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Yellow Dog Linux 2.0 review

Posted by Hemos on from the fighting-the-OSX-fight dept.

lotion writes "MaximumLinux.org has posted it's take of Yellow Dog Linux 2.0 on a PowerBook G4: "My distribution of choice was Yellow Dog Linux from Terra Soft Solutions. Adam and I had the opportunity to speak a bit with the co-founder and CEO Kai Staats of Terra Soft Solutions at the MacWorld Expo in NYC last month and I must say I was impressed. Not only was I impressed with there 2.0 release but there new hardware that they had rolled out that day as well.""

7 of 123 comments (clear)

  1. OS X isn't unreliable... by __aaaaxm1522 · · Score: 4, Informative
    First off, let me state that I'm not a Mac Junkie. I own a Powerbook G4 simply because I liked the hardware, and because I could run Linux on it (the big screen was what drew me in).


    That being said, I run YellowDog Linux 2.0 on my Ti and it kicks serious ass. It is an excellent Linux distribution, and for all intents and purposes, I've pretty much replaced my Linux desktop with the G4.


    I've also played with OS X on the Ti quite a bit. While Aqua (the GUI) *is* slow, OS X itself has been nothing but rock-solid. I take exception to the author's comment " (it) flat out kills OS X in speed and reliability..." - OS X has been nothing but reliable. But yes, KDE on the G4 certainly runs faster than Aqua under OS X - no wonder, since Aqua's rendering system is PDF based...


    All in all though, YDL 2.0 is a great PPC-based Linux distro.

    1. Re:OS X isn't unreliable... by jeffy124 · · Score: 4, Informative

      If you think OS-X is good now, wait until OS-X.1 is released next month. I've seen beta versions of it because my company is an Apple "Premier Developer." They've made a TON of gui fixes that result in faster reaction to user interactions. They've also improved on the so-called "bouncemark" measurement used to time how long a program takes to boot up. Overall, everything runs faster in the beta version. Plus they've added a few additional items, like DVD suppoer. Can't wait to play Crouching Tiger on my 21" wide-screen cinema monitor :)

      --
      The One Rule Of Chess You'll Ever Need: Don't play someone who carries a kit in their bookbag.
    2. Re:OS X isn't unreliable... by Rura+Penthe · · Score: 3, Informative

      Agreed, OS X has very few stability problems in most situations (and the ones it had problems in have mostly been ironed out as of 10.0.4). The GUI itself is slow (but useable for most people) and even that is being addressed with the 10.1 update due out in September. So any complaint on those fronts is specious.

      If you just want X11 you can even run XFree side by side Aqua and switch between the two on the fly or rootless X and stay entirely within Aqua. Or dualboot Darwin and the linux kernel and have everything you could ever want all on one machine. :)

    3. Re:OS X isn't unreliable... by owenc · · Score: 2, Informative

      While OS X is as stable as any other *nixy system, if aqua poops out on you it is essentially a crash, as there are no virtual consoles or key combinations that get you out of it. If you go to this page the flash content will freeze the desktop (using internet explorer). In linux, you can simply go to a different virtual console and kill stuff, but in OS X you have to SSH in from another box or reboot.
      I'm not advocating virtual consoles, but it would be nice to have a key combination that killed the loginwindow process.

  2. Upgrading Is, Quite Literally, Impossible by waldoj · · Score: 5, Informative
    A warning to all considering purchasing Yellow Dog 2.0 that already run an earlier version: it's impossible to upgrade.

    I bought v2.0 as soon as it came out a few months ago (the same as I did with v1.0), wanting to support Terra Soft by giving them some money. Not having read all of the technical notes before purchasing it, I didn't found out until I got it in the mail that there was no upgrade path from v1.2. I complained on the mailing list, which started a big battle, but solved nothing. I sent another post about a week ago, asking if I could upgrade yet. No replies.

    Poking around on their site, I can only find a single reference to the fact that upgrading is impossible. Is that in the installation guide? Nope. The engineer's notes? No sir. Perhaps just a note in their on-line store? Unh-uh. Surely the installation FAQ? No siree Bob. No, you'd have to go to the bottom of the support page and follow the Can I upgrade my previous install of YDL to 2.0? link, which says:
    While technically feasible, we have not yet posted instructions on using 'yup!' to update a YDL 1.2 system to YDL 2.0. Please stay tuned as we work out these details.
    This would indicate to me that upgrading is possible, just not via YUP, their fantastic apt-get type updating system. That, unfortunately, is not the case. Maybe there are other notices on their site, but I'm yet to locate them.

    I was told, at the time that I initially complained, that I just didn't properly appreciate how difficult that it was to get v2.0 out, and that it's really difficult to create a distribution that can be upgraded, and why should I worry about such details anyhow? Didn't I have proper tape backup and off-site storage procedures for my home iMac? Didn't I know that I was a fool to ever upgrade a machine? All of these things are true, but they don't excuse creating a release that without notifying purchasers beforehand cannot be upgraded.

    I like Yellow Dog Linux. I use it every day. I like Terra Soft, and I've enjoyed every enounter that I've had with their staff. I think that they've created a fine distribution. It irks me that it can't be upgraded, but that's their perogative and my incentive to run Mac OS X. But their lack of notification that this problem exists makes me nuts. This review, like all others, really makes me want to run v2.0. I sure hope that I can someday, because it looks like a gem of an update.

    -Waldo
  3. Re:Debian for PPC? by Jeffrey+Baker · · Score: 2, Informative

    I use Debian PPC on the TiBook, as do many people on the debian-powerpc@lists.debian.org mailing list. I installed 2.2r2 and upgraded using apt to the latest unstable release. I then replaced the kernel with Ben H's 2.4.8-benh kernel, which includes support for sleeping and some other useful bits. I don't have any problems at all, other than Linux using the battery a bit faster than MacOS 9 does.

  4. Re:yeah, but what about the BriQs? by DavidRavenMoon · · Score: 2, Informative
    The briQs are too expensive! Their 500 MHz G4 machine is almost $2,000!

    For $1,690 you can get a 733 MHz G4 with 4 PCI slots (the briQ has one slot that doesn't even come as PCI) and three RAM slots. The BriQ has 2. Plus the 4X AGP slot with a nVidia card. And the CD-RW drive, keyboard, mouse, etc.

    Other then the color, cosling more and having less features, the briQ and the G4 has more or less the same spcs.

    --
    -- if it was so, it might be; and if it were so, it would be; but as it isn't, it ain't. That's logic - Lewis Carrol