# Anyone else use Linux



## Steerpike (Oct 12, 2011)

Just curious. Been using Fedora 15. Just installed "Oneiric Ocelot" (beta). Nice, once I got rid of Unity.


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## Zootalaws (Oct 13, 2011)

Yeah, I use OS X 

But I am a command-line geek...


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## TheFuhrer02 (Oct 13, 2011)

I had the chance to use Ubuntu for a brief while. It was a rather cool experience, considering I'm a Windows guy ever since I first used a computer.


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## Steerpike (Oct 13, 2011)

I like to use the command line as well.

I keep Windows around for gaming and the odd Netflix movie, but I prefer Linux.


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## elite (Oct 13, 2011)

I work with Windows, Unix (Ubuntu) and OS X on a daily basis. Save for a few annoyances I prefer windows over the other two.


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## Zootalaws (Oct 13, 2011)

I work with Windows, Unix and OS X on a daily basis, when I get home the first computer (of many on offer) I reach for is my Mac.

I agree that OS X as an office OS is a PITA to manage... great as a personal OS, though.


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## garza (Oct 13, 2011)

Puppy One Bone, pure command line, runs on one elderly Pentium dual boot machine along with Windows ME. Most of the time I yield to the fast and easy appeal of Windows XP and 7. 

Back when memory was measured in kilobytes and cpu speed in megahertz I avoided Windows and used apps that ran barefoot in dos. Today memory and speed are cheap so the Windows bulk is not an issue. I look on using Linux as a continuing education programme. 

I see no point in using a Linux distro with a gui. I've tried a few and they look and feel like wannabe-Windows, but without the ease of use of Windows, and without continually improving apps such as Microsoft Office.


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## Zootalaws (Oct 13, 2011)

On this subject:

RIP Dennis MacAlistair Ritchie - the creator of Unix and the C programming language has passed away today, aged 70.

Arguably the most ground-breaking contributor to personal computing since Robert Noyce invented the microchip.



> Dennis Ritchie the designer and original developer of both the C programming language, and co-creator of Unix has died at age 71 after a prolonged illness.
> It seems incredible from today's perspective that two people, motivated mainly by enthusiasm, should develop both an operating system and a programming language but that's exactly what Dennis Ritchie and Kenneth Thompson achieved.
> They met and started working together at Bell Laboratories around 1968. At the time the Bell Labs (now Alcatel-Lucent) were famous as the home of the transistor and many other basic research projects. Ritchie and Thompson were given the brief to "investigate interesting problems in computer science".
> Like all good teams, Ritchie and Thompson had different but complementary qualities. Dennis Ritchie had studied physics and then moved on to pure computer science via maths. His PhD thesis was on recursive functions, but he got bored with it and never submitted it. Ken Thompson was an electronics enthusiast. It would be too much of a simplification to say that Ritchie was the theoretician and Thompson the practician but the difference in their backgrounds must have helped rather then hindered their working together.
> Ritchie and Thompson set out to implement an operating system but because Bell had just had a bad experience with the Multics operating system and it not the ideal time to look for official resources and so they started work with an obsolete PDP 7. The story of how the Unix project expanded  and eventually saw the light of day is told in our history article, Ritchie & Thompson.


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## Steerpike (Oct 13, 2011)

Linux GUIs (Ubuntu, Mint, Fedora, and others) are very easy to use these days, and there's lots of good software that is developed and improved over time. The distros have come a long way from a decade ago.

Mac OS is my least favorite of Linux, Windows, and Mac. I doubt I'll ever buy another Mac.


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## Bloggsworth (Oct 13, 2011)

Having started with a Commodore Pet, with a huge 1k memory and built in cassette drive, and worked my way through Apple IIe and a couple of BBC "B" computers with an amazing 64k of memory and 2 floppy drives which cost me the best part of £200, quite frankly I will use whatever works with the most efficiency and least effort. I have a Mac Mini and 3 Windows machines, which, if you are not a geek, are far more accessible and easier to use than Apples (I find Apple's arrogance towards its customers off-putting, not to mention their refusal to alter their keyboard for our market - Then there's the price, I could buy 3 Lenovos with i3, 6Gb memory and a 640Gb hard disc and dedicated 1Gb graphics for less than the price of a 15" MacBook Pro with smaller memory and HD - Macs are good, but not *that* good), no hassle printing across mixed networks, easy to wander through as many levels as you feel confident to access. I don't want to write routines, set up my own structures etc., my computer is an electronic "screwdriver", I just want to pick it up and use it.

If you handed me a laptop with which I can start working intuitively within 2 minutes, I wouldn't care if it was running Ubuntu or The Red Red Robin, just give me a decent WP and an easy to understand and use filing system and I'm happy...


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## Zootalaws (Oct 13, 2011)

Bloggsworth said:


> ...not to mention their refusal to alter their keyboard for our market



What do you mean? I have three Apple keyboards - all with £ & € symbols. Other than that, what's the difference between your market and the rest of the world?


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## Bloggsworth (Oct 13, 2011)

The position of the " and @ keys


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## Gamer_2k4 (Oct 13, 2011)

I've worked with Linux off and on for about three years now - mostly flavors of Ubuntu.  I like the concept of it, but I never got used to the system itself.  Compatibility and usability are two things I appreciate most in my OS, and Linux offers neither.


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## elite (Oct 13, 2011)

Bloggsworth said:


> The position of the " and @ keys



I don't know what you're talking about. They are in the same place as any other qwerty keyboard. If anything, I like apple keyboard layouts better because they have less clutter; laptop manufactures seem to agree with this as well.

The only downside to apple keyboards is that you will have to map a delete key to a shortcut if you expect to use it on windows (there is no delete key, only backspace). That can easily be solved by using an utility called AutoHotkey.

EDIT = Wait, I get it now, different region keyboard. Forget I said anything.


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## Bloggsworth (Oct 13, 2011)

elite said:


> EDIT = Wait, I get it now, different region keyboard. Forget I said anything.



More to the point, Apple refuse to supply a different region keyboard. Buy a Windows computer in America and you get the Apple layout, by one in Europe and you get the @ on the same key as the ' and the " on the same key as the 2; it's not a cost thing, they told me to "Get used to it" Why? I use 5 or 6 Windows computers to every 1 Apple; so not an attitude that's going to get me to buy another Apple any time soon.

Apples are jewels of the personal computing world, beautifully designed, well crafted, the perfect lifestyle accessory, but I don't wear jewellery and don't use only Apples.


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## Steerpike (Oct 13, 2011)

Apples aren't worth the extra cost. You're paying for a brand, when it all comes down to it. You're not gaining functionality. Rather, you're buying into a product from a company that likes to tell you how you're going to use your technology, and has at the same time managed to convince people that it is worth paying extra for the 'status.' 

I don't have any usability issues in Linux. Compatibility - Netflix and games. Otherwise, no issues there either.


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## elite (Oct 13, 2011)

Steerpike said:


> Apples aren't worth the extra cost. You're paying for a brand, when it all comes down to it. You're not gaining functionality. Rather, you're buying into a product from a company that likes to tell you how you're going to use your technology, and has at the same time managed to convince people that it is worth paying extra for the 'status.'
> 
> I don't have any usability issues in Linux. Compatibility - Netflix and games. Otherwise, no issues there either.



I only buy macbooks because they are pretty much the only laptops in the market that are powerful and aren't as tick and heavy as a hardcover encyclopedia. Okay, I am exaggerating, but you get the idea; the only good quality laptops I know of are Macbooks; everything else is flimsy, heavy, thick, and filled with stickers that are hard to remove. Dell and Samsung are catching up, but they still don't have performance equivalents of their slim models and I just hate Sony so I don't buy anything from them. Other than that, I prefer to build my own desktops and buy whatever phone has the best features. I have an iPhone because back then (3g) there were no other alternatives, and I'd never buy an iMac or an overpriced MacPro.


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## Zootalaws (Oct 14, 2011)

Bloggsworth said:


> The position of the " and @ keys



You might find that it is the outdated BS standards that are the problem, not Apple. We have three different windows keyboards at work, two have the @ in shift+2, one doesn't. All three have £.



> The BS 4822:1994 standard does not make any use of the AltGr key and lacks support for any non-ASCII characters other than ¬ and £. It also assigns a key for the non-ASCII character broken bar (¦), but lacks one for the far more commonly used ASCII character vertical bar (|). It also lacks support for Welsh orthography. Therefore, various manufacturers have modified or extended the BS 4822 standard:
> The B00 key (left of Z) shifted results in vertical bar (|) on some systems (e.g., Microsoft Windows' UK/Ireland keyboard layout and GNU/Linux/X11 UK/Ireland keyboard layout), rather than the broken bar (¦) assigned by BS 4822 and provided in some systems (e.g., OS/2's UK166 keyboard layout)
> The E00 key (left of 1) with AltGr provides either vertical bar (|) (OS/2's UK166 keyboard layout, GNU/Linux/X11 UK keyboard layout) or broken bar (¦) (Microsoft Windows' UK/Ireland keyboard layout)



Describing a company that is probably the best marketing computer company in the world as recalcitrant in one of their larger markets is probably far from the reality. It would be much more likely that they are observing ANSI standards, which have been universally adopted as the way forward with compatibility.


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## Zootalaws (Oct 14, 2011)

Steerpike said:


> Apples aren't worth the extra cost. You're paying for a brand, when it all comes down to it. You're not gaining functionality. Rather, you're buying into a product from a company that likes to tell you how you're going to use your technology, and has at the same time managed to convince people that it is worth paying extra for the 'status.'
> 
> I don't have any usability issues in Linux. Compatibility - Netflix and games. Otherwise, no issues there either.



In your opinion.

In mine the hardware is far more integrated and reliable. I have 7 year old Mac's that are still extremely functional and still command a decent resale. There's a reason for that. 

And it isn't exactly like I am a 'user'. I am into my 37th year of working in IT at a senior technical level. Not some johnny pushing bits of paper or making business decisions technical, but making things go together and finding out why things don't, technical. I am as comfortable debugging a mainboard, card or other sub-system as I am installing Windows or Unix. 

Yet again, this sort of discussion has veered from a 'do you use unix' to a PC-centric slagging off of anything not made by MS.

As a previous employee of MS, Intel, Wang, Unisys, Burroughs, NEC, IBM, Dell, HP, ICL, Apple, Toshiba, Bay Networks, DEC, et al, I think I would be happy to categorically state that it's horses for courses.

Some people do some things really well, some not so well and some horribly. Apple does most things well. As does Intel, Dell and Toshiba.

Blithely stating 'Apples aren't worth the extra cost' misses out one vital ingredient. Apples aren't worth the extra cost - to you. To millions of people that are extremely happy Apple users, that is not true.

I am not into status, my computer's rarely leave the house and my wife isn't in the least impressed. And no-one at Apple tells me how to use my computer, that's just dross.


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## Zootalaws (Oct 14, 2011)

elite said:


> ...I'd never buy an iMac or an overpriced MacPro.



iMac's have their place and a Mini makes a great multi-media unit for under your TV. And there are very few dual-die computers out there that can touch a MacPro. 

I have done a lot of work over the years with graphics houses like Saatchi's, etc. There is no substitute to a MacPro with 128GB Ram and 12-core processors when you are on a deadline with a £250,000 ad campaign. The cost is peanuts and there is nothing else on a desktop that can touch it.

But... if you need bags of power for anything other than pixel manipulation you might be better of with a distributed app running on a bunch of multi-core blades.

Horses for courses.


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## Steerpike (Oct 14, 2011)

@Elite - Asus has some very thin laptops coming out. Only problem is I think the price point is about the same as Macbooks.

@Zootalaws - I've had plenty of non-Macs last seven years (or more), including one Toshiba laptop. You don't have to pay the extra cash for a Mac to get that. Paying for a Mac gets you nothing in addition to a good non-Mac (at a lower price) except the Mac name and the little Apple logo.


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## Zootalaws (Oct 14, 2011)

It's not the lasting 7 years, it's the still being productive after 7 years.

I have some old pentium class mobo's hanging around that are only good for using as print servers, etc. but I can happily turn on an old 400MHz iMac and be as productive on it as my 2.4GHz dual core.

But... this is something that will never be resolved - you don't like Apple, I find all sorts of different manufacturers have their place. 

Holding such strong views to the extent that you categorise an entire company's product range for more than 3 decades as 'not worth it' is, in my opinion, myopic.


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## TheFuhrer02 (Oct 14, 2011)

^ Aww, I still have Pentium 2 running. And I play Warcraft on it. (I did upgrade its video card and HDD, though. But the processor is pretty much P2.)

Nevertheless, I don't give much thought on the brand. As long as I can use it and it runs to my liking, then that's fine with me, whether it's Linux, Windows or Mac OS.


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## Syren (Oct 14, 2011)

I always believed that for general users, mac books were great. There's very little learning curve for productivity and they are stable systems for the most part. 

But I also think that serious computer enthusiasts prefer the IMB pc's and notebooks over Mac, simply because you get much more for your dollar and there are fewer limits to what you can do.

We have two macbooks, two desktops (win7 and ubuntu) and three notebooks. I build systems for others, so there's also a few others laying around in my shop at any given time.

If Apple would allow any software on their systems, then they'd be great. Course, then they'd be buggy as hell and basically the same as a toshiba or dell. Personally, I've never enjoyed using a Mac.

Unix systems are great because you can rework them as you see fit. For average users though, the learning curve is too steep and it's not worth the time and effort. System 76 and similar companies have some great all in one solutions that mid-level users would really enjoy.

Personally, I prefer the IBM machines. More options, more power, more value - more problems too, but I can handle those. 

My two cents.


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## Steerpike (Oct 14, 2011)

Syren said:


> I always believed that for general users, mac books were great. There's very little learning curve for productivity and they are stable systems for the most part.



Macbooks (and Macs in general) are good computers. The question for a general user is whether it is worth it to get one, or to get comparable hardware specs in a Windows 7 computer for a lot less money, or a more powerful computer for the same money. Both have small learning curves, and both are stable. It comes down to an aesthetic choice, I suppose. 

For your average non-savvy, general user I would not recommend Linux yet, which is unfortunate as it is my favorite.


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## Niklas (Oct 14, 2011)

I used to run dual-boot on my old Dell, running Linux Ubuntu and Windows XP. I liked the feel of Ubuntu, even the small games they supplied in their library were entertaining for some time. But I had a lot of difficulty downloading and installing programs, and it seemed to me it was more of a web browsing OS (ubuntu at least). Also the incompatibility with many games made it difficult. I used SSH to gain access to a server console for a Minecraft server I was an administrator on, but eventually I moved that over to Windows, using an equivilant program that got me the same results, plus I could now play Minecraft and be on console at the same time, as well as our IRC channel. 

I might try Ubuntu out, and other Linux OS's, once I have the time and patience to work with them, but for now I'm busy with schooling and don't have time to have my computer wiped. (I know you don't have to wipe your computer to install linux, but I was notorious for screwing something up that would end in me having to wipe everything and start over fresh. Always had trouble with GRUB.)

As for Mac. No. Just no. I don't like anything Apple related. I once had an iPod nano, and it lasted great for about a year before it went to crap. Plus iTunes on Windows was very resource dependant and was a bother to even have installed, even if it wasn't running the main program, there were always update programs for iTunes and other crap running in the background that would slow my computer. I understand I don't have such a great computer to begin with, but for that reason alone iTunes is not something I need. I'm doing just fine for music with WinAmp and using my phone as an mp3 player.


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## Skeletor (Oct 14, 2011)

After getting into Linux during the late '90s, I've dabbled in the various distros over the years.  For me, it's still very much a tinkerer's OS, although distro's like Ubuntu have done much to create a more user-friendly experience.  I've also worked on various Linux systems at an Enterprise level, mostly Red Hat and SuSE, running underneath SAP systems or Sybase or DB2 or whatever.  I'm no longer very much compelled to run it at home, although I do have Fedora sitting on an old laptop somewhere.

As for the Mac argument: their portable offerings are generally their strongest.  I used a MacBook Pro for 3 or 4 years for all my consulting work, running VMWare Fusion for all the Windows bits.  I generally find OSX the most polished and enjoyable OS to use, if simply navigating around your machine can be said to be enjoyable.  Some of the stuff genuinely enhances productivity, like Expose and Spaces (although I believe that has been rebranded now, I'm not on Lion yet), and some hardware that was a pain to set up on Windows works really seamlessly and automatically on my Mac.  +1;  Cost-wise, Macs are priced higher but you need to factor in the bundled software, particularly iLife.  I did some really nifty stuff with home videos, music and photographs that would have been impossible to do on an "off the shelf" WinTel box.

That said, I recently had to upgrade my laptop and decided against their current offerings, not liking the graphics processors and RAM options that I could get on a much cheaper HP.  Pity, as when I did the same exercise a few years back the cost difference (if you spec'd a machine piece by piece) was actually not very high.

So mostly back on Windows 7 now, and since I'm somewhat more interested in doing STUFF with my computer these days rather than what's happening under the hood, I'm pretty happy.  At least it's not Vista.


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## Steerpike (Oct 14, 2011)

To get back to the original topic (and yes I participated in the derail  ), for those interested in Linux Ubuntu 11.10 is looking like a good release. So far, no problems - everything from installation to hardware detection, good, usable software, &c has been great. Unity is the default interface, and that sucks. But you can solve that problem by installing gnome shell from the software center with a single click, or if you like the command line just do sudo apt-get install gnome-shell. Then you never have to see Unity again.

Comes with, among other things, LibreOffice, Thunderbird, Banshee, Shotwell, Totem movie player, Gwibber, Empathy and Firefox. I added GIMP, Dropbox, Chrome, Opera, Pyroom, and a couple of other software choices with single mouse clicks in the software center for most of it (I think for Opera I downloaded the .deb, but I can't remember).

Good stuff.


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## Niklas (Oct 14, 2011)

Steerpike, you make me want Ubuntu again >_>
I might just try dual-boot again. I hope I don't end up wiping my drives .-.
My current pattern shows my hard drives being wiped roughly every 6 months. I'm about due in two months, which just so happens to be my winter break, and the only time I'll have to reinstall linux in dual-boot.


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## Steerpike (Oct 14, 2011)

Niklas: I hope you don't wipe them! I installed it as a dual-boot right alongside Windows 7. I've never had trouble with the Windows installation being wiped out. Ubuntu will configure everything automatically, and that's supposed to work pretty well (you'll see the option in the graphical installer). I generally go for the manual configuration so I can create the partitions I want and install it the way I want.


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## Niklas (Oct 14, 2011)

I've done it before, but my problem is, during boot-up of the computer, it will boot automatically into linux without a second glance at the windows hard drive. I have 2 drives, and generally install linux on one, and windows on the other. Normally, the installation of Linux makes windows inaccessible to me, to the point the only way I can gain access to windows is to cut power to, or remove completely, the linux hard drive.

I've been getting better at it though, and at the very least, I've learned to back up my important files on my external. I think I have a linux install disk in my locker.. But I can't do much with it with simply the default settings, so it would be somewhat a waste to install it now, without internet access for updates and new installations.


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## Zootalaws (Oct 15, 2011)

Windows 7 brought an entirely new disk management system into play, along with the ability to boot from any device the BIOS can see. It may be that your Unix Boot Manager and Windows Boot Manager are arm wrestling for control.


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## Zootalaws (Oct 15, 2011)

I am sorry to have to do this, but there was really no option left. Despite what you may think, Napoleon has the last word on the subject:


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## Steerpike (Oct 15, 2011)

Niklas:

You should be able to access your windows partition from Ubuntu. Also, Ubuntu will automatically install GRUB, which will give you an option of which operating system you want to use when you start your computer.


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## Zootalaws (Oct 15, 2011)

That is, I believe, the problem.

Grub and Windows 7 DM are known to cause issues if you don't know what you are doing when you install them.

Niklas, if you want to fix it there are a couple of things you can do - if you are committed to your unix installation, the best is to fix Grub, if not, fix Windows.

I suggest that as Grub is the one that boots and doesn't find Windows, you fix Grub:

This will sort it out.

open terminal

issue commands:


sudo grub

find /boot/grub/stage1

this will return your unix part.

quit

now list the rest of the parts.:

fdisk -l

the output from this will show where your unix and windows are installed, as Grub sees it.

Note:: /dev/sda2 = (hd0,1)

and configure rootnoverify (hd0,0) accordingly: This is obviously only an example - your configuration will be dependent on what you got from your investigation



> title Windows 7
> rootnoverify (hd0,0)
> makeactive
> chainloader +1
> ...



That will sort it.


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## Die Oldhaetunde (Oct 15, 2011)

God, I hate Ubuntu. It is the spawn of the devil. Practially the worst thing to ever happen to linux, ever. Period. People who get ubuntu are not true linux user's. I'm sorry, but that is my opinion on the subject. My word is law. _True linux is staying up till 2:00 in the morning coding your own driver with the csh shell because bash is for sissies and postscript doesn't have the right extensions to work with the vector graphics you need. AND OMFG YOU NEED TO LOOK UP SOME OBSCURE LATEX INSTRUCTION BEFORE YOU CAN RUN PS2PDF! Oh, and GUI are for wimps. True linux user's use cfdisk, use lilo, slackware, and know how to compile a kernel from scratch.

ALL HAIL THE MIGHTY LINUS TORVALDS!!!

Whoah... where am I... I feel like... something just possessed me..._


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## Zootalaws (Oct 15, 2011)

I use bash 

I'm with you on Ubuntu, though... give me AIX or HP-UX or Solaris any day


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## elite (Oct 15, 2011)

Zootalaws said:


> I am sorry to have to do this, but there was really no option left. Despite what you may think, Napoleon has the last word on the subject:
> 
> View attachment 2428



The greatness that is that image cannot be disputed. Macs win by sheer nerd badassery.


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## Steerpike (Oct 15, 2011)

With respect to Windows 7 / Linux and GRUB...

I've probably had a dozen different Linux distros dual-booting on my Win 7 machines and I've never had a problem with GRUB. It always detects the Windows installation and sets everything up right automatically. There is no need to do anything other than let the installer do its work. That's been my experience. Maybe if you are installing Arch or Gentoo you'd have more to do.

Grub/Win 7 has worked for me with nothing more than a mouse click on:

Ubuntu
Mint
Fedora
Sabayon
Crunchbang
Archbang
Puppy
Macpup
SliTaz
Peppermint
Black Panther

and the others I've tried that aren't coming to mind. It has been years since I had to manually edit grub.conf or any other file, and that was in the pre-Win 7 days.


I can't imagine I've just been getting lucky all of these times.


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## Niklas (Oct 15, 2011)

I'm using windows XP, not 7. >_>

And I don't currently have linux installed, nor will I for at least the next couple of months. Thanks for your advice, it is appreciated, but it won't be applied at least for another 2 months, if at all.


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## Zootalaws (Oct 16, 2011)

Steerpike said:


> With respect to Windows 7 / Linux and GRUB...



The problems occur when upgrading/moving and conjoining OSs.


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## Zootalaws (Oct 16, 2011)

elite said:


> The greatness that is that image cannot be disputed. Macs win by sheer nerd badassery.



And I am nothing if not a badass nerd  (and my hero, Napoleon, of course - he led me to excel in computer hacking skills, ninja skills, etc.)


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## Zootalaws (Oct 16, 2011)

Niklas said:


> I'm using windows XP, not 7. >_>



Urrggghhh - the MBR kludge...

Good luck to ya... 10 years old last month, you think they would have worked out the bugs by now


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## Niklas (Oct 17, 2011)

Zootalaws said:


> Urrggghhh - the MBR kludge...
> 
> Good luck to ya... 10 years old last month, you think they would have worked out the bugs by now



I'd upgrade, in all honesty, to 7 if I could. But I'm in school with no job, and very little income, so the computer I have (which I got for 125 dollars at a garage sale 5 years ago) is what I'll have to deal with. I have a couple of old, and I mean _old_ laptops in my closet, but one of them straight out doesn't work, and hte other needs a new battery, which I doubt is produced any longer. One of the laptops has an amazing 500MB of HD space! Isn't that amazing!? (I'm being sarcastic if you didn't realize that yet.)

I should just trash the old laptops, but for the simple fact I've never had one, it's better to have one, even if it doesn't work. I'll either get it to work, even if it costs me a decent chunk of money, or I'll get a newr laptop and throw those ones out. Haven't decided which, and if you make comment on it, don't be mad if your opinion doesn't sway me. I'm not easily swayed, especially if it's just an opinion.


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## Zootalaws (Oct 17, 2011)

No shame in an old computer... I have a few. Before you go trashing those old laptops, check out ebay, sometimes you may find you are sitting on a parts goldmine!

I sold an old e-Book for more than I paid for it 7 years before... I sold an old Compaq LTE, because they have become a bit of a collectors item.

Anyway, computing is a bit of an arms race - but if your armaments required are only a word-processor and some other base apps, pretty much anything reliable will do the job.

I wasn't ragging on your choice of OS, merely having my regular dig at MS... I should be kinder to them, they have paid my bills for over 20 years now.


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## Die Oldhaetunde (Oct 17, 2011)

I run a fairly old Shuttle Mini-ITX form factor with an AMD Athlon +1700 processor, 512 mb of ram, and 40GB of hard drive space, but because I compiled my own kernel, use the the *truly badass* cwm window manager, and use the lightweight csh/ash shells, I get my work done at lightning quick speeds. Latex lets me create professional looking books, heck I can even run my own apache server at a decent speed, (Although I don't, as my location in the country would make doing so a stupid undertaking. Stupid performance bottlenecks!)


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