Hey Guys just a quick update on how the complete linux experience has been working out for me.
Firstly, I don't know what the Linux Mint team did with their latest round of updates but it DOES NOT work on a Macbook pro 5,5 from early 2009. it got to the point where every time I restarted after the upgrade the network card would hang the boot process and I couldn't get into the OS. I know I probably should have stuck at it to try and find the problem like a good Linux enthusiast but after nearly a week of tearing my hair out over it I decided to give OpenSuse 12.1 a try on the macbook because it has been SOOOOO stable on my 7 year old desktop.
So I go ahead and install the 64 bit version of OpenSuse KDE on the mac book and so far I am incredibly happy. My only gripe is their implementation of the open source Gallium driver (which I prefer to use because it is better integrated into the kernel than the proprietry Nvidia drivers, and actually does things automatically instead of having to manually tell it to do everything, seriously who doesn't auto detect new monitors any more?) seems to hang the computer on every time it resumes from RAM. Don't know why, but changing to the proprietry Nvidia drivers fixed it.
On the proprietary note, OpenSuse has to provide some of the easiest access to Proprietary Drivers of any distro, Mint and Ubuntu do it well but I think the one click install from the web that OpenSuse use is much better. Firstly, this method forces new users to determine that there is a missing driver that explains why there hardware either isn't working, or not working correctly. I think this is really important as, in my opinion, the whole point of moving to Linux is to become better acquainted with the inner workings of a computer. Secondly, when you do find the answer (and seriously it's not that hard) it works! I think it's a great way to both get users use to googling there problems (which is vital if you're going to use Linux) and trusting the answers when they do find them.
So after very little effort I have a very stable install, that doesn't hang on boot, and is doing everything I need it to, well!
It also means I have completely moved away from gnome shell in favour of KDE 4.7.x thus far it runs very smoothly on the mac and looks very nice. It's a little jumpy on the desktop but I chock this up to the ancient video card that is attached to it, I hope to upgrade it soon which will hopefully improve the problem. Having said that KDE is running fine it just has a few rendering problems and is a bit jumpy but it in no way makes it unusable.
I don't really use any KDE specific apps, I tried KMail but thunderbird, for me, is just so much more user friendly and after you have done 7 or 8 reinstalls in a week you do not want to sit there and try to determine exactly how signatures and all of that are meant to be implemented when it takes me a grand total of 30 seconds to set up in thunderbird. I've never really used Konqueror and like most I jump in favor of chrome because I have chrome sync I don't have to set up the browser with all my favourites, apps etc, i just tell it my google ID and poof, it's all there, which is very handy. I do use Dolphin as my primary file manager and it seems to handle everything I need admirably, I particularly enjoy the quick access to sudo.
There is one bizarre thing I will point out. I installed opensuse off of the live CD on my desktop and when I finally got round to setting up the network printer I discovered that the OpenSuse Live CD doesn't install any HP libraries, this rendered the HP printer unusable. Now again, this is a very easy fix but it just seems bizarre to me that such a small file that gives you plug and play access to the vast majority of printers around the world didn't come by default in the live environment. They were there in the DVD but that doesn't have a live environment. However, once they were installed setting up a network printer was a simple press of a few buttons. If your interested in a how to please comment and I will post one at a later date.
Anyways, there you have it a quick update on what has happened in the last week. I now use OpenSuse on all my client computers and fedora 13 on the server. They are all integrating very smoothly and thus far I am very happy with the set up.
As always, if you have any suggestions, criticisms or opinions please feel free to comment below.
Talk soon!
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