Damn straight I still can't get a single wireless nick to work on any linux distro I've installed yet. What the hell is a wlan0, and who the hell needs an eth0. I'd use linux more if I could actualy use linux.
I totaly dissagree with the other guy that replied to this thread. The first I ever heard of Vidalinux was from this post. I've been looking for an easy to install gentoo since I first heard about gentoo. Thanks for the post. Very insightful.
-manno
HA! Yeah how about I like running my games at full speed not just emulated speed. And I like it when I can play a game the day I bought it rather than "hacking" it into playability. I'm not looking for an excuse to leave Windows, I'm looking for a better experience than Windows.
Now I understand that some of you pro hacks out there can get game "X" to work on Cedega or what ever it is with "just a few tweaks" what I believe you guys don't understand is I have a life, a girl, friends, a 9-5, and a family. If I do get the time to play a game, I want to pop in the CD install it and run it without spending a few hours learning how to hack wine to get a game to work on the OS my PC didn't ship with.
Mod me troll I could care less, but please let this sink into your heads. I want my games to work the way they were intended. 60 FPS is not high enough for me, and spending an exorbitant amount of money on a PC to then install Linux on it to play a Windows game at 25-75% of it's typical performance is not a sound investment. I would buy a PC that was 3 years old if I wanted to play games at that level, and the money I saved on the premium for high performance hardware would pay for itself at the very least 3 fold on my $60 student copy of XP Pro. When Linux is an easy to use OS I'll sing its praises, the OS itself works fantastic if you have nothing but free time. I'd rather stick with Windows it works the way I want it to 99.9999% of the time regardless of what you guys like to think. It's like 100 times easier to use than Linux, and even with the Mac mini it's still 1/2 the price for a comparably performing system from apple... though that thing looks damn sexy. Don't get me wrong I love open source software, I use OO.o exclusively, Thunderbird, Firefox, TighVNC, and openVPN all for win32. But Linux itself is just not ready for prime time. Cut the effort it takes for me to install programs, make it so I don't need to worry about dependencies, and all that garbage to install a program. Realize that because your OS doesn't require ".---" at the end of a file isn't a big deal. Make a distro that can be released without a shell prompt. I understand that you like the shell, I'm glad to hear it cause it ships with every distro, but I don't want to have to use it, ever, that includes when it comes time to install a new program on my PC. Sigh... I understand for you needs Linux works great, but please appreciate the fact that for mine it just doesn't come close, so please don't tell me that one of my major, and well founded caviates with the Linux/Windows situation isn't a "good excuse".
Trolling done,
-manno out
Do you honestly believe that? That's a lot like asking for directions and being told you can't get there from here. I understand where the reponses are coming from, but I still don't see why MS would even care if it lost ground to Firefox. hech they'd save face if it became more popular. It's not IE that's the problem any more it's Firefox ect. In the 90's when no one had a clue about the web I'de agree with you guys. MS, Netscape ect. had no clue where this thing was going, but now-a-days. A web browser is just that a tool to browse the web.
Why would MS care if it looses browser share? How much easier would it be for them just to drop it all together, and let the hassles of securing, and patching a web browser end up in someone else's hands?
I've always struggled to put how I feel about Linux in words, and now some one has. You want to make Linux useful, here's an idea create a double click install system. and introduce Linux to 1989!
Make a distro that doesn't need a shell prompt. I'd say at least 50% of PC users out there don't get a PC to play games. Most are women, and in general, if my last couple of girlfriends, 4 sisters, and mom are any indication they HATE computer games. They do however use the PC a lot. They use it for shopping online, word processing, spreadsheets, email, and the younger ones (my sisters that is) IM. Now none of them know how to troubleshoot a PC, as far as I can tell that is. Every time I'm at one of my GF's, mom's, or one of my sisters places, I get the "My computer is running slow, and I get pop-ups" line. So I install firefox if I haven't already, adaware, and spybot, ect. Now they can all figure out how to install AOL, weatherbug, and Active X components without even knowing they did it. Yet it took me an hour just to install GAIM on the last Linux distro I tried out. That is what's wrong with Linux. For some reason it's considered good practice to make it a chore to install even the most basic programs. Until the non tech-savvy users can truly use Linux it will never catch on as a viable alternative to Windows, games or no games.
Stop making Linux for people who have more free time on their hands than they know what to do with. Make it for your mom, not as cool sounding as the counter culture ideals that Linux e-L33T are made of, but if you ever want real market penetration your going to have to be able to hand your mom a distro CD.
Games are fun but let's face it everyone that's going to go through the trouble of playing games on Linux is already playing games on Linux. I'm not going to forgo the joy that is double clicking on the nVida/ATI driver install program, and having it flawlessly install the latest Windows drivers requiring no more effort on my part than finding the next button and clicking it 3 or 4 times. Yeah I've been through the pain that is getting new drivers to work on Linux, and no thank you very much I'll stick with Winblows, by Micro$oft I can handle not being "L33T". I catch enough hell from my woman for spending to much time on the PC as it is. I use my computer to make life easier, not occupy my free time.
-manno
Internet Explorer has been a black eye on Microsoft's face for a long time. It's full of security holes, and costs them big time in both manpower+time="lots of money", and in the public conscience. I think letting Firefox gain as much of the browser market as possible would, and is a very viable strategy for them. It allows them to move programmers to areas where their needed, like longhorn for instance, which has slipped repeatedly over the last year or two, and saves them the cost, and trouble of updating, and the ongoing process of patching all the holes. It also saves them the bother of handling the help calls, instead people are told to go to mozilla.org. If I was in MS's shoes I would gladly surrender the market share. Something like Open Office however is a different story, and after looking at the latest pre-release of 2.0 (while still very buggy) it looks like Microsoft is going to have fight on its hands. You start taking away $200-500 per seat licenses from Microsoft, and they're going to notice. If you put software on your computer that replaces software that you've already purchased from them, I doubt they'll care.
-manno
Unfortunately I know of no benchmark comparisons across platforms for blender. I just know that the G4 gets trounced by all the modern architectures, in both FP, and Int. You also raise a good point about the software package though, I read somewhere that iWork might be included with the mini, and that would be a really nice bonus (i might even consider buying one if that's the case). On the size issue I totally feel you especially since the mini makes every SFF I've seen look big, it's also probably quieter, and less power hungry.
Honestly though if you were a customer, and said I have $500 to spend on a rendering box I couldn't in good conscience recommend the mini, I mean it only has 256MB of RAM could you imagine the thrashing your harddrive will get in a texture intensive scene? And we're not talking a very intensive one either after OSX + all of it's components, and Blender itself you might have 128-180MB of RAM left for the render.
If you came in and said I want web, email, music, and word processing, I'd be hard pressed not recommending the mini.
-manno
But think of all the time you would save on rendering if you upgraded to a larger box P4/A64/G5 for not gaming, not rendering this is a good system, but for rendering get a real workstation type PC go for an A64 P4, or if you have the bling bling definitly a G5. But you can still put together a more powerful (not as stylish or easy to use) x86 system for the same price. If you plan on making video a 40GB hard drive will fill up quick. For ma, and pop a G4 is a great system, but for a power user like you especially one whose using for rendering I would suggest a more powerful system with more RAM, a faster processor, and a larger hard drive.
2x the RAM, 2x the Hard Drive Space Slightly better processor Better DVD drive (Dual Layer) WAY better video card. The 9550 is the same thing as a 9600 just clocked lower, overclock it a tad and you'll be playing Far Cry, Doom 3, Half-Life 2, all at reasonable resolutions, and very playable frame rates
And still just under $500
Of course it's not as pretty and FRIGGAN HUGE compared to the sexy and sleek mini. Not to mention the ugly XP UI. But over time it will shave days off of your rendering time.
Do yourself a favor, and get a true workstation for rendering.
Slashdot Mirror
and what about the 250, and do the ATI or Nvidia cards work with MythTV? Anyone know?
This is so rediculously overrated, it's astounding.
I LOVE Calvin and Hobbes, but I don't remember that line what book is that in? mmasdf@hotmail.com -manno
Damn straight I still can't get a single wireless nick to work on any linux distro I've installed yet. What the hell is a wlan0, and who the hell needs an eth0. I'd use linux more if I could actualy use linux.
I totaly dissagree with the other guy that replied to this thread. The first I ever heard of Vidalinux was from this post. I've been looking for an easy to install gentoo since I first heard about gentoo. Thanks for the post. Very insightful. -manno
HA! Yeah how about I like running my games at full speed not just emulated speed. And I like it when I can play a game the day I bought it rather than "hacking" it into playability. I'm not looking for an excuse to leave Windows, I'm looking for a better experience than Windows. Now I understand that some of you pro hacks out there can get game "X" to work on Cedega or what ever it is with "just a few tweaks" what I believe you guys don't understand is I have a life, a girl, friends, a 9-5, and a family. If I do get the time to play a game, I want to pop in the CD install it and run it without spending a few hours learning how to hack wine to get a game to work on the OS my PC didn't ship with. Mod me troll I could care less, but please let this sink into your heads. I want my games to work the way they were intended. 60 FPS is not high enough for me, and spending an exorbitant amount of money on a PC to then install Linux on it to play a Windows game at 25-75% of it's typical performance is not a sound investment. I would buy a PC that was 3 years old if I wanted to play games at that level, and the money I saved on the premium for high performance hardware would pay for itself at the very least 3 fold on my $60 student copy of XP Pro. When Linux is an easy to use OS I'll sing its praises, the OS itself works fantastic if you have nothing but free time. I'd rather stick with Windows it works the way I want it to 99.9999% of the time regardless of what you guys like to think. It's like 100 times easier to use than Linux, and even with the Mac mini it's still 1/2 the price for a comparably performing system from apple... though that thing looks damn sexy. Don't get me wrong I love open source software, I use OO.o exclusively, Thunderbird, Firefox, TighVNC, and openVPN all for win32. But Linux itself is just not ready for prime time. Cut the effort it takes for me to install programs, make it so I don't need to worry about dependencies, and all that garbage to install a program. Realize that because your OS doesn't require ".---" at the end of a file isn't a big deal. Make a distro that can be released without a shell prompt. I understand that you like the shell, I'm glad to hear it cause it ships with every distro, but I don't want to have to use it, ever, that includes when it comes time to install a new program on my PC. Sigh... I understand for you needs Linux works great, but please appreciate the fact that for mine it just doesn't come close, so please don't tell me that one of my major, and well founded caviates with the Linux/Windows situation isn't a "good excuse". Trolling done, -manno out
Is this a mechanical gate or electrical?
Do you honestly believe that? That's a lot like asking for directions and being told you can't get there from here. I understand where the reponses are coming from, but I still don't see why MS would even care if it lost ground to Firefox. hech they'd save face if it became more popular. It's not IE that's the problem any more it's Firefox ect. In the 90's when no one had a clue about the web I'de agree with you guys. MS, Netscape ect. had no clue where this thing was going, but now-a-days. A web browser is just that a tool to browse the web.
Why would MS care if it looses browser share? How much easier would it be for them just to drop it all together, and let the hassles of securing, and patching a web browser end up in someone else's hands?
I've always struggled to put how I feel about Linux in words, and now some one has. You want to make Linux useful, here's an idea create a double click install system. and introduce Linux to 1989! Make a distro that doesn't need a shell prompt. I'd say at least 50% of PC users out there don't get a PC to play games. Most are women, and in general, if my last couple of girlfriends, 4 sisters, and mom are any indication they HATE computer games. They do however use the PC a lot. They use it for shopping online, word processing, spreadsheets, email, and the younger ones (my sisters that is) IM. Now none of them know how to troubleshoot a PC, as far as I can tell that is. Every time I'm at one of my GF's, mom's, or one of my sisters places, I get the "My computer is running slow, and I get pop-ups" line. So I install firefox if I haven't already, adaware, and spybot, ect. Now they can all figure out how to install AOL, weatherbug, and Active X components without even knowing they did it. Yet it took me an hour just to install GAIM on the last Linux distro I tried out. That is what's wrong with Linux. For some reason it's considered good practice to make it a chore to install even the most basic programs. Until the non tech-savvy users can truly use Linux it will never catch on as a viable alternative to Windows, games or no games. Stop making Linux for people who have more free time on their hands than they know what to do with. Make it for your mom, not as cool sounding as the counter culture ideals that Linux e-L33T are made of, but if you ever want real market penetration your going to have to be able to hand your mom a distro CD. Games are fun but let's face it everyone that's going to go through the trouble of playing games on Linux is already playing games on Linux. I'm not going to forgo the joy that is double clicking on the nVida/ATI driver install program, and having it flawlessly install the latest Windows drivers requiring no more effort on my part than finding the next button and clicking it 3 or 4 times. Yeah I've been through the pain that is getting new drivers to work on Linux, and no thank you very much I'll stick with Winblows, by Micro$oft I can handle not being "L33T". I catch enough hell from my woman for spending to much time on the PC as it is. I use my computer to make life easier, not occupy my free time. -manno
Internet Explorer has been a black eye on Microsoft's face for a long time. It's full of security holes, and costs them big time in both manpower+time="lots of money", and in the public conscience. I think letting Firefox gain as much of the browser market as possible would, and is a very viable strategy for them. It allows them to move programmers to areas where their needed, like longhorn for instance, which has slipped repeatedly over the last year or two, and saves them the cost, and trouble of updating, and the ongoing process of patching all the holes. It also saves them the bother of handling the help calls, instead people are told to go to mozilla.org. If I was in MS's shoes I would gladly surrender the market share. Something like Open Office however is a different story, and after looking at the latest pre-release of 2.0 (while still very buggy) it looks like Microsoft is going to have fight on its hands. You start taking away $200-500 per seat licenses from Microsoft, and they're going to notice. If you put software on your computer that replaces software that you've already purchased from them, I doubt they'll care. -manno
I agree with you, by the way you can't change the video because the video chip, and menory is soldered to the motherboard a-la laptop style -manno
Unfortunately I know of no benchmark comparisons across platforms for blender. I just know that the G4 gets trounced by all the modern architectures, in both FP, and Int. You also raise a good point about the software package though, I read somewhere that iWork might be included with the mini, and that would be a really nice bonus (i might even consider buying one if that's the case). On the size issue I totally feel you especially since the mini makes every SFF I've seen look big, it's also probably quieter, and less power hungry. Honestly though if you were a customer, and said I have $500 to spend on a rendering box I couldn't in good conscience recommend the mini, I mean it only has 256MB of RAM could you imagine the thrashing your harddrive will get in a texture intensive scene? And we're not talking a very intensive one either after OSX + all of it's components, and Blender itself you might have 128-180MB of RAM left for the render. If you came in and said I want web, email, music, and word processing, I'd be hard pressed not recommending the mini. -manno
But think of all the time you would save on rendering if you upgraded to a larger box P4/A64/G5 for not gaming, not rendering this is a good system, but for rendering get a real workstation type PC go for an A64 P4, or if you have the bling bling definitly a G5. But you can still put together a more powerful (not as stylish or easy to use) x86 system for the same price. If you plan on making video a 40GB hard drive will fill up quick. For ma, and pop a G4 is a great system, but for a power user like you especially one whose using for rendering I would suggest a more powerful system with more RAM, a faster processor, and a larger hard drive.
Here's a system, that speaking strictly only in terms of performance this would be a way better system for you:
http://secure.newegg.com/app/WishR.asp?ID=1230141
2x the RAM,
2x the Hard Drive Space
Slightly better processor
Better DVD drive (Dual Layer)
WAY better video card. The 9550 is the same thing as a 9600 just clocked lower, overclock it a tad and you'll be playing Far Cry, Doom 3, Half-Life 2, all at reasonable resolutions, and very playable frame rates
And still just under $500
Of course it's not as pretty and FRIGGAN HUGE compared to the sexy and sleek mini. Not to mention the ugly XP UI. But over time it will shave days off of your rendering time.
Do yourself a favor, and get a true workstation for rendering.
-manno