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thedukeofurl.org has a linux buyers guide.

Duke of URL did it. Buyer's Guide 13

Ditto, you'll probably need to change a bunch of stuff to make the transition from a 2.2 to 2.4 kernel, _unless_ your distribution came out late last year (redhat 7, for example) and it has most of the junk already in place because people knew in a general way what 2.4 would require. This link was posted on slashdot around the time 2.4 came out, and it has good instructions on compiling a new kernel, as well as what changed from 2.2 to 2.4.

cheers

"Basically, NVIDIA's drivers cannot be open sourced. They contain several components which are licensed technology, and we have no rights to share that source code with anyone. We do not even provide source code to OpenGL or our kernel module to our board customers"

seems like a reasonable explanation to me. (Interview from theDukeofURL.org.

DukeOfURL wrote this helpful article in choosing the best Linux distribution for your skill level, with comparisons of Beginner, Intermediate and Advanced distributions. They highly recommend Mandrake Linux for beginners, and I would tend to agree.

According to this non-Apple comparison, the G4 500 is about equivalent to a Pentium III 800.

A review I've read indicates that OS X system response is less than stellar on a 400 MHz G3. Maybe OS X.1 will fix that (I'm guessing that that's what people are referring to as "speed gremlins"), but meanwhile I'll wait until it comes out and find out for myself.

Incidentally, the Yellow Dog Linux review posted earlier on /. has some more real-world performance metrics than Apple marketing's Photoshop tests and show that the lower real-world system performance may be endemic to the G3/4 processors slower clock speeds. The summary is that a 500 MHz G4 is roughly equivalent to an 800 MHz Pentium III.

Moderator: This user's post was a pun, not a troll.

Check out:

http://www.thedukeofurl.org/reviews/misc/yellowdog 20/7.shtml

from the review, or more specifically:

http://devel.yellowdoglinux.com/rp_yup.shtml

I certainly preferred this rather than some lamer posting 'Weee 1st post!'.

I think the URL for the review is mangled... The real one is here:

http://www.thedukeofurl.org/reviews/misc/libranet1 90/printable.shtml

--8<--

ÕÕ

Once that is done and you get the TCP/IP stack up to speed I might even try it!

Up to speed? Looks like it's been there for a while. Graph shows the 4.2 FreeBSD is faster.

It's a fairly well known fact that the *BSD's are not very popular due to the zealotry and elitism associated with it.

The only 'zealotry and elitism' I see here is what you are trying to associate to BSD.

The duke of URL had a graph showing quake running faster on FreeBSD than Linux. way to the Duke and the duke and for the graph. the graph showing its faster

And Walnut Creek had a 1 page glossy claiming 20-30% faster performance.

The duke of URL had a graph showing quake running faster on FreeBSD than Linux. way to the Duke and the duke and for the graph. the graph showing its faster

And Walnut Creek had a 1 page glossy claiming 20-30% faster performance.

Your criteria is "small, fast, and compatible" not to mention "freely hacked"

Yet BSD is a BETTER choice based on your criteria.
Small - PicoBSD is a fully functioning Unix OS on a floppy.
Fast - BSD on benchmarks runs FASTER than linux. 10-30% faster.
Compatible - The result of the X86Open group (creation of a common binary format for X86 unixes) was a Linux ELF format. Thusly products like FreeBSD can run Linux binaries. And, FreeBSD can run Quake III linux binaries FASTER than Linux does. And, it is well known and accepted that NetBSD is ported to more platforms.

And, "freely hackable", the BSD license allows the user of the code to commericalize their product without the worry of having to release the IP the company uses in the product. The code is MUCH more free to do what a human wants to than other licenses.

Looking at 2 'linux' projects that are willing to admit they used the pioneering work of NetBSD are the dreamcast port (acknolodge the boot code is NetBSD inspired) and Linux on WinCE

Linux may 'work well', but in the world of computer code, the BSD tree is BETTER!

Yeah, I had the same problem with my computer (Mandrake 7.0 + NVidia GeForce II MX). I just had to download the drivers off NVidia's website; after that X started up just fine.

Maybe this is drifting off topic a little, but I found these two links extremely helpful when trying to solve the problem you mentioned.

http://www.thedukeofurl.org/reviews/misc/3dlinux/4 .shtml

http://www.evil3d.net/articles/linux_nv4/index.sht ml

If you're interested in why NVidia's drivers are closed-source, I would recommend reading this brief interview of an nvidia developer.

Here's a nice review of the SMC EtherPowerII, Intel EtherExpress Pro, and 3Com Etherlink XL. According to the article, the SMC outperforms both the Intel and the 3Com card (Intel performs second-best). Pretty interesting since the SMC is actually cheaper than the Intel/3Com NICs.

Today's keynote address was from Michael Dell who preached the promising future of Linux. Dell discussed his company's efforts to focus on Linux for server infrastructure. He mentioned that Dell is spending more R&D dollars on Linux than any other OS. What that means, you can figure out. While Michael Dell energized the crowd at first, there were some tense moments when numerous audience members berated Dell for charging a premium price for a Linux system as compared to a Windows server. He tried to avoid the issue as best as possible, but the audience pursued the issue. Finally, he answered that people should be looking for an OS that offers applications with the most value.

What does that last fatuous statement translate as? My translation would be "I'll say any damn thing as long as you buy my slightly overpriced machines". Yes, he's supporting Linux, but only in the most cynical way possible, by jumping on a hot PR bandwagon.

The folks at duke of url have discussed 4.0.1 and the nvidia drivers, and they are mirroring the drivers. As of now, the drivers are linked right on their main page. I myself am using 4.0 and the .93 drivers and things are working great (except that the .93 driver or an interaction with xfree86 4.0 seems to break dpms power management) -- I'm in no hurry to upgrade right now.

-schussat