I’m new to programming and not really knowledgeable to comment here generally, though I read Slashdot regularly mostly for the comments—you guys are great.
I’ve had both Windows 7 and Ubuntu 11.04 in a dual boot configuration on my desktop and laptop for quite some time. I installed Ubuntu because I was told, correctly I think, that it was a good way to get to know my machine, but I pretty much never booted into Ubuntu because I never really had to and for what I was using the computer, Windows worked really well.
At any rate, a couple of days ago I get a ‘this copy of Windows is not genuine’ message at the bottom left corner of my desktop—probably because it probably really isn’t—so I upgraded to 12.04 and moved over to Ubuntu. I think I’m going to stick with it.
The first thing I notice is that only one of my monitors displays, so I go into ‘display’ or whatever and see that the system isn’t aware of a second monitor. Detect monitors does nothing. So I spend some time googling and somehow after surfing I discover that there’s this nvidia-setting app on my system that I can use to configure my video card/display. I spend about 40 minutes messing with the configurations, trying different settings until, yay, I get my dual monitor display up and running. It’s running okay, but it doesn’t look nearly as crisp as it did on Windows. Also the top panel of the desktop covers the top of my applications’ windows so that I need to drag them down to minimize or close them. I am now researching moving the desktop panel, which seems to be trickier than it should be on this new Ubuntu release. I did learn a bit in the process, about drivers and configurations and settings utilities, so I’m more equipped to deal with the next issue that hits me, but none of this happens (as far as I know) on Windows and after everything, so far, Widows looks better. Now I have to set up my wifi router and I don’t think it will be as easy to do as following the prompts on the Linksys setup wizard I used on the Windows cd I got when I bought the product. Good thing, I have some free time tonight.
It’s thrilling to have a solved a problem, and I was too happy having figured out how to configure the dual display (baby steps ) to worry about the display quality (though I do hope there’s way to fix it).
I will more become more knowledgeable hacking my way through the OS but if I weren’t interested in learning about this stuff, I’d pony up the bucks and go with Window 7 which I think is a stellar product.
To answer the question, I think the only way Linux gets respectable market share is when and if users get to choose (off the shelf) between a Widows loaded machine and a substantially less expensive Linux machine. I know of no way now to buy a machine without building it (or having it built, which is was I did with my desktop and is why I have an illegal Windows OS) and save money by going Linux. So the ‘free’ advantage is mostly moot for regular users who simply buy machines. As far as I know all machines come with Windows when shipping from major retailers.
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I’m new to programming and not really knowledgeable to comment here generally, though I read Slashdot regularly mostly for the comments—you guys are great. I’ve had both Windows 7 and Ubuntu 11.04 in a dual boot configuration on my desktop and laptop for quite some time. I installed Ubuntu because I was told, correctly I think, that it was a good way to get to know my machine, but I pretty much never booted into Ubuntu because I never really had to and for what I was using the computer, Windows worked really well. At any rate, a couple of days ago I get a ‘this copy of Windows is not genuine’ message at the bottom left corner of my desktop—probably because it probably really isn’t—so I upgraded to 12.04 and moved over to Ubuntu. I think I’m going to stick with it. The first thing I notice is that only one of my monitors displays, so I go into ‘display’ or whatever and see that the system isn’t aware of a second monitor. Detect monitors does nothing. So I spend some time googling and somehow after surfing I discover that there’s this nvidia-setting app on my system that I can use to configure my video card/display. I spend about 40 minutes messing with the configurations, trying different settings until, yay, I get my dual monitor display up and running. It’s running okay, but it doesn’t look nearly as crisp as it did on Windows. Also the top panel of the desktop covers the top of my applications’ windows so that I need to drag them down to minimize or close them. I am now researching moving the desktop panel, which seems to be trickier than it should be on this new Ubuntu release. I did learn a bit in the process, about drivers and configurations and settings utilities, so I’m more equipped to deal with the next issue that hits me, but none of this happens (as far as I know) on Windows and after everything, so far, Widows looks better. Now I have to set up my wifi router and I don’t think it will be as easy to do as following the prompts on the Linksys setup wizard I used on the Windows cd I got when I bought the product. Good thing, I have some free time tonight. It’s thrilling to have a solved a problem, and I was too happy having figured out how to configure the dual display (baby steps ) to worry about the display quality (though I do hope there’s way to fix it). I will more become more knowledgeable hacking my way through the OS but if I weren’t interested in learning about this stuff, I’d pony up the bucks and go with Window 7 which I think is a stellar product. To answer the question, I think the only way Linux gets respectable market share is when and if users get to choose (off the shelf) between a Widows loaded machine and a substantially less expensive Linux machine. I know of no way now to buy a machine without building it (or having it built, which is was I did with my desktop and is why I have an illegal Windows OS) and save money by going Linux. So the ‘free’ advantage is mostly moot for regular users who simply buy machines. As far as I know all machines come with Windows when shipping from major retailers.