Welcome to Thunderdome

Posted: **Tue Aug 30, 2005 10:10 am**

Unless you like Hollywood telling you what to do.

Posted: **Tue Aug 30, 2005 10:15 am**

"The table is already set," said Marcus Matthias, product manager for Microsoft's digital media division. "We can come in and eat at the buffet, or we can stand outside and wash cars."

Wash cars?

Posted: **Tue Aug 30, 2005 11:42 am**

I have a feeling that once WinXP reaches the point of obsolescence... say, 4-7 years from now, I'll be embracing Linux in a big way.

Posted: **Tue Aug 30, 2005 12:26 pm**

My thoughts exactly. Mebbe Wine and hardware will be polished enough to keep me from having to lose any games I have and brand new games were never much my style.

Posted: **Tue Aug 30, 2005 1:05 pm**

In short, the company is bending over backward--and investing considerable technological resources--to make sure Hollywood studios are happy with the next version of Windows, which is expected to ship on new PCs by late 2006.

I think they're just bending over for Hollywood.

Posted: **Tue Aug 30, 2005 1:15 pm**

Microsoft announces that it's spending millions to delay video piracy 90 days or so.

Posted: **Tue Aug 30, 2005 1:23 pm**

So they'll spend all their $ on this, yet forget about WinFS and the user-oriented features of Vista.

Yeah, this should help *nix in a serious way.

Posted: **Tue Aug 30, 2005 1:34 pm**

I was perfectly happy with my Win 98 box until the hardware it was running on started to flake out.

Posted: **Tue Aug 30, 2005 6:17 pm**

I stayed on with win98 way past the point of obselecence. I already knew I'd stay with winXP for a long time due to this kinda crap. Can you call a whole operating system spyware btw. WinXP will be my last microsoft operating system unless some huge changes happen.... but I still won't go with Macs :laugh:

Posted: **Tue Aug 30, 2005 6:31 pm**

RH Linux is cheaper and so much nicer than Windows. Only reason I don't use it is compatibility with my software.

Posted: **Tue Aug 30, 2005 9:06 pm**

Yawn.

There are already pirated copies of Vista out there. Does anyone really believe that peeps won't completely rip this OS apart within 90 days of release like Paul said?

It should be interesting to see if anyone sues Microsoft for this "feature".

And does anyone remember MSN Explorer?

Posted: **Wed Aug 31, 2005 7:27 am**

RH Linux is cheaper and so much nicer than Windows. Only reason I don't use it is compatibility with my software.

Red Hat, Redmond east.

They've got so many proprietary hooks in their software they can begin the extortion the same as Microsoft.

You might be able to use Wine to get your software to run.

Posted: **Wed Aug 31, 2005 9:09 am**

RH Linux is cheaper and so much nicer than Windows. Only reason I don't use it is compatibility with my software.
Red Hat, Redmond east.

They've got so many proprietary hooks in their software they can begin the extortion the same as Microsoft.

You might be able to use Wine to get your software to run.

Absolutely true, they are definately beginning to take ideas for MS. However, for now, they're the easiest to use for non-techie types. Once they're too proprietary, move to the next one down the chain. It should eventually bring this proprietary crap to a screeching halt.

And sure, I can get some software to run with Wine now, but I need most if not all to function.

And, I need a hellacious fast processor to run games through an emulator.

What we really need is software companies to release their software compiled for Linux.

Posted: **Wed Aug 31, 2005 9:11 am**

What we really need is software companies to release their software compiled for Linux.

Would doing so cause Microsoft to jack up their fees to that company to license the newest DirectX code?

Posted: **Wed Aug 31, 2005 9:15 am**

Ok, I've used RH. In my experience it's one of the most difficult distributions I've worked with. I tried to install it on a laptop with no success. I dropped Debian in and was good to go. Knoppix is insanely easy to work with. With the live CD you just plop it in the CD drive and boot. You can install it to the hard drive. Progeny Linux is really great too. I could go on but I'm kinda biased. Course, I've moved on from Linux.

Posted: **Wed Aug 31, 2005 9:41 am**

I've tinkered with the Knoppix boot CD.
I have a partition on my home PC that I was planning on using to boot some flavor of Linux (probably Knoppix), but I never got around to figuring out how.

My home PC us dual-boot with XP Pro and Windows 98. I kept 98 around because my old scanner required it. I suppose I could use it to run old games and such, but I just don't do that sort of stuff anymore.

Posted: **Wed Aug 31, 2005 9:51 am**

I've started using virtual machine so taht I can run Windosw XP and Windows 2000 at the same time on the same machine. Makes life easier.

Posted: **Wed Aug 31, 2005 9:58 am**

What we really need is software companies to release their software compiled for Linux.
Would doing so cause Microsoft to jack up their fees to that company to license the newest DirectX code?

Direct X is software designed to allow games to run in Windows. Trust me, a Linux program wouldn't use it.

Ok, Where to start.

RH is by far the simplest for the non-technically minded. It's point and click interface, specifically when installing is nice. Also, it focuses on X for the user interface, I found its X configurations much easier to use. And, given wider support, their laptop support will go up.

Debian...well, I love debian. You avoid all of the RH trappings with a great OS that can get its own updates online. I use Debian right now for my server, but Debian can be a real bitch to get X running.

Knoppix was really easy to use and seemed cool, but I'm curious about its power user functionality. I'd like to learn more about this in a non-boot-disk situation.

Never used Progeny, will have to look that one up.

Welcome to Thunderdome

Windows XP - The Last OS you'll ever want