So then, my netbook, an eeepc 901, has recently been terribly slow, and incompatible with videos/streaming. This is possibly due to the terribad atom it has, but is also the fault of windows XP. I'm currently in the market for a new OS, and hopefully some of the linux folks who I know are around here can help me out without the trolling I would receive on /g/. With any luck, there is a simple procedure to fix my gripes in a distro of linux.
Windows XP Gripes
- Frequently hangs due to SSD usage/some unknown reason, not really fixable
- Does not have multiple workspaces
- Does not have the ability to make a window always on top
- Horizontal multi-touch gestures don't work, probably due to terrible drivers
- Some streaming video is choppy (sounds like a flash inefficiency problem rather than an OS problem)
Mint Linux
I can't find a way to easily view where my storage space is, as there is no "detailed" view like in windows. Swear to god I only had "compact" and "icon" view before, not "list" view.
- "/" takes up 4.2 GB when I right click/properties all but the media folder as root. The drive mint is installed on is 3.8 GB. I don't know where that .4 GB came from, or how to view the stats on that drive like I can on my second drive or my SDHC card.
Updating firefox to 3.6.3 isn't a simple copy/paste, point and click ordeal, as the latest version in package manager is 3.5. Apparently there is no install utility other than package manager, so if you want the latest version of a program, you have to manually download/create shortcuts. That's cool.
- Coupled with the space problem, it makes knowing where stuff is incredibly difficult (though I like being able to download a program and run it without any form of "install")
If anyone could debunk any of these gripes, mainly for mint, I'd be appreciative. If you can recommend a different distro, and why, that would be nice too. I figured mint would be best due to ease of use and codec support.
Post has been edited 3 time(s), last time on Apr 15 2010, 12:35 am by rockz.
"Parliamentary inquiry, Mr. Chairman - do we have to call the Gentleman a gentleman if he's not one?"
>be faceless void >mfw I have no face
For mint, don't use the package manager to DL firefox, just dl the latest package from the FF download page and follow
these instructions.
Not sure about #2
As for #1, can you explain more?
And finally, for #4, you just need to get used to how linux installs stuff. A lot can be found in your /home/USERNAME folder if you enable Show Hidden Files.
Red classic.
"In short, their absurdities are so extreme that it is painful even to quote them."
Thanks. #1, I swear I clicked the different ways to view folders, and there were only 2 that showed up. Now there are 3, one of which is what I wanted, so nvm.
There's a lot of crap in different places no matter your OS. I'd really prefer to be able to see all of my internal drives, including the one I installed mint on.
"Parliamentary inquiry, Mr. Chairman - do we have to call the Gentleman a gentleman if he's not one?"
>be faceless void >mfw I have no face
There's a lot of crap in different places no matter your OS. I'd really prefer to be able to see all of my internal drives, including the one I installed mint on.
Ah, now I understand. That's one of the slightly annoying things about linux, but also one of the good things. There's one filesystem used for all (or most) hard drives/partitions. But if you want to browse a particular HD, I'm not sure how to do that. What you CAN do is check out the /mnt and /media folders to see if your drives are listed there. If you want to find out what drive a particular file is stored on, right click it and go to properties, and then see where it says Volume: blah. That SHOULD be the drive it's in. However, when I tried that on this particular computer, which has only one drive, it said Volume: Uknown, which makes me think it won't specify a hard drive if you only have one. I could be wrong, though.
Red classic.
"In short, their absurdities are so extreme that it is painful even to quote them."
/media/ has all my drives listed except the former c:\ drive.
"Parliamentary inquiry, Mr. Chairman - do we have to call the Gentleman a gentleman if he's not one?"
If you want to see free space on all of the mount points, there's the df command from the console. Or if you just want to see where all of the drives or partitions are mounted, type mount on the console. Either of these should work on just about any GNU/Linux or Unix-based system.
By the way, Flash Player will probably be worse on a non-Windows platform (possibly at least not worse on Mac). I think that's how it was when I last tried it on Ubuntu, anyway (but a while ago).
None.
Flash not working means little. The videos I couldn't watch can be downloaded and watched in mplayer if I really want to. Half the problem was I couldn't get my laptop to connect to my desktop, or vice versa. Seems linux works out of the box, so I can watch my vids just about anywhere.
However mount and df worked well. I'm seriously disappointed that mint is taking up 3 GB, though.
"Parliamentary inquiry, Mr. Chairman - do we have to call the Gentleman a gentleman if he's not one?"