review. It’s interesting to see how windoze spoiled users can use Linux and what problems they have. His problem about updating is farce, most of the time windows “exaggerates” about what their security patches are for, so what on God’s green earth makes you understand windoze and not Linux. Every time M$ releases another security patch I have to go look it up to find out what it is. The Ubuntu updating feature is simple, and sometimes too simple! At least Linux doesn’t install malware and ad ware on your computer.
@Dan C, quote “Real Linux users use Slackware.”
I have used Linux for years now and have tried at least 20 different distros. It is my opinion that picking the distro for a new person should be carefully done as to not make the users experience a negative one. That said, I should also point out that even with the best distros many people will get up and run at the first problem. This surprises me because at this point in time Microsoft really trails Linux in many ways. The most advanced desktops - Linux. Ease of hardware detection - most of the time now -Linux. I set up several systems a month and find over and over again that many times the MS solution will not boot because of a missing driver when Linux will. Surely we don’t always have the best drivers, BUT we have something that works until there is better. In windows many times if the driver is not detected your out of luck. IS it the right time to switch… It has been for awhile, the user just has to come to terms with the small differences. To prove a small point. Once as a CIS student I switched the default Windows desktop with LiteStep - another desktop but still on a Windows OS, the result? about 75% of the class was instantly lost and refused to try and find there way around- mostly because they thought they were running another Operating system.
Try Linux - pick a main distro like Ubuntu, OpenSuSE, Mandriva and get use to the apps. You will find you may never go back.. I didn’t and that was 10 years ago.Good Luck all.
If you haven’t heard of WUBI, you should try it if you haven’t made the ubuntu switch yet. Basically it will install Ubuntu within your existing windows installation and not disturb windows at all. When you reboot, you have the option to boot to Ubuntu or Windows and both work just fine for me. No partitions or risk of messing up your existing setup. Give it a shot. If you don’t like Ubuntu, you can simply uninstall it with WUBI and all is fine.
Here’s a link to the Wubi installer:
http://cutlersoftware.com/ubuntusetup/wubi/en-US/index.html
For your WLAN your can use ndiswrapper,i have the same card you have and with ndiswrapper , is way faster!And cool review!
I’ve been using Ubuntu exclusively for about a year since Ubuntu 6.06. I have 7.04 on my back up computer and will give it a workout as soon as I have time. The one thing that I learned is that it is really difficult to try to use Windows after working with a Gnome desktop for a while. I don’t miss Windows at all
If someone enjoys customizing their desktop, Ubuntu is the way to go.
I have been using Suse 10.2 since November ‘06, when my XP system “fell” and took about 80gigs with it. I had already had the suse system up and running bu more as a backup system. Looking back I don’t really understand why I didn’t get into linux more seriously earlier. I used to dabble with it, every-now-and-then, over the last 10 years, and now wish I had done more of it.
I’m not really a gamer, so I don’t miss that part of windows; I DON’T miss the constant anti-virus updates and I absolutely don’t miss all the blue screens of death or the sudden unexplained system crashes.
Sure you do have to do a little bit more research before buying new hardware - printer, webcam, scanner etc, but with 10.2 there is a phenomenal amount of help out there, not just from Suse but also from “second” and third parties.
Probably the best thing about suse is the support I get from the forums. The main forum http://forums.suselinuxsupport.de/ (don’t let the “.de” scare you off, the forum is in english), members of which have helped me time and again, and to my surprise, very quickly. I have since found out that some of the mods there are the actual programmers/developers of opensuse/suse.
Everyone talks about Ubuntu, Fedora, Mandriva, Linspire, etc, etc. How about checking out Suse 10.2. Don’t be surprised if you are surprised by it.
@silkmaze: Suse is actually my favourite after Ubuntu. Made by germans it has the same quality and durability as a VW or Audi! I was surprised bu it’s hardwaresupport and it was also otherwise easy to set up properly. I can’t remember why I didn’t stick with it… Probably messed something up bad like I always do.
WINE can run most of my programs. Synaptics makes installation/uninstallation almost flawless. Now is just the matter of full NTFS support. When any alternative OS can read, write and move files around it’s game over for XP.
And, no, NTFS-3G doesn’t cut it right now.
I installed Feisty on my Toshiba Satellite M-45 laptop and found it to be a really simple experience. This is the easiest time I have ever had setting up wireless (with the exception of PC Linux OS 2007). Setting up the codecs for mp3, DVD’s, etc. worked as I expected it to from previous reviews.
Based on what I’ve read in forums and reviews, Broadcom wireless cards seem to be more problematic than Intel cards. I have ipw2200 and haven’t had to use ndiswrapper yet.
On be dual-boot issue, an MBR repair may take care of that. I’ve had that problem with XP & Linux dual-booting in the past. If I can track down a url for that info, I’ll post another reply.
I have successfully installed a XP virtual machine which runs all windows apps like normal. I use mainly Photoshop and InDesign but others also work. Don’t know about gaming though… I think 3D support through virtualization is quite poor.
This should take care off any windows dependency - as well as remove that damn dualbooting hassle!
Too much hassle getting Ubuntu to work to where you can actually use it. Getting drivers to work is the biggest pain that I found. If it weren’t for that Linux would be a serious contender and a big headache for Gates.
Dude, you’re using Synaptic
not Synaptics
So wait you still can’t boot into your vista? Is it unfixable? I’m so tired of network adapters not working from the start. That stuff makes not want to even fool around with it. I mean I could be being productive, or I could be installing ubuntu.
@Motorcycle Guy: No - my Vista installation was rendered totally unusable which wasn’t as bad as it might sound because I didn’t really use this machiine for anything important. And although Vista was broken I could still rescue all important files from the partition without any problem since it showed up nicely in Ubuntu.
Whether it would have been fixable I don’t really know. I read some articles about rescuing Vista from the “missint NTLDR” error and it could probably have been done by using Vistas own recovery console but to be honest I didn’t miss Vista enough to start any delicate rescue operations.
I’ve been very productive on Ubuntu. With it I can do all the stuff I’d normally do in windows. Some hardware is still a bit of an issue but the Ubuntu community is very helpful and everything was sorted out as fast as I it would have on a normal XP machine. When I installed XP on this machine the WLAN adapter didn’t work either so… I don’t see that much of a difference between Windows and Ubuntu there. It’s a myth that installing hardware would be any easier on Windows than on Linux.
UBUNTU DOES NOT INSTALL AUTOMATICLY YOUR ATI DRIVER, YOU HAVE TO OPEN YOUR RESTRICTED MANAGER, AND CLICK ON IT, IT WILL DOWNLAOD IT AND INSTALL IT.
Stupid guy said:
“I was a linux user from 97 to 99 (till windows 2000) came out.
I regret to say it but:
linux users still go for the ‘almost’, and ‘thats good enough’.
Well wakeup, you only live once, theres no time for being in the middle. Use the best things that you CAN in order to be more productive. Go OSX, go Vista.
And with photoshop CS3 in the horizon, the Gimp never EVER looked that stupid.”
Congratulations, your knowledge of Linux are 8 years old.
If by: ALMOST, you mean GIMP (wich is free) and PhotoShop, you’re quite and stupid guy (It’s only one fucking application, and what makes that argument even funnier it’s that it runs under wine!).
I use Linux because I am more productive whit it. OS X it’s pure VAPORWARE, Windows Vista it’s a lot of things, but not an improvement in productive.
Do you want stability? Go Linux.
Do you want eye candy? Go Linux.
Do you want security? Go Linux.
Do you want a huge resources OS? Go Vista.
Do you want a “Cool” OS that only run on “cool” hardware? Go OS X (I hope you catch the irony)
Do you want videogames? Go Wii/PS3/X360, but, if you really want to run your games in a very poor framerate, then go Vista, or for a decent game experience then go a 6 years old OS, Called XP.
I dont get it.. do you people really run a spell check on pages and feel good about correcting people?? Use these reviews and responses in a effort to knowledge urself with information about ubuntu. Not to jack off on the internet, because your an awesome speller.
Nice review!
It installed well on my pc, and im making the switch.
thats a nice thing u have there.
but i have this problem,
i am using hp dv 6000 but after installing the ubuntu, it starts to boot and the screen goes off. not able to boot.
i need help.
Balanced review but PCLinuxOS is better than Ubuntu. PCLinuxOS Gnome version will be on the block soon to conqueror the ubuntu base for all the good reasons. Visit http://pclinuxos2007.blogspot.com to know why.
Hi
This is a great website! Very useful.
Hey, if you want to compare both OS don’t use hp, dell or acer computers. they need special cds with tools to make them work, whether we install any linux distro or we reinstall win. i had a huge problem when reinstalling winxp in my hp pavillion, for i didn’t have the drivers cd hp provided. c’mon, it doesn’t happen in linux
and for those who think that drivers are harder to get in linux, try to look for an specific driver when you don’t know where to have it in win. Ubuntu has synaptic, and it’s the only place you need to get and fix all drivers. can you do it with win?
if you feel win is better, tell me why my nvidia vanta can’t load AOE III, and i can’t put screen resolution over 800 x 600 (yes, i know the procedure, but it goes black screen), tell me why my dvd unit can’t show me the files, but i can create images with nero out of it, with all files copies ok. tell me why is explorer going over 80% cpu with no reason, and why is it crashing when i open word, excel and ppoint at the same time? (yes, i need them all at the same time often , so it is quite boring to me)
if you dont want a problem installing linux, you can get a kubuntu live dvd (it’s lighter than ubuntu) and do everything from it. there’s no performance difference between kubuntu at livedvd and xp installed. or go wubi.