Giving Linux a 2nd chance

[Prof.Wizard]

I know I'm playing with fire here... but I want to try my luck again with Linux. This time doing things right and buying SuSE, not Mandrake... not yet of course... when the new version (7.4 or 8.0) arrives and if my Audigy and the rest of my hardware is already supported by the latest kernel...

Any alternatives to SuSE?

PS. My traumatic experience with Mandrake 8.1 pulls me away from that distro, even if some say it's the easiest around. Afterall, SuSE has done great steps in easiness and hardware-support...

[CougTek]

Any alternatives to SuSE?

If you want to learn Linux the right way, then you should do the Linux from scratch (http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/).

Or at least, try Debian instead of the more bloated distro like Mandrake/Red Hat/SuSe. Debian is supposed to be a lot easier to customize than the three other.

[The JoJo]

hmmmm, from my experience:

If you wanna try something out and learn, go ahead and try debian, slackware etc...
On a personal note, I didn't like debian too much. Tried it out for a few days only though...

If you want (as I understood) something that will have support for your equipment (out of the box) go for suse or redhat. Bloated, maybe. But that depends a lot on what you install.

[Prof.Wizard]

SuSE supports out-of-the-box even my Hauppauge TV Tuner... :) This is extremely good.
I'll be going to a major (bloated!) distro, cause I want the maximum of hardware compatibility and support.

[Cliptin]

Even with Linux from scratch you still have to have a working compiler.
I'd say start with SUSE to make sure Linux can do everything you want it to. Then take steps toward LFS.

Personally, I'd rather you keep learning to be a brilliant neurosurgeon than deal with LFS.

[Prof.Wizard]

Personally, I'd rather you keep learning to be a brilliant neurosurgeon than deal with LFS.

:D

[Mercutio]

Pre-step 1.) Make sure that your hardware is reasonably well-supported (check your NIC, video card, SCSI controller, and modem). I strongly suggest installing on a second PC if you're someone who gets frustrated
Step 1.) Pick a distro
Step 2.) Spend a goodly amount of time on google/google groups searching for the answers to questions you didn't know you had until you installed your distro of choice.
Step 3.) Enjoy a sweet, well-tuned system.

[Prof.Wizard]

Step 3.) Enjoy a sweet, well-tuned system.

Amen!

You remember my frustration last time, don't you? :x
Let's hope this time works... so, I'm waiting SuSE 7.4 or 8.0 then...

[The JoJo]

It appears that support for the Sound Blaster Audigy has progressed to the point of actually having a downloadable tarball available. The new home for the CVS repository is at SourceForge. According to some of the forum postings, there has been some great progress made.

This was from linuxhardware.org ...

[Prof.Wizard]

I've read it... but don't forget that I haven't actually played with my previous Linux box (not having sound was pretty frustrating for a Windows-grown guy like me) and thus I'm still a newbie...

I'm not sure I'll be able to install it manually and compile my own kernel (don't know how!)...

I saw that SourceForge project some days ago. It's still experimental support. I'll better wait for the official kernel.org support...

[Adcadet]

Pre-step 1.) Make sure that your hardware is reasonably well-supported (check your NIC, video card, SCSI controller, and modem). I strongly suggest installing on a second PC if you're someone who gets frustrated


Playing with Linux on a second PC makes life sooooo much easier. Especially when you can't get your NIC to work and want to surf the web for answers.

[Handruin]

I setup RH 7.2 at work a week ago and I was really impressed how easy it was and how well this machine works! I have much respect for Linux OS. (even if I'm using a bloatware version) Now I need to get MySQL going and configure it with apache!

[Prof.Wizard]

Playing with Linux on a second PC makes life sooooo much easier. Especially when you can't get your NIC to work and want to surf the web for answers.


You have just spoked into the core of the problem... :) This is the greatest issue... If I were back home in Greece (I sport 3 PCs there!) I would have installed the darn OS right away... but having to dual-boot my current PC is a more risky approach. You can't have real-time answers otherwise you would...

OT: If we ever want to see Linux compete head-to-head with Windows, the 3 major "bloatware" players (Red Hat, Mandrake, SuSE) might have to merge in a unique company. 5 months now, and still no support for the Audigy... That's why Linux hurts me... they lag too much with hardware support... :(

Outrageous...

[Sol]

Is it that Linux doesn't support Audigy or that Creative doesn't support Linux.

[Tannin]

Or possibly that Creative doesn't support Creative. I mean, what is it now? Four years we have been waiting for decent Sound Blaster Live drivers? And we are still waiting.

[Prof.Wizard]

Drivers?! Only drivers?!?

YOU BET! Everything "Software" about Creative sucks! Their laughable drivers, their lousy "crashy" applications, the fact that you CAN'T (outrageous!) download the darn drivers from their site...

EVERYTHING! Where are the glorious days of Creative, back in Sound Blaster Pro, when George (a classmate of mine) had just bought the darn card (we were 14 or 15 then... :oops: ) and was proudly showing us the blockbuster game Wolfenstein... :wink:

[Mercutio]

Prof, last I checked there were Live! drivers on the asian and european sites.
Also try manually browsing their FTP site (you'd have to get the address from a download link on their web site. I don't know it offhand).

And yes, Creative doesn't really support Creative. Their Linux driver people are seperate from the Windows group, although there are still reports of odd problems that have been associated with the Live! under Linux. Either poor specifications for their driver software or the card is poorly-designed. No matter. I don't seem to have problems with them. :)

[Prof.Wizard]

Prof, last I checked there were Live! drivers on the asian and european sites.
Also try manually browsing their FTP site (you'd have to get the address from a download link on their web site. I don't know it offhand).

AFAIK, these are updates after you've installed the CD drivers... These guys need to rewrite the darn drivers from the beginning... A thing they don't do...

[Mercutio]

OT: If we ever want to see Linux compete head-to-head with Windows, the 3 major "bloatware" players (Red Hat, Mandrake, SuSE) might have to merge in a unique company. 5 months now, and still no support for the Audigy... That's why Linux hurts me... they lag too much with hardware support... :(

Outrageous...


Linux is just a kernel. Drivers for hardware are written by interested third parties or by different software groups than the main product development people. Often, because of commercial interests, the people writing the linux drivers are given incomplete or even incorrect (based on an old spec) information, and usually very little support from the company making the hardware.
There are exceptions - Intel and Adaptec, for example, but in general the linux stuff is an afterthought.