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VectorLinux SOHO 5.9 Deluxe Reviewed

Posted by timothy on from the heavy-duty-polish dept.

An anonymous reader writes with a link to Caitlyn Martin's review of the Slackware-based Vector Linux SOHO 5.9 Deluxe: "I've read past reviews by other reviewers describing Vector Linux as 'better Slackware than Slackware' or 'what Slackware should be' and I always felt that was a bit of a stretch. With this release it isn't a stretch. You get all the reliability and stability of Slackware, better performance than vanilla Slack (at least on my hardware) and the features and most of the conveniences users of distributions touted as user friendly have come to expect."

7 of 36 comments (clear)

  1. Cool by BPPG · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Vector Linux is a decent distro to try out if you're a distro-hopper. But it's still just one of those generic desktop distros that doesn't seem to have any specific aim. I've used it in the past on computers that struggled with other distros, and it seemed to work well.

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  2. Im a little confused... by jskline · · Score: 4, Informative

    I remember Slackware as being the most fundamental flavor out there--where you have to meta-configure every little thing about it... aka "fine tune" if you will the thing from the ground up. Which made it a rather secure system to start with since out of the proverbial box, it opens nothing up until you do.

    So; what is this "what Slackware should have" business???

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  3. Vector's aim by number6x · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Vector's aim is to be a small stable distro for home and small business use.

    That pretty much puts it in a class with a few hundred other distros. The difference with Vector is that it is a small stable Slackware based distro for home and small business use.

    For most people new to Linux that difference might be like saying 'but our's goes to 11!'. However, for long time Slackware users it is a good thing. If you have year's(or even decade's) of Slackware experience and are looking for a user friendly distro. Vector would be a good choice. Especially for small businesses.

    For non-Slackware users and Linux newbies you are absolutely correct that it does not stand out from the crowd.

    Vector is for Slackware what Libranet was for Debian. A really great implementation based on the parent distro. I miss Libranet. I keep hoping that Ubuntu or Mepis get up to Libranet quality standards someday.

    1. Re:Vector's aim by genican1 · · Score: 3, Insightful

      If you have year's(or even decade's) of Slackware experience and are looking for a user friendly distro.

      If you have years of slackware experience, why would you need a "user friendly" distro?

    2. Re:Vector's aim by Bootarn · · Score: 3, Insightful

      If you have years of slackware experience, why would you need a "user friendly" distro?

      I used Slackware for about five years, but I got tired of it mainly because of the package system. I tried to remedy this by installing third-party package managers like slapt-get. That didn't work for me either, because of (very) small repositories. About two years ago I decided I care too much about the bleeding edge to use Slackware, which is more stability oriented, and switched to Arch Linux. I keep thinking to myself that it would be nice to have a distribution with roots in Slackware, but with better community support and more recent packages. The point is, even if you want to have control over everything, configure && make && make install starts to drive you nuts after about four years. Even hackers eventually get lazy.

  4. Sorry by Chemisor · · Score: 3, Interesting

    No 64-bit build - no deal. All modern CPUs are 64-bit, and pretending that they don't exist is not going to help you.

  5. Great for older hardware too..... by budword · · Score: 2, Interesting

    I'm a Kubuntu fan, but when I'm setting up older hardware, sometimes even xubuntu and fluxbuntu are too heavy. Vector Linux light edition runs just fine on a 500Mhz box with 64MB of ram. DVD's and other multi-media run out of the box, no difficult config needed. Set up was easy too, though I wasn't using any unusual hardware. It's worth trying out.