It should be possible to buy a Dell PC with JUST Windows installed, and nothing else.
All of the Dell systems I have seen from the Small Business and Home units at Dell come with lots of crap installed. The systems we get at work from the Large Business unit come stripped of everything but Windows.
As a resident of Greenville can you give me any more details on this? Right now I have the Charter price rape package. I can be downtown in less than 10 min (I think I am less than 5 miles). I would definitely be interested in finding out more.
Thanks,
James
Wow! What is with this story submission? The title on/. would suggest that the Linux growth is slowing. The only thing the article stated was that the rate of new companies testing Linux solutions was slowing.
The last line of the article sums it up nicely:
It may get harder to find potential customers that haven't yet tried out the Linux operating system. But has Linux hit a wall? Don't bet on it.
The prior paragraph also states that Linux server sales were up 35.2% for first quarter 2005, and that was the 11th consecutive quarter of double digit growth.
If you only need occasional black and white then laser is indeed the best way to go. For moderate to high volume black and white laser is also the way to go. For economy laser is the way to go. Using some examples from work, the cost per page for bubblejet printers was ~$.10/page. Laser was ~$.02/page. Figures for personal use will be a bit different, but not that much. (I buy toner/ink in large quantity for work.)
To sum up, bubblejet only if you need color and often. For anything else laser is probably the better option. If you are like me and print 10 pages a year for personal use, beg work or go to Kinko's or some other printing establishment.
I don't think I would tout Dell's website as a good example of.NET. It has been my experience that Dell's website has more problems than any other major company's website I have to regulary visit.
Just this week I worked quite hard to get a good price from Dell only to watch as the deal almost fell through because of their website being down (Quote to Order section) with no estimated time to repair. In fact it does not even have a notice that it is down. It simply fails to return any results.
There may be examples of.NET working for large website, but I would definitely not point to Dell's website as an example.
Booting from a Linux software RAID drive works just fine. I currently run a RAID1 (mirror) array for my / partition.
I have two 160GB SATA disks. Partitioning is like this:
/dev/sda1 15G Fat32 (0x0c) /dev/sda2 15G Fat32 (0x0c) /dev/sda3 15G JFS (0xfd) /dev/sda4 rest of disk
sdb is an exact copy of sda. I boot fine from/dev/sda3 (the grub boot block is on/dev/sda1, but that is only to dodge the 1024 cylinder limit, the actual kernel file is on sda3)
To sum up booting from a/dev/mdX device is easy. Just have a recent 2.6 kernel and compile in md. Pass boot=/dev/mdX and let it figure things out for itself.
The only problem with putting sites in the hosts file (%systemroot%\system32\drivers\etc\hosts) is that many of these programs will lock the computer until they are able to communicate. The first exposure I had to spyware was a friends laptop who claimed the system froze showing an hourglass and the start bar/desktop. I hooked the system up to my home lan and it worked, albeit slowly. Once I disconnected the lan cable it froze. Some research/cleanup later it worked fine either with or without the network connection, but the moral of it is that some spyware apps will block the computer from use until they connect to their respective site.
The only article I could get to said that the technology "will allow a tripling of battery life." That would seem to indicate that it will make the batteries last for three times as long rather than hold 3x more power at once. It would be nice to have a battery that held 3x the power, but a battery that needed replacing every ~3 years vice every year would be great as well.
By default on Win2000 Pro and WinXP Pro the network icon in system tray is only there when no connection is present. Of course most people I know change it to always be there. I also have about one user per week disable their ethernet connection and then call me wondering why their internet no longer works. Go figure.
Well, as someone responsible for broadband access at several sites across South Carolina and North Carolina I can say that TimeWarner Cable (RoadRunner) is only available in part (half maybe) of South Carolina.
The breakdown that I know of is:
Greenville: Charter (haven't seen TW here)
Columbia: TimeWarner
Myrtle Beach: TimeWarner
Charleston: Don't remember who, but not TW
I know that this is in no way an exhasutive list, but Charter has the upstate, TW the central and north coastal regions, with someone else handling the Charleston/south coastal areas.
I think AOL is pushing BellSouth Fastaccess, because it is available in all 9 states they are pulling out of. It may not be the best option, but their prices pretty much obliterate everyone else for business access. For home users if BellSouth would offer naked DSL I would get it. Charter charges ~$100/month for cable modem and most TV channels. BellSouth can be had (at a slower speed 128/768?) for ~$30/month. It is no wonder that AOL is pulling out of broadband. Most broadband users are more knowledgeable than the standard AOL user. Those who get broadband soon find out how bad AOL is and then dump them.
Just my simple ramblings on why this is happening.
Even if the spammer implements retry on their zombies, the sheer volume of replies from SMTP servers will cause a DOS on the cable/dsl line. Hopefully when Joe Sixpack can no longer use his internet connection he will attempt to find and fix the cause.
<rant> Not to knock your game (I have no idea which one it is), but of the 18+ PS2 titles I have I would readily go back in time and stop myself from spending my hard earned $50 on most of them. I have been satisfied with a very few titles. My favorites that I still play were bought for $20 as "Greatest Hits" titles. I did buy a couple of games brand new that I feel as if I got my money's worth from them. So out of the games I bought maybe four or five were worth my hard earned money. Most of the games I played through partway and then just quite. I felt most games were simply wasting my time. If game developers made games that had some replay value then more people would buy them. The small percentage that pirated the game would be inconsequential due to sheer volume of sales. </rant>
I wonder what kind of hd was used in those units? I have a roll-your-own mini-itx setup in my trunk. The OS drive is a 1Gb CompactFlash card and the media drive is a 30Gb Hitachi 2.5" laptop HD. To date (just over a year) I have not had any problems with the HD skipping or crashing. I drive a Prelude that is regularly abused by numerous potholes and the laptop HD has taken the beatings well. I have experienced problems with the touchscreen in the dash due to summer heat, but no issues with the HD.
If your system was skipping over small bumps I would definitely have that "professional" mounting job checked. My HD was screwed to the PC case and the case was mounted to the sheet metal in the back of the back seat. I used no manner of shock dampening system at all. Hopefully I haven't jinxed myself by posting this, but what the hell.
I probably shouldn't reply to myself, but after digging a little through the Neuros site I found that there is software (written in Perl) that works great on Linux. The software, Sorune (linky), is to manage playlist and such for the Neuros. The CEO of the company also seems committed to open source (not just the firmware, but the specs of the player as well). I will do some more research on this tommorrow, but I think I may have just found my next purchase.
The Neuros looks damn cool, but does it work under Linux? The site lists Win?? as a requirement. Can you mount the flash/HD as a USB mass storage device under Linux? I have been considering purchasing a player, but ogg support (my 1000 CDs are ripped in ogg vorbis format) and Linux support are a must.
As an armchair astronaut (is there such a thing?) I applaud NASA's decision to keep the Hubble Space telescope operational. I have been fascinated over and over again by the images it produces. I think it may be one of the things that can keep NASA in the public eye and help it to get funding for more space exploration. I just hope that the repairs go well.
I have no idea how to apply the patch under Linux, but you can get a trial version of rar/unrar from:
http://www.rarsoft.com/download.htm. You can also get the source for the unrar under some sort of freeware license from:
http://www.rarsoft.com/rar_add.htm. Not to be a Gentoo zealot, but under Gentoo an 'emerge -v unrar' will get you the free unrar utility. I imagine other distros have a package of unrar as well.
Application installs can be a little rough on Linux.:) Again though, corporate desktops will be handled by the IT dept. Home users can install most things in their home directory. Most system wide applications will be installed during install so that should not be that much of a problem. The biggest hurdle I see is training users not to run as root all the time. Running as root makes things easier on the user (the reason Windows does this). Maybe these recent virus incidents will open the average home users eyes to at least consider security.
I am not saying that I do not want Joe Sixpack to be able to install Linux, just that once the corporate desktop is running Linux Joe Sixpack will be as well.
I also question your idea that business users are Joe Sixpacks at work. In a business environment it is the responsibility of the IT dept to handle computer related issues. At home Joe Sixpack must make those decisions (and deal with the consequnces) for himself.
I think that once business moves the home market will follow. Do you think Dell, HP, eMachines, etc want to support Linux for business and Windows for home? I feel that IBM/Wintel=work Mac=school thoughts are what pushed MS to where they are today. Once we get Linux=work mentality around I think the same thing will happen again.
Do you honestly expect Joe Sixpack to install Linux? I think the problem is not that we need to make Linux installable by Joe Sixpack, but rather that we need to get OEMs to install and configure Linux.
Have you ever met a "normal" user who could install Windows? Most installs of Windows are done by OEMs or from a specially tailored OEM install disc. If users had a special install of Linux that included support for all of their OEM hardware do you think they could install it?
I think a more widespread adoption of Linux will start with business. You will have IT depts that start using it and eventually replacing Windows with it. Once the more technically inclined start to use it at work they try it at home. There will be problems, but who cares? As more people start to use Linux the answers to their questions will be posted to forums, discussion sites, usenet, whatever. The same way that Windows help has become so common.
One last question: Why is there an impression that Windows is easier to install/fix than Linux?
My opinion is that most users know how to speak "Microsoft". i.e. They know how to formulate questions that are worded in the common language used to describe the Windows environment. Back when I worked on a HelpDesk and fixed 100% Windows machines I was able to quickly locate answers to my technical questions. Forward 6 years to today: I still occassionally fix Windows PCs, but the majority of my work is on Linux. I can fix problems in Linux because I know how to speak the "Linux" language. I can do a Google search and get productive results because I know how to search for Linux specific answers.(I know Google has a Linux Specific search, but s/Linux/MacOS X/ and the point still stands)
In conclusion, I don't think we need to make Linux so easy to install that Joe Sixpack can do it (he can already _use_ Linux), I think we need business to start adopting it. The masses will follow.
I think your comment was intended to be funny, but I would like to point out that if you change the file extension in the wav link to mp3 you will get the mp3 version.
Mozilla does not have the per site Java/JavaScript controls, but Konqueror does. I don't have a Mac, but I would guess that Safari has the same controls. If you are running on Linux (or some *nix) Konqueror is an option.
2) Whatever browser is set as the default is what the Run box will open. Firefox will never be as integrated as IE, but that integration is part of the problem. It is a good thing. Open Firefox from an icon and use it as just a web browser, not as a file browser, desktop viewer, whatever else IE wants to be.
3a) In Mozilla you can disable the download manager by going to Edit->Preferences. Under the Navigator section select Downloads. On the right side of the screen you can choose Download Manager, Progress Dialog, or nothing for downloads.
3b) Under Firefox (0.9.1) you can trun off the Download Manager, but the alternative is no Progress Dialog of any kind. To do this go to Edit->Preferences. Select Downloads on the left. On the right side set the download folder to whatever you want and then look at the settings for the download manager.
This is all from a Linux box, but the settings for the Windows version of Mozilla and Firefox should have identical settings.
I have never been able to use WindowsUpdate from Mozilla. Of course even if you uninstall IE from XP or 2000 all the parts of it are still there, just the icon is gone.
I don't know how much instruction you can get from Burnout 2, but it is the most addictive video game I own. After purchasing it, I think my friends and I beat it in a week and still play almost every week more than 6 months after I bought it.
I just found two copies online for others that have played it at my house. Burnout 2 is a highly recommended game.
Slashdot Mirror
It should be possible to buy a Dell PC with JUST Windows installed, and nothing else.
All of the Dell systems I have seen from the Small Business and Home units at Dell come with lots of crap installed. The systems we get at work from the Large Business unit come stripped of everything but Windows.
Cheers,
the_crowbar
As a resident of Greenville can you give me any more details on this? Right now I have the Charter price rape package. I can be downtown in less than 10 min (I think I am less than 5 miles). I would definitely be interested in finding out more. Thanks, James
Wow! What is with this story submission? The title on /. would suggest that the Linux growth is slowing. The only thing the article stated was that the rate of new companies testing Linux solutions was slowing.
The last line of the article sums it up nicely:
The prior paragraph also states that Linux server sales were up 35.2% for first quarter 2005, and that was the 11th consecutive quarter of double digit growth.
the_crowbarIf you only need occasional black and white then laser is indeed the best way to go. For moderate to high volume black and white laser is also the way to go. For economy laser is the way to go. Using some examples from work, the cost per page for bubblejet printers was ~$.10/page. Laser was ~$.02/page. Figures for personal use will be a bit different, but not that much. (I buy toner/ink in large quantity for work.)
To sum up, bubblejet only if you need color and often. For anything else laser is probably the better option. If you are like me and print 10 pages a year for personal use, beg work or go to Kinko's or some other printing establishment.
Cheers,the_crowbar
I don't think I would tout Dell's website as a good example of .NET. It has been my experience that Dell's website has more problems than any other major company's website I have to regulary visit.
Just this week I worked quite hard to get a good price from Dell only to watch as the deal almost fell through because of their website being down (Quote to Order section) with no estimated time to repair. In fact it does not even have a notice that it is down. It simply fails to return any results.
There may be examples of .NET working for large website, but I would definitely not point to Dell's website as an example.
Cheers,the_crowbar
Booting from a Linux software RAID drive works just fine. I currently run a RAID1 (mirror) array for my / partition.
I have two 160GB SATA disks. Partitioning is like this:
sdb is an exact copy of sda. I boot fine fromTo sum up booting from a /dev/mdX device is easy. Just have a recent 2.6 kernel and compile in md. Pass boot=/dev/mdX and let it figure things out for itself.
Cheers,the_crowbar
The only problem with putting sites in the hosts file (%systemroot%\system32\drivers\etc\hosts) is that many of these programs will lock the computer until they are able to communicate. The first exposure I had to spyware was a friends laptop who claimed the system froze showing an hourglass and the start bar/desktop. I hooked the system up to my home lan and it worked, albeit slowly. Once I disconnected the lan cable it froze. Some research/cleanup later it worked fine either with or without the network connection, but the moral of it is that some spyware apps will block the computer from use until they connect to their respective site.
Cheers,the_crowbar
The only article I could get to said that the technology "will allow a tripling of battery life." That would seem to indicate that it will make the batteries last for three times as long rather than hold 3x more power at once. It would be nice to have a battery that held 3x the power, but a battery that needed replacing every ~3 years vice every year would be great as well.
Any one else interpret it the same way?
Cheers,the_crowbar
By default on Win2000 Pro and WinXP Pro the network icon in system tray is only there when no connection is present. Of course most people I know change it to always be there. I also have about one user per week disable their ethernet connection and then call me wondering why their internet no longer works. Go figure.
Cheers,
the_crowbar
Well, as someone responsible for broadband access at several sites across South Carolina and North Carolina I can say that TimeWarner Cable (RoadRunner) is only available in part (half maybe) of South Carolina.
The breakdown that I know of is:
- Greenville: Charter (haven't seen TW here)
- Columbia: TimeWarner
- Myrtle Beach: TimeWarner
- Charleston: Don't remember who, but not TW
I know that this is in no way an exhasutive list, but Charter has the upstate, TW the central and north coastal regions, with someone else handling the Charleston/south coastal areas.I think AOL is pushing BellSouth Fastaccess, because it is available in all 9 states they are pulling out of. It may not be the best option, but their prices pretty much obliterate everyone else for business access. For home users if BellSouth would offer naked DSL I would get it. Charter charges ~$100/month for cable modem and most TV channels. BellSouth can be had (at a slower speed 128/768?) for ~$30/month. It is no wonder that AOL is pulling out of broadband. Most broadband users are more knowledgeable than the standard AOL user. Those who get broadband soon find out how bad AOL is and then dump them.
Just my simple ramblings on why this is happening.
Cheers,the_crowbar
Even if the spammer implements retry on their zombies, the sheer volume of replies from SMTP servers will cause a DOS on the cable/dsl line. Hopefully when Joe Sixpack can no longer use his internet connection he will attempt to find and fix the cause.
I do agree with your second point though.
Cheers,the_crowbar
<rant> Not to knock your game (I have no idea which one it is), but of the 18+ PS2 titles I have I would readily go back in time and stop myself from spending my hard earned $50 on most of them. I have been satisfied with a very few titles. My favorites that I still play were bought for $20 as "Greatest Hits" titles. I did buy a couple of games brand new that I feel as if I got my money's worth from them. So out of the games I bought maybe four or five were worth my hard earned money. Most of the games I played through partway and then just quite. I felt most games were simply wasting my time. If game developers made games that had some replay value then more people would buy them. The small percentage that pirated the game would be inconsequential due to sheer volume of sales. </rant>
Cheers,the_crowbar
I wonder what kind of hd was used in those units? I have a roll-your-own mini-itx setup in my trunk. The OS drive is a 1Gb CompactFlash card and the media drive is a 30Gb Hitachi 2.5" laptop HD. To date (just over a year) I have not had any problems with the HD skipping or crashing. I drive a Prelude that is regularly abused by numerous potholes and the laptop HD has taken the beatings well. I have experienced problems with the touchscreen in the dash due to summer heat, but no issues with the HD.
If your system was skipping over small bumps I would definitely have that "professional" mounting job checked. My HD was screwed to the PC case and the case was mounted to the sheet metal in the back of the back seat. I used no manner of shock dampening system at all. Hopefully I haven't jinxed myself by posting this, but what the hell.
Cheers,the_crowbar
I probably shouldn't reply to myself, but after digging a little through the Neuros site I found that there is software (written in Perl) that works great on Linux. The software, Sorune (linky), is to manage playlist and such for the Neuros. The CEO of the company also seems committed to open source (not just the firmware, but the specs of the player as well). I will do some more research on this tommorrow, but I think I may have just found my next purchase.
Cheers,the_crowbar
The Neuros looks damn cool, but does it work under Linux? The site lists Win?? as a requirement. Can you mount the flash/HD as a USB mass storage device under Linux? I have been considering purchasing a player, but ogg support (my 1000 CDs are ripped in ogg vorbis format) and Linux support are a must.
Thanks,the_crowbar
As an armchair astronaut (is there such a thing?) I applaud NASA's decision to keep the Hubble Space telescope operational. I have been fascinated over and over again by the images it produces. I think it may be one of the things that can keep NASA in the public eye and help it to get funding for more space exploration. I just hope that the repairs go well.
Cheers,
the_crowbar
I have no idea how to apply the patch under Linux, but you can get a trial version of rar/unrar from: http://www.rarsoft.com/download.htm. You can also get the source for the unrar under some sort of freeware license from: http://www.rarsoft.com/rar_add.htm. Not to be a Gentoo zealot, but under Gentoo an 'emerge -v unrar' will get you the free unrar utility. I imagine other distros have a package of unrar as well.
Cheers,the_crowbar
Application installs can be a little rough on Linux. :) Again though, corporate desktops will be handled by the IT dept. Home users can install most things in their home directory. Most system wide applications will be installed during install so that should not be that much of a problem. The biggest hurdle I see is training users not to run as root all the time. Running as root makes things easier on the user (the reason Windows does this). Maybe these recent virus incidents will open the average home users eyes to at least consider security.
Cheers,the_crowbar
Congratulations! Please don't think I do not want you to run Linux; it is just that I think the focus should be on business.
Cheers,the_crowbar
I am not saying that I do not want Joe Sixpack to be able to install Linux, just that once the corporate desktop is running Linux Joe Sixpack will be as well.
I also question your idea that business users are Joe Sixpacks at work. In a business environment it is the responsibility of the IT dept to handle computer related issues. At home Joe Sixpack must make those decisions (and deal with the consequnces) for himself.
I think that once business moves the home market will follow. Do you think Dell, HP, eMachines, etc want to support Linux for business and Windows for home? I feel that IBM/Wintel=work Mac=school thoughts are what pushed MS to where they are today. Once we get Linux=work mentality around I think the same thing will happen again.
Cheers,the_crowbar
Do you honestly expect Joe Sixpack to install Linux? I think the problem is not that we need to make Linux installable by Joe Sixpack, but rather that we need to get OEMs to install and configure Linux.
Have you ever met a "normal" user who could install Windows? Most installs of Windows are done by OEMs or from a specially tailored OEM install disc. If users had a special install of Linux that included support for all of their OEM hardware do you think they could install it?
I think a more widespread adoption of Linux will start with business. You will have IT depts that start using it and eventually replacing Windows with it. Once the more technically inclined start to use it at work they try it at home. There will be problems, but who cares? As more people start to use Linux the answers to their questions will be posted to forums, discussion sites, usenet, whatever. The same way that Windows help has become so common.
One last question: Why is there an impression that Windows is easier to install/fix than Linux?
My opinion is that most users know how to speak "Microsoft". i.e. They know how to formulate questions that are worded in the common language used to describe the Windows environment. Back when I worked on a HelpDesk and fixed 100% Windows machines I was able to quickly locate answers to my technical questions. Forward 6 years to today: I still occassionally fix Windows PCs, but the majority of my work is on Linux. I can fix problems in Linux because I know how to speak the "Linux" language. I can do a Google search and get productive results because I know how to search for Linux specific answers.(I know Google has a Linux Specific search, but s/Linux/MacOS X/ and the point still stands)
In conclusion, I don't think we need to make Linux so easy to install that Joe Sixpack can do it (he can already _use_ Linux), I think we need business to start adopting it. The masses will follow.
Cheers,the_crowbar
I think your comment was intended to be funny, but I would like to point out that if you change the file extension in the wav link to mp3 you will get the mp3 version.
Cheers,the_crowbar
Mozilla does not have the per site Java/JavaScript controls, but Konqueror does. I don't have a Mac, but I would guess that Safari has the same controls. If you are running on Linux (or some *nix) Konqueror is an option.
Cheers,the_crowbar
Ok here is a little more detail:
1) Firefox is lighter
2) Whatever browser is set as the default is what the Run box will open. Firefox will never be as integrated as IE, but that integration is part of the problem. It is a good thing. Open Firefox from an icon and use it as just a web browser, not as a file browser, desktop viewer, whatever else IE wants to be.
3a) In Mozilla you can disable the download manager by going to Edit->Preferences. Under the Navigator section select Downloads. On the right side of the screen you can choose Download Manager, Progress Dialog, or nothing for downloads.
3b) Under Firefox (0.9.1) you can trun off the Download Manager, but the alternative is no Progress Dialog of any kind. To do this go to Edit->Preferences. Select Downloads on the left. On the right side set the download folder to whatever you want and then look at the settings for the download manager.
This is all from a Linux box, but the settings for the Windows version of Mozilla and Firefox should have identical settings.
I have never been able to use WindowsUpdate from Mozilla. Of course even if you uninstall IE from XP or 2000 all the parts of it are still there, just the icon is gone.
HTH
the_crowbar
I don't know how much instruction you can get from Burnout 2, but it is the most addictive video game I own. After purchasing it, I think my friends and I beat it in a week and still play almost every week more than 6 months after I bought it.
I just found two copies online for others that have played it at my house. Burnout 2 is a highly recommended game.
the_crowbar