Slackware has a binary package format you know...ever heard of the pkgtools (installpkg, upgradepkg, etc.)? Slackware packages are available on many sites too...linuxpackages.net being a big one.
Having switched from an RPM-based distro (Red Hat) to Slackware, I can honestly say that I don't miss RPMs at all and like having the option of using either source or Slackware packages, which I can actually use together properly...without dependency hell.
So don't buy the board, is it that hard?
I hope not...since I'm not going to buy it.
You use old hardware, why should NEW boards pander to your antiquation?
I don't know...backwards compatbility? You see, buying a new board doesn't necessarily imply building a completely new system with all new peripherals.
Why would you buy a USB mouse? Oh yeah, an optical USB mouse that works on any surface and never needs cleaning is such a PITA.
An optical PS/2 mouse requires just as little cleaning and it's supported without USB drivers (just needs a simple PS/2 port mouse driver)...neat eh?
SCSI is not for consumers. It's too expensive. Always has been, always will be.
Unfortunately...
"Legacy free" = Realizing that most consumers looking to buy such a board are on the cutting edge of hardware and technology, not stuck in 80s.
Actually, this machine (which has no USB or Firewire peripherals) doesn't contain any components from the 80s...though many of my other machines do. Having cutting edge hardware is fine, but I don't consider a "high speed" serial bus like USB to be the greatest thing since sliced bread. I mean, why not just stick those 2 simple PS/2 ports on there so that people can just use the same old PS/2 mice and keyboards?
Let's not forget that parallel port printers are still plentiful and many people have the old serial Palm cradles around. I don't know about you, but I'm not a big fan of replacing all my peripherals to use a new board...especially my tough IBM Model M keyboards.
This is the stupidest board I've seen in a while. I mean how the hell am I supposed to connect my IBM PS/2 Model M keyboard? No, I won't buy a new, low quality keyboard that doesn't click. Also, why would I ever buy a USB mouse...? I guess all those USB ports would come in handy for the whole 0 USB devices I own.
I'm not sure what Abit was smoking when they came up with this design...it just boggles the mind. I have a Palm cradle and an HP Deskjet which conveniently wouldn't work because they use "legacy" interfaces. Maybe all those IDE channels could come in handy...oh wait, or I could just continue to use SCSI.
In conclusion, "legacy free" = a load of cheap integrated crap with no backwards compatibility in terms of hardware. Way to go Abit (whose products I once purchased)...if I actually owned an Athlon or a Pentium 4 I know what I wouldn't be buying in terms of a mainboard.
Mozzilla is nice (I tried the 1.0 release recently), but the number of sites I surf daily that didn't render properly was pretty significant.
What are you smoking? Mozilla 1.0 hasn't been released yet. That might certainly explain why pages didn't render properly...
An open post the editors of Slashdot
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Penguin2Apple
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· Score: 1
It seems like every week now someone is writing one of these "I used to use operating system X and now I'm an OS X freak" articles and it gets posted on some sort of nerd news site (Slashdot, OSNews, etc.). It generally seems to be the same thing...some Windows bashing (always popular) and some desktop Linux bashing (generally not as popular), followed by a bunch of "OS X is great" and it gets pretty boring.
Now, I'm a Linux user and I used to be a DOS user (liked PC-DOS best), an Amiga Workbench/Amiga DOS user, but Linux is the best I've found yet. If I write some long opinion-filled "article" and submit it to Slashdot will it get posted?
Maybe it only works the other way...can someone send me a nice new Mac (for free, I lack money) with OS X loaded onto it so that I can write a "me too" article for all the Apple zealots?
Re:Linux versus Mac OS X is not a valid comparison
on
Penguin2Apple
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· Score: 1
Only the first paragrpah should be in italics...typo.
Re:Linux versus Mac OS X is not a valid comparison
on
Penguin2Apple
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· Score: 1
Linux is a decent server OS, that SUCKS as a desktop. Will people give up with this linux desktop shit? It is over until someone comes out with a completely unified desktop/window manager package that can be installed with a wizard. It has to be that easy.
What's that I see...could it be horrible generalizations? Since when does a GUI system have to be easy to use? I use Linux everyday and don't have a problem with X or whichever Window Manager I'm using at the time. You know why? Because I read the documentation and it wasn't so hard either. Just because X is graphical doesn't mean it has to be trivial to use, I mean it's there so that you can do stuff that can't be represented (easily or at all) in text.
I also find it somewhat incorrect that you claim that Linux "SUCKS" on the desktop...if it does everything that many people want (which it clearly does) then who are you to say that it isn't useful as a desktop OS? Don't confuse your opinion with everyone else's reality.
"Will people give up this linux desktop shit?", hmmm...no. It isn't over until no one is using it and that is unlikely to happen...sorry to disapoint you. I think the world would be better if you just stayed in your little land of pretty operating systems and let people who know what they're doing use real operating systems. If you want to use OS X then good for you, but don't expect others to care when you start on completely childish "I'm stupid and can't use Linux" rant.
The best way I've found to deal with ACPI is to NOT enable ACPI in the kernel, even though the BIOS on my board (Asus TUSL2-C) always has ACPI going. The kernel still sees the static IRQs I've setup for my PCI devices, so it's all good. Standard APM is all you need...
I mainly meant VIA-based Athlon boards...I don't know much about AMD's current chipset offerings these days, though I know I'd much prefer their stuff if I owned one of their CPUs (I used to). With VIA all you have to say is "4 in 1"...since getting things right the first time has never been one of VIA's strong points. I know for a fact that their chipsets has some serious problems with burst transfers over PCI, which tends to make them somewhat worthless in any real mission-critical environment.
I suppose someday AMD will shake off the consumer-class CPU reputation that it still yet has. When your biggest supporters are gamers and people who just want a 'bang for your buck' system that gaining a positive reputation for corporate servers and such will take some time.
Maybe some Athlon MPs and this chipset you speak of would be sufficiently reliable, but keep in mind that AMD isn't well known at all for SMP stuff and definitely aren't pushed very strongly by the big boys (Dell, etc.) in corporate/business markets. Don't get me wrong though, I don't think that Intel is king of CPUs or anything, but an Intel-based SMP setup is a bit less risky...though a bit more expensive certainly.
If you're only testing then it doesn't really matter does it? You see, when you're using less memory than your system has then adding more doesn't change things.
I suspect that anyone who would buy such a thing would be doing so on behalf of their company as well...so they would likely have more than 512MB installed, but I don't really see how you've determined that >= 2GB RAM is the magical number for such a setup. Think *application* here...
I would use the Xeons myself. Athlon-based systems really lack the kind of reliability that say a server needs...though that is mostly because of chipset problems, not the CPU itself.
I believe that Michael Dell would use the Xeon as well...since it's a bit hard to sell an Athlon MP to a large company who needs a system that won't lockup (or burn up) on its own accord.
Slashdot Mirror
Having switched from an RPM-based distro (Red Hat) to Slackware, I can honestly say that I don't miss RPMs at all and like having the option of using either source or Slackware packages, which I can actually use together properly...without dependency hell.
I hope not...since I'm not going to buy it.
You use old hardware, why should NEW boards pander to your antiquation?
I don't know...backwards compatbility? You see, buying a new board doesn't necessarily imply building a completely new system with all new peripherals.
Why would you buy a USB mouse? Oh yeah, an optical USB mouse that works on any surface and never needs cleaning is such a PITA.
An optical PS/2 mouse requires just as little cleaning and it's supported without USB drivers (just needs a simple PS/2 port mouse driver)...neat eh?
SCSI is not for consumers. It's too expensive. Always has been, always will be.
Unfortunately...
"Legacy free" = Realizing that most consumers looking to buy such a board are on the cutting edge of hardware and technology, not stuck in 80s.
Actually, this machine (which has no USB or Firewire peripherals) doesn't contain any components from the 80s...though many of my other machines do. Having cutting edge hardware is fine, but I don't consider a "high speed" serial bus like USB to be the greatest thing since sliced bread. I mean, why not just stick those 2 simple PS/2 ports on there so that people can just use the same old PS/2 mice and keyboards?
Let's not forget that parallel port printers are still plentiful and many people have the old serial Palm cradles around. I don't know about you, but I'm not a big fan of replacing all my peripherals to use a new board...especially my tough IBM Model M keyboards.
I'm not sure what Abit was smoking when they came up with this design...it just boggles the mind. I have a Palm cradle and an HP Deskjet which conveniently wouldn't work because they use "legacy" interfaces. Maybe all those IDE channels could come in handy...oh wait, or I could just continue to use SCSI.
In conclusion, "legacy free" = a load of cheap integrated crap with no backwards compatibility in terms of hardware. Way to go Abit (whose products I once purchased)...if I actually owned an Athlon or a Pentium 4 I know what I wouldn't be buying in terms of a mainboard.
What are you smoking? Mozilla 1.0 hasn't been released yet. That might certainly explain why pages didn't render properly...
Now, I'm a Linux user and I used to be a DOS user (liked PC-DOS best), an Amiga Workbench/Amiga DOS user, but Linux is the best I've found yet. If I write some long opinion-filled "article" and submit it to Slashdot will it get posted?
Maybe it only works the other way...can someone send me a nice new Mac (for free, I lack money) with OS X loaded onto it so that I can write a "me too" article for all the Apple zealots?
Only the first paragrpah should be in italics...typo.
What's that I see...could it be horrible generalizations? Since when does a GUI system have to be easy to use? I use Linux everyday and don't have a problem with X or whichever Window Manager I'm using at the time. You know why? Because I read the documentation and it wasn't so hard either. Just because X is graphical doesn't mean it has to be trivial to use, I mean it's there so that you can do stuff that can't be represented (easily or at all) in text.
I also find it somewhat incorrect that you claim that Linux "SUCKS" on the desktop...if it does everything that many people want (which it clearly does) then who are you to say that it isn't useful as a desktop OS? Don't confuse your opinion with everyone else's reality.
"Will people give up this linux desktop shit?", hmmm...no. It isn't over until no one is using it and that is unlikely to happen...sorry to disapoint you. I think the world would be better if you just stayed in your little land of pretty operating systems and let people who know what they're doing use real operating systems. If you want to use OS X then good for you, but don't expect others to care when you start on completely childish "I'm stupid and can't use Linux" rant.
The best way I've found to deal with ACPI is to NOT enable ACPI in the kernel, even though the BIOS on my board (Asus TUSL2-C) always has ACPI going. The kernel still sees the static IRQs I've setup for my PCI devices, so it's all good. Standard APM is all you need...
I mainly meant VIA-based Athlon boards...I don't know much about AMD's current chipset offerings these days, though I know I'd much prefer their stuff if I owned one of their CPUs (I used to). With VIA all you have to say is "4 in 1"...since getting things right the first time has never been one of VIA's strong points. I know for a fact that their chipsets has some serious problems with burst transfers over PCI, which tends to make them somewhat worthless in any real mission-critical environment. I suppose someday AMD will shake off the consumer-class CPU reputation that it still yet has. When your biggest supporters are gamers and people who just want a 'bang for your buck' system that gaining a positive reputation for corporate servers and such will take some time. Maybe some Athlon MPs and this chipset you speak of would be sufficiently reliable, but keep in mind that AMD isn't well known at all for SMP stuff and definitely aren't pushed very strongly by the big boys (Dell, etc.) in corporate/business markets. Don't get me wrong though, I don't think that Intel is king of CPUs or anything, but an Intel-based SMP setup is a bit less risky...though a bit more expensive certainly.
The consumer-grade versions of Windows are usually a waste for uni-processor systems frankly.
If you're only testing then it doesn't really matter does it? You see, when you're using less memory than your system has then adding more doesn't change things. I suspect that anyone who would buy such a thing would be doing so on behalf of their company as well...so they would likely have more than 512MB installed, but I don't really see how you've determined that >= 2GB RAM is the magical number for such a setup. Think *application* here...
I would use the Xeons myself. Athlon-based systems really lack the kind of reliability that say a server needs...though that is mostly because of chipset problems, not the CPU itself. I believe that Michael Dell would use the Xeon as well...since it's a bit hard to sell an Athlon MP to a large company who needs a system that won't lockup (or burn up) on its own accord.