Review: PCLinuxOS 2007 Test 3
March 18th, 2007 by jamesI’m back again after a few days. I got busy and had some things to take care of. My apologies to all my readers for that short and unannounced break. Nevertheless I am back with another review.
After a number of recommendations from readers on my SimplyMEPIS 6.5 RC1 review, I decided to make my next Linux distribution review about PCLinuxOS 2007 Test 3. Like SimplyMEPIS, it is an up-and-coming distribution that aims to make all the advanced capabilities of Linux easily available to everyone.
About PCLinuxOS
This live CD based distribution uses RPM for its package format and Synaptic as its package manager. You can also use apt-get with it as well. It uses KDE and aims to be a simple to use distribution with a flashy desktop. Their website states that it is developed by a small but dedicated team of developers to deliver a desktop-ready open source OS.
PCLinuxOS also has a large community following judging from their forums and also the number of recommendations it received on my MEPIS review.
Booting it up
The boot screen is pretty nice, and offers a wide range of options to suit your system.
PCLinuxOS boot loader (VMware only used for the screen shot of the boot loader)
So I started booting it normally on my desktop system. Once again this is an Athlon 64 x2 with 2GB of RAM and a Nvidia GeForce 7800GT video card. I also tested this distribution on a 5 year old Dell Optiplex system for comparison. (The screen shots on this review were taken from the Dell system since it had a better time supporting its on-board Intel video adapter than my GeForce 7800GT.)
The splash screen to hide the kernel messages is pretty nice. After a moment the desktop began to load. A blank black screen appeared with only my mouse cursor. My keyboard wouldn’t work. I couldn’t change terminals nor did toggling the caps lock key light up the LED on my keyboard. This is the classic symptom of the Xorg “nv” driver being loaded instead of the real binary driver. I can’t even Ctrl+Alt+Del but have to hit my computer’s hard reset button.
On the Dell Optiplex system, the distribution booted cleanly and without incident straight into X at 1024×768. I was hoping for the same on my self-built desktop.
So I reset the system for try number 2. At the boot loader I go to VideoSafeMode which uses framebuffer mode. The system proceeds to boot once again. This time I got to select my keyboard layout and timezone and setup my network. The KDE login screen came up and I logged in as guest. The desktop loaded and here I was in PCLinuxOS.
PCLinuxOS Desktop
Trying it out
Since the desktop loaded as 800×600 and on my 1440×900 LCD monitor it looked horrible, I decided to reboot and see if frambuffer at 1024×768 worked from the boot loader. Unfortunately it didn’t so I decided to try something else: use the copy to RAM feature, select VESA driver, and see if I could get Nvidia working directly from within the live CD. By the way, SimplyMEPIS was able to allow me to use the Nvidia binary drivers directly from the boot loader. I definitely must give the point to SimplyMEPIS here.
After a few minutes of copying the live CD to RAM, the system booted and X began to load. Looks like my selecting to use the VESA driver didn’t work. As soon as X began to load, my system froze hard. It seems it really wanted to load the nv driver on my system. Either that or the boot loader didn’t listen to my configuration choice. I hard reset and selected VideoSafeMode and went back to what I knew worked. Once again it did work and I was back in 800×600. At least it booted this time.
PCLinuxOS uses the latest stable KDE 3.5.6 as its desktop environment. It also includes a ton of applications. It has pretty much everything you would expect from a modern distribution available by default. You can burn CDs and DVDs, play videos and music, write documents, etc.
A few of the many applications PCLinuxOS comes with by default
The KDE desktop provided by PCLinuxOS is very cohesive. It feels similarly to SimplyMEPIS 6.5 RC1 which is also KDE-based. Both systems were visually appealing, but so far SimplyMEPIS was ahead because I could boot straight into using my Nvidia card from the live CD.
As an aside, many people recommend doing various things in the comments of my reviews that could fix problems I experience during my reviews. I definitely appreciate these comments as I have learned much from them. However when I review a distro I’m mainly checking for things to work as easily as possible out of the box. I feel that most people who try out a Linux distribution are going to want things to just work. I’ve been using Linux for over 10 years and I could figure out most of the problems I’ve had with these distributions, but having to manually fix things that should work is not what my reviews are about. I do look on the distro’s website to see if there is documentation about any problems I’m having that may be the result of not being familiar with that distribution.
I rebooted once more to try setting a higher resolution from the boot loader using the instructions found in the PCLinuxOS wiki. Unfortunately it seems I could only get the live CD to work in framebuffer (VideoSafeMode option) mode.
Display drivers aren’t everything and I know I could get everything setup perfectly if I installed the distro to my system.
The distribution detected and set up all of my other hardware correctly. The ethernet card on my Nforce4 chipset was setup properly. PCLinuxOS also properly detected the wireless network card I have installed in my desktop. I couldn’t configure and use it however because I needed to download and install some extra firmware for the card. Helpfully, PCLinuxOS told me exactly where to go to download the firmware.
Using the PCLinuxOS configuration panel I was able to reconfigure my display resolution. Unfortunately it said I had to reboot for the changes to take effect. Being that I was using the distribution in live CD mode, obviously that wouldn’t help anything.
The Synaptic package manager works well and I like it. I’ve used it on Debian and Ubuntu many times. It doesn’t fit in with the KDE desktop though and seems out of place compared to all the other applications. Regardless it works and it’s a very good package management GUI interface.
Synaptic Package Manager
Other than not being able to get my video card working the way I wanted to from the live CD, PCLinuxOS is a solid Linux distribution. I know I would’ve had a better time if I had installed it to my system fully, but I prefer to only install final releases of distributions to my system. I didn’t install SimplyMEPIS 6.5 RC1 to my hard disk so in the interest of a fair comparison of that review this distro isn’t being installed either. The distro is visually appealing and the configuration panel is very comprehensive.
System Configuration
The system configuration panel that PCLinuxOS comes with is definitely one of its strong points. PCLinuxOS Control Center gives you a centralized and easy way to configure almost everything you can do with your system. Clearly this is where most of the work in Linux should go, since making a system easy to use and configure is much more important than making it cool looking. From scoping around at the multitude of things you can configure from the control center, you probably have very few reasons to ever open up a terminal and configure things by hand. In fact I would imagine that manually configuring things would probably cause this nice looking configuration utility to break.
PCLinuxOS Control Center
From the control center you can configure file sharing, your hardware settings, all the network settings, your firewall, boot options, a web server, and more. It looks and feels like Windows control panel but with far more options.
And that brings me to something I have noticed about PCLinuxOS. It’s very hard to overlook the fact that this distribution looks and feels almost exactly like Microsoft Windows. True, it uses KDE which has been blamed for being Windows-like in the past, but the theme and configuration so closely resemble using Windows that after using it for a couple of days it really bothers me. It does make it easy to use Linux, that is a fact. The default theme and layout is designed to make it easier for people to switch from Windows, and I can see how it would certainly facilitate that. However having used Linux and Mac OS X more than Windows for that last 5 years, the imitation of Windows is not very welcome to my eyes.
Perhaps this imitation of Windows is what is helping make this distribution so successful. It helps convert new users and the fact that it, for the most part, works great out of the box helps show those users of Windows that there are alternatives out there they can use and get working with little fuss.
My personal opinion is that imitating Windows is not where Linux should be heading. The beauty of Linux is that there is so much choice out there that you are bound to find a Linux distribution that suits your preferences. Certainly PCLinuxOS is an excellent candidate to convert users from Windows. I think some of the more adventurous of these converts might find other distributions more to their liking that don’t mimic Windows so closely.
PCLinuxOS has a comprehensive website with lots of documentation in the form of a Wiki and also a very active community in the forums. You will be able to find help with almost every problem imaginable.
Final Thoughts
Other than my Nvidia card not working from the live CD and at times forgetting I was using a Linux distribution and not Windows, I’d have to say that PCLinuxOS is a very good Linux distribution. For new Linux users in particular the layout and feel of the OS, as well as its comprehensive configuration panel and good hardware detection, will help get the less experienced Linux users up and running with very little problems.
If I had opted to install the distribution completely on my system, I’m well aware of the fact that I could’ve gotten the Nvidia drivers working using the instructions on the PCLinuxOS website. I liked the fact that pretty much everything you would ever need to configure on your Linux system is capable of being handled by the PCLinuxOS Control Center.
All that being said, the fact this distribution felt so close to Windows did bother me. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing it is just not my preference.
I look forward to seeing how this distribution, like SimplyMEPIS, continues to improve and bring a friendly and comprehensive configuration system to Linux. New Linux users would do well to check out either of these distributions. However if you’re using a recent model Nvidia card, I have to recommend SimplyMEPIS over PCLinuxOS for its out of the box Nvidia driver support.
March 18th, 2007 at 6:52 pm
You have picked on my two most favourate distro. I use both of them and I feel Simply Mepis is fractionally much better.
March 18th, 2007 at 7:03 pm
I tried both SimplyMEPIS 6.5 RC1 and RC2, and neither would boot into the X Server. I have an Athlon X2, 2GB RAM, and a 7600GT. No boot option allows me to run the LiveCD.
I have been using PCLinuxOS 2007 Test 3 since it was released, and must say that unless SimplyMEPIS fixes their LiveCD for the final release, I’ll stay with PCLinuxOS 2007.
March 18th, 2007 at 7:21 pm
PClinuxOS is great! Although you certainly know its still beat when you computer shuts down and you cant download very packages from the repository. Aside from a few other little things, its great!
March 18th, 2007 at 7:22 pm
Screwed up on some spelling, sorry.
I meant beta and the computer wont shut down automatically.
March 18th, 2007 at 8:34 pm
Both Pclos and Mepis are top-notch distros.
I’ve always found previous versions of Pclos superior to the Mepis counterparts but the final releases will tell the tale.
Any Kde based distro is window’s like. Nothing wrong with that. Makes the transition to linux a little less intimidating for newcomers. Once they get their feet wet they are bound to try Gnome, Enlightenment, etc. Personally, I find Kde hard to beat when you need to get things done. I do enjoy playing with the others but they are lacking.
In closing, I think your review is fair. I would not consider an in depth review of any live cd deserving. It only takes a few minutes to install these guys so its not a big deal.
March 18th, 2007 at 11:58 pm
SimplyMepis is a great distro by all means (and vastly superior to PCLOS, for that matter), and one that is not like any other OS. But PCLOS on the other hand is NOTHING LIKE WINDOWS! Instead, PCLOS 2007 is a bad ripoff of Mandriva, its base. I’ve been using KDE based distros for over 4 1/2 years, now as my main operating system, and just because it has a menu and a bar at the bottom, KDE is not Windowsish. The applets, different menu arrangement (I mean the older one, but the new one too, for that matter) four desktops, different controls…MUST I LIST FOREVER?!? If you can find Synaptic for Windows, I’ll grant you credibility. But until then, get you r similes straight. You really should try Mandriva, as, Synaptic and unnecessary looks aside, they are almost the same, save for overall quality:) Mandriva is the best of all three for that matter. Mandriva 2007.1 is looking better than this already.
March 19th, 2007 at 12:02 am
andy:
Yes, KDE-using distros are much more Windows-like than other distributions, but it just seemed like PCLinuxOS went the extra step to feel like it was Windows. I do prefer KDE over GNOME, however. I also agree a full installation is necessary for a comprehensive review. I will certainly make the point of doing that for PCLinuxOS and SimplyMEPIS in the near future. I will wait and see what their respective final releases bring.
GDC:
That’s odd. I just picked the Nvidia driver option and it worked for me. Must be a bug somewhere.
I think both SimplyMEPIS and PCLinuxOS are definitely in the same league. They are both great distributions that make it easy for anyone to have a fully working easy to configure and use system. Since both provide live CDs, anyone looking at Linux distributions need only burn a CD and give it a try.
Thank you all for your comments!
March 19th, 2007 at 12:07 am
QueepoMatrix:
Honestly I have not tried Mandriva in awhile. I’ll reserve judgment until I give it a try, but thanks for your opinion. I plan on checking it out soon.
My comments on it being Windows-like is based on the KDE theme looking like XP. I’ll give you that beyond the look and feel they aren’t the same.
Perhaps I shouldn’t have criticized it for *being* too Windows-ish and only just for being too Windows-looking.
Thanks for your comment.
March 19th, 2007 at 4:08 am
In 0.94 TR3 when I change to my monitor (And by the way there is an 1400×900 LCD option) the system tells me I have to log out and back in for the changes to take effect. It does NOT say I have to reboot. After I hit the ok button it goes right to the shutdown screen and the “Restart session” button is already selected. The same sequence occurs when I go back in and (Using the “Control Panel”) select the resolution (In my case 1280×1024) of choice.
I seem to remember some of the older releases of PcLinuxOs had that issue with asking for a reboot when doing changes from the LiveCD. Is it possible you grabbed TR2 by mistake?
March 19th, 2007 at 6:43 am
PCLinuxOS is NOT a bad rip off of mandriva.It is what mandriva should have,could have been.Each system is different.I use an nvidia fx 5200 video card and have no problems booting to live cd in tr3.It was a fair review though as mepis is a great distro and is #2 on my list.PclinuxOS is overall top to bottom superior to mepis in every way in my opinion.Still if you use mepis you can’t go wrong.It is afterall about choice.That is the beauty of linux.
March 19th, 2007 at 8:40 am
I tried SimplyMepis. Software was placed all over the place and things did not work “out of the box”, so to speak, as it does with PCLOS. PCLOS is by far the better distro. All the distros that use KDE look like Windows. But you are “free” to change the look to suite your taste. Ant thats what it’s all about!
March 19th, 2007 at 8:56 am
To suggest that PCLOS is a bad rip off of Mandriva is equivalent to saying Mepis is a bad rip off of Ubuntu. My experience with PCLOS 2007 R3 was vastly different than your review. My machine has an A64 3200 w/6800 Ultra videocard, 1G ram. In live mode I was able to obtain my desired 1280×1024 desktop by selecting my vender specific monitor. Next I installed the 9700 Nvidia drivers and following clear instructions on the PCLOS forums I enabled the Beryl desktop. I had a lot of fun playing with the transparent cube, thick windows that float off the surface of the cube, etc. It was a far cry from “windows” and it all was available in livecd mode. I’m waiting for
PCLOS 2007 final, it will replace my current Mandriva install.
March 19th, 2007 at 9:20 am
Riktar:
Yes, I’m positive I have the right one. On account of your comment I just double checked. I should’ve grabbed a screen of it, but it most certainly did say I had to reboot. Nor did it automatically go to the restart session screen. Interesting.
beerhunter:
You installed the Nvidia drivers in live cd mode? I might have to go back and try this. I attempted to follow the instructions on the wiki but the kernel source package they said to look for wasn’t there. I’ll search the forums and see what I can turn up.
Clearly this distribution (along with SimplyMEPIS) has quite a following of users. Each has quite strong opinions about their distro of choice! And like bones113 said, that’s what it’s all about.
March 19th, 2007 at 9:48 am
Gosh…I never get the impression with Simply Mepis or PCLinuxOS that it’s anything like Windows. I get none of thet ugh feeling at all. Some distros can emeulate it sort of; Xandros, Linspire..etc, but I just don’t feel it. Gnome comes closer to Windows in my mind, I believe Windows 98 mixed with Mac bits. I personally have PCLinux running on 3 different Laptops and 2 different desktops…no problems here. My past distros have been. Kanotix (my favorite debian based), Simply Mepis (never worked on Laptops), Ubuntu(hated it), Suse 10.1(pretty but did not like it. Freespire (it worked very well on all my machines but it had some ugh to it. Mandriva 2007 (almost liked it} And many more. I always have come back to PCLinuxOS just because it works and works well.
March 19th, 2007 at 10:00 am
James: I guess YMMV is the saying for this. I just went back (again) and loaded the liveCD and got the same message I touted to you before. I’ll see If I can capture the sequence and forward it to you.
March 19th, 2007 at 10:48 am
James:
Yes I installed the 9700 Nvidia drivers in live cd mode (using synaptic) without rebooting, only logging out and back in. I then opened a terminal and as root did a simple cut and paste of the two commands required to edit the Xorg.conf file and enabled the 3d destop in the master control center, I may be off in the sequence of these events but the end result was beryl in all it’s glory…:’)
As a side note, I was able to change the hot corner used by “scale” away from the upper right corner which is my biggest compliant with my current Mandriva install. I was also delighted with the way everthing just seems to work, firefox plugins, mplayer, flash, etc. I’ve tried Mepis on several occasions without becoming as enamored.
March 19th, 2007 at 11:14 am
James,
This is what worked for me…
http://www.pclinuxos.com/forum/index.php?topic=16605.0
March 19th, 2007 at 12:18 pm
Riktar:
It’s probably because I was using the VideoSafeMode which uses framebuffer for its display. The normal mode wouldn’t work and I tried specifying it to use vesa which also didn’t work.
beerhunter:
Thanks for the link. Which mode did you boot the live cd in? Normal? Did you have to pass any options to get it from loading the nv driver? Thanks.
March 19th, 2007 at 12:29 pm
Hi, I commented about your SM6.5 review and said then that, to be fair, you should review Sabayon 3.3, which completely obliterates any other distro in the linux world today for all the things you tend to evaluate them for. Please, do a hard review of Sabayon, and post your honest thoughts. Compare it to any other distro out there today (keeping in mind that it is Gentoo based but very different from Gentoo install), and you WILL find that it is the gem of gems.
March 19th, 2007 at 1:08 pm
I’ve tried both distros extensively on several desktops and one laptop. My choice has been PCLinuxOS for a rather trivial irritation with Simply Mepis of not getting the weather applet to read anything other than Morgantown, Warren Woodford the developers hometown.
Aaarrrgghhh.
March 19th, 2007 at 2:47 pm
“Using the PCLinuxOS configuration panel I was able to reconfigure my display resolution. Unfortunately it said I had to reboot for the changes to take effect.”
There it is !!! There is your Window-ish behavior
March 19th, 2007 at 3:10 pm
Guys, right at this moment, I am downloading the live-cd.iso for PClinuxOS, and I intend to give it a try, giving linux itself a fair shake in the process.
Understand that at this point, I have used Windows exclusively. I am sick and tired of MS constantly releasing buggy “new” OS’es, with “patches to be released soon”. I am also sick and tired of being told by any corporation that I “have” to upgrade either my system, or my OS.
If linux can provide this, with the stability and relative ease of use of, say 98SE, then I will happily switch.
This statement may not be taken well, though, but it is true. IF Linux wishes to be a serious competitor with MS, then many will have to change their views somewhat.
1. Get rid of the US/VS/THEM attitude, since MS could care less, and the only ones paying any attention, and in the process being turned off by it, are the potential users who are stuck with MS products at this point …(One of the main reasons >I HAVE NOT TRIED LINUX YETilliterate
March 19th, 2007 at 3:30 pm
Sorry, but I typed way to much in my last post, and it was truncated.
Bad Things…
1. US/VS/THEM (enough came through)
2. Too many linux user interfaces, too little cooperation netween linux programmers on any one interface. Remember, “A house divided against itself cannot stand”.
3. No Linux Standardizations. People, seriously, as a programmer who pays attention to the desires of those around him, I can state that most end-product users WANT some form of standardization. People in general are “resistant to change”.
Good Things:
1. Linux has more potential in it’s little pinky… IF the programmers will make sure that it is first completely stable, second powerful, third compatible, fourth cool. Linux would then blow MS’s doors off, concerning the desires of the end user.
Paul
March 19th, 2007 at 5:08 pm
James I see that, rather belatedly, you realised you only had to log out and in to see nvidia in all its glory.
For me, I find that many of the “up and coming” distros, MEPIS included, are not so much distros as variants. MEPIS is a variant of Ubuntu as it will use Ubuntu repositories. Likewise Sabayon and Gentoo. Or Linux Mint and Ubuntu. Of all these distros, only PCLinuxOS maintains its own repos. Texstar, the leader of the distro, made his name as an independent packager for Mandrake, and though much is copied in terms of the base system, it’s not all from Mandriva, it’s across the board, such is the GPL.
But what makes PCLinuxOS stand out is not just the greater attention to detail in getting your hardware set up, but the fact that you will be able to add/update packages for years until the new compilers are obselete, direct from Texstar and gang, and PCLOS will stay PCLOS, and not gradually turn into Ubuntu, Debian, Mandriva or Gentoo over time!
And during the lifetime of this install, you will benefit from the skills of one of the great Packagers in Linux.
March 19th, 2007 at 7:53 pm
I tried the live CD
I like…I like alot
Off of the CD it installed ALL BUT ONE of the right drivers for my home-built system, including my matrox video, with absolutely no problems.
The one not installed was form my lexmark all-in-one printer, and I didn’t have it turned on. (it well may have installed if on)
Windows NEVER installed that easy, or that fast, especially considering running off of a CD!
This is awesome!!!!!!!
March 19th, 2007 at 8:49 pm
Paul:
Glad to hear it worked out great for you! Welcome to Linux!
Your journey is only beginning. I hope you enjoy it and I’m happy that you have taken the plunge.
March 19th, 2007 at 9:27 pm
Paul:
Yes indeed, you will find Linux a wonderfully stable OS with many new and exciting features that M$ is, and never will be capable of doing. Give PCLos a try and, if it works, you will like it because it is an ok distro, and more than suitable as a replacement to that trash that M$ passes off to the ignorant masses as an OS. You will find many in the Linux community who are VERY opinionated when it comes to the company in Redmond and thier intensely monopolistic practices. I too am fairly new to the Linux world and, like you, started from scratch with zero knowledge about Linux, or even its distro’s for that matter. In the 2.5 months since that time, I have struggled, yet I have learned so much now about computers, thier operating systems and parameters, and this never would have happened had I remained one of the mindless many happily throwing my hard earned $$ to the Ballmer crew (aka monkey boy http://www.ntk.net/media/dancemonkeyboy.mpg )
( http://www.bbspot.com/toys/video/ballmer/ballmer_fun.mpg )
March 19th, 2007 at 11:03 pm
[…] Sabayon Linux 3.3Review: PCLinuxOS 2007 Test 3K3b 1.0 ReleasedApple’s multi-touch technology seen spawning […]
March 20th, 2007 at 2:52 am
Installing the nvidia drivers is a snap in PCLinuxOS after the install. Once the drivers were installed via Synaptic I rebooted into 1440X900 resolution. My machine has a 7800 GT card (AMD 64 X 2) but I did not need to use frame buffer booting from the CD. In the older .93 version I did need to frame buffer. However, on my machine I need to install the FX Graphical drivers after install to get the full graphical effects. I make the change from the Nvidia 7 Series drivers to the FX in the system control panel.
PClinuxOS is extremely fast and extremely stable.
March 20th, 2007 at 7:59 am
I’ve had to manually configure xorg.conf to get my nvidia card to be recognized in PCLinuxOS since their early releases, and now they STILL haven’t addressed that in their 2007??
Dang.
Well, it’s worth the extra effort, imo; it’s quite a robust distribution, and it is possible to “un-Windows” the look and functionality of it by tweaking here and there. :O)
March 20th, 2007 at 2:29 pm
This may get lost but the bad boot may be a result of your disc burn speed. I was surprised my system would not finish the boot and got stuck on the black progress screen (at two different percents complete on the dvd writer than the cd writer). This led me to believe the data was not recognizable to some extent and burnt a new disk - the system booted fine afterward.
March 20th, 2007 at 7:17 pm
I agree with paul there are just too many linux distro’s out there, some of which are almost identical. My main bug bear is all the silly names with K’s and G’s in front; I mean would anyone want to have a kAlpha kRomeo or a kMercedes kBenz in their drive?
I find the review websites are too subjective although they are interesting. I would like a comparison chart of like for like and a list of what each linux has and how fast they are, or maybe that would expand to infinity.
I have been trying to decide what to replace my windows os with and while I agree that Linux rocks, I am getting more confused as each day I read about yet another os, but I am going to persevere till I find the kperfect kmatch for my kcomputer.
March 20th, 2007 at 7:50 pm
Kpaul Kconfused Klinux Kwindow Kshopper:
Haha yes the names are sometimes silly. But really what else do they have to name their programs? Aren’t all the good names already taken?
As far as a review being subjective… well it’s pretty hard not to be subjective at least somewhat. Everyone’s personal experiences are different and the hardware used to test something differs as well. Not every distro works for everyone. And of course people have different preferences.
As far as what you should replace your Windows with… just download a few live CD distros and give them a try. Pick a few you find interesting and see what floats your boat.
March 21st, 2007 at 2:09 am
PCLOS has worked for me with no time wasting - unlike the 7 or 8 others I’ve tried, including the big ones.
I can’t work out the Windows-ish complaint. They all look much the same after I junk the eye candy.
March 21st, 2007 at 7:51 pm
I have been using Linux for 2 years, and switched to PCLOS from Fedora. I am very happy with PCLOS. It’s currently at 16 days of uptime on my system - a test release.
Your Windows-like comment is fair, but that is easily changed, as Terry says.
iWonder iwho ielse inames itheir iprograms ilike iKDE?
March 22nd, 2007 at 4:18 pm
I like the look and feel I think it’s a fine blend of Linux and Windows. For some there is nothing wrong with the look of windows, but the poor programming and business practices. If it makes windows refugees feel more at home then I’ll deal with tweaking kde to look a little more like Linux.
March 23rd, 2007 at 10:38 am
Well, after trying out four live distros last night - Kubuntu, Mandriva, PCLOS, and SM 6.5 (all latest releases) - I have to agree taht PCLOS and SM are leaps and bounds ahead of the others. No silly errors, no codecs missing. They both just work. And SimplyMepis 6.5 works even better than PCLOS.
The only reason I say this (so don’t get all up in arms) is because of the fact that include the native Nvidia drivers so that you can load into your native res (1680×1050 for me) with Beryl enabled right off. There’s some fiddling to do in PCLOS, but I’m sure if I did a full install of either of these distros, they would both work great with minor tweaks. My impression from these was that they are easy to use, well thought-out and really very slick, even compared to M$ with all its cash backing.
I do have the same complaint as KPaul, though. What’s with all the stupid names? If any Linux distribution wants to be taken seriously, they’re going to have to start renaming the majority of their apps. Konqueror, fine. KDE, fine. But most people don’t give a crap (Joe User, that is) that they are running KDE. They likely don’t even know that they are and get confused when all these names are thrown all over the place. Having every app on the system start with a K is equally as confusing as starting a graphics editor called THE Gimp (not just GIMP, mind you). And no, not all the names are taken. Instead of The GIMP, why not Phototools? or ImageMate? or something that ties it in with photoediting/images. Some of the app names make sense - Kontact. I get that… but some are just confusing.
I also agree that in order for Linux to break even a tiny bit into the mainstream (ie: an equal or higher install % than Apple), we’re going to have to see some of these distros start working together. It would be great to see Linspire, Xandros,Ubuntu,PCLOS, Mepis communities and developers get together and build ONE distro (not three variants… ONE) that could feasibly take on M$ or Apple… for free.
As it stands, I’m going to wait until PCLOS 2007 and SM 6.5 final are both ready, then choose which one to install. Frankly, I think they’re both pretty great. Oh as for Kubuntu or Mandriva? ehhh. Kubuntu didn’t have the codecs installed to play M4As and Mandriva… well it would either cost me money or take a looong time to configure to get working the way SM/PCLOS did ‘out of the box’.
BTW, the above pseudo-rant is my opinion. You are encouraged to disagree and if so, tell me all about it.
Oliver
March 23rd, 2007 at 11:43 am
QueepoMatrix,
You are indeed lost.
PCLinuxOS maintains it’s own repositories and enables NO OTHER REPOSITORIES.
Ubuntu uses Debian repositories.
SimplyMEPIS uses Ubuntu repositories as do all the other Variant distros…
what this says is that PCLinuxOS is truly an independent distro…a fork of Mandrake 9.2 originally…but it takes in the best of all distros. Included in PCLOS are red hat patches and software, Suse patches and software, Mandriva patches and software.
Not to mention that PCLinuxOS is entirely independent because it doesn’t boot the same way either…it uses the LiveCD project at BerliOS.
So you are a completely uninformed troll by trashing another Linux distro. You should be commending people for trying Linux at all…afterall, it’s better than Microsoft right? So stop with the trollish comments and make informed ones instead of ignorant ones.
March 25th, 2007 at 4:59 am
Im willing to try pclos. Im trying to get away from windows and to see which distro is as easy as windows in terms of operation. Im getting tired of people saying other distro s are better than this one or that this distro is windows clone. Ubuntu is a a popular distro, tried it…and well…sucks….you have to downoad a lot of programs and configure this in order to run ok. So thanks again to people who actually tests distros….more power and keep it up.
March 25th, 2007 at 9:44 am
PCLinuxOS 2007 is one of the most polished LiveCDs out there today and is ideal for selling Linux as an alternative to Windows users.
But for all you guys who have already taken the plunge, have a look at Archlinux, if you want an easily configured distribution that you will never need to reinstall.
Don’t just take my word for it - many people have tried many alternative distros before settling on Archlinux:
http://bbs.archlinux.org/viewtopic.php?id=12926&p=1
March 26th, 2007 at 2:50 am
I’m new to linux.
I thought linux is strange before! Now, it’s just nice, easy, and very very fast.
PCLINUXOS is very fast, stable, and easy to use.
Thanks for the PCLINUXOS. Thanks and thanks very much to the team. God Bless you all.
March 26th, 2007 at 10:46 am
Bob:
Thanks for the suggestion! I will definitely be checking out Archlinux in the near future.
March 26th, 2007 at 1:24 pm
The PCLOS developers are currently testing new nvidia packages which will automate the part where you had to go into the Control Centre to finish the job, thus making nvidia drivers install thus:
1. Run synaptic
2. Find dkms-nvidia
3. Install it and all dependencies (added for you)
4. Log out and back in.
5. Er ….
6. That’s it.
Similar work is being done on the ATi drivers.
March 27th, 2007 at 11:06 pm
I entirely agree with this and other reviews that single out SM and PCLos as two of the easiest-to-use and most robust of the Linuxes out there. A few observations:
1) PCLos is a more cohesive and I’d say advanced distro. SM was a winner early on, then lagged for a while, and now seems to be maturing, but is still more conservative than many distros (to some, that’s a good thing)
2) Both PCLos and SM suffer from inane product release numbering - incessant betas and RCs.
3) Both PCLos and SM can’t quite compare with the Ubuntus and some other, bigger distros in terms of user support, because they are, at root, the projects of basically an individual and a small, very dedicated team. This is a catch-22, since big development teams and user communities also tend to diffuse focus and sometimes create problems (too many cooks…). But, on the other hand, I kinda worry about the future of PCLos, SM, or other such distros (Sabayon has some potential), if their leaders burn out. Also, for the Ubuntus, it can’t hurt for LTS that a multi-millionaire is backing the project (and I’m sure some would site that as a problem).
4) For all the criticisms of Ubuntu here, it’s the one distro that for me has consistently done the best job detecting and handling all of my hardware, all the way down to hotkeys (no other distro compares). YMMV is definitely key here, and I often notice that review commenters seem to forget that. On the other hand, PCLos and SM are, as people note, set up from the get go to handle multimedia. And in my experience, they both boot and run faster. Points for PCLos and SM, but good hardware detection is paramount.
5) Question: In 2 or 4 or 10 years, will all of these Linuxes, reviews of Linuxes, and comments on reviews of Linuxes mean anything? Is there any cohesive trajectory toward an ultimate OS, or is that antithetical to the point of Linux, and will OSes be obsolete soon enough, anyway? It’s clear that a lot of people want to find the ultimate Linux that’s full-featured, easy to use and configure (and reconfigure), and that will stay around for a long time. I figure the folks who prefer fussy, command-line-heavy distros - and distro-hopping - will end up being more satisfied in the long run, since they aren’t setting their expectations so high.
Sorry for being so long-winded. It’s just another comment!
March 30th, 2007 at 2:03 am
Jabadabaduu.Too lazy to read other replys, but about screen resolution & refresh rates…
Quickly read article and there was some dilemma with live CD and nVidia.
I have nVidia 7600 Gt.So I start live CD - Go to System Configure - Set res=1280×1024 and skip restart part = cancel - chance refresh rates to proper values and again skip restart by pressing cancel. After this shutdown x and restart it and everything runs smoothly with proper settings..
Now it´s installed and liked a lot and if youre looking fast and easy distro you should give a chance to try.
March 31st, 2007 at 4:52 am
PClinuxOS is the best release of a distro for the desktop yet(2007 version). Strange when you look at Distrowatch you see PClinuxOS outdoing Mandriva its base. Strange Mandriva does nothing to have the same out of the box experience of completeness and readiness .
April 2nd, 2007 at 6:14 am
You did not mention the wireless! Why I am going to try Memphis next is because I heard that it has an option for selecting WPA encryption in the GUI. With Windows XP, I can just select the wireless point to connect to and it automatically figures out what encryption it is using. I hope this is added to a distro…
April 5th, 2007 at 4:35 pm
I’ve been trying out PCLinuxOS since version 0.7 (Can’t even remember if it was 0.6) it was about the time Mandrake Linux 10.0 was released.
My point here is that for the past three years, we have never seen the release of a “Final” version of PCLOS.
This however, does not mean its not a great distro. Like I said in my response to the review on Mepis 6.5 RC1 http://www.triedit.org/review/review-simplymepis-65-rc1/
April 6th, 2007 at 2:30 am
Yo…is Linux ever in Final? Is MS ever in Final? Instead of whinging/whining about video rates, install the sucker & go real-world
There is a massive diff between Live & Install. Mandrake 8/9/10? were all great, then the Frogs took over & 2006 was OK, since then they have lost me…until PCLOS.
That PCLOS mimics Windows is terrific, who needs to re-learn where stuff is BEFORE using the OS, let alone being productive. Yr critique of PCLOS is hypocritical. Both for & against the windowesque look?? So which is it - that you cannot stand the ‘look’ is your problem.
We simply want an OS that works & is more bleeding-edge than boring XP, et al. Mandriva Cube/Wadda/? was great - could have 3/4 apps running & accessible at once - but I could never get it to perform properly…Any ideas???
BR>Jack
April 10th, 2007 at 5:30 pm
James: When it says to restart just hit Ctrl + Alt + Backspace, this will restart X and it should work.
PCLinuxOS, Radically simple
April 20th, 2007 at 12:08 am
I’v got to say over the last few days I’v tried loading PCLOS 07t3, SimplyMEPIS, Kubuntu, ubuntu, Mandriva, Xandros 4 and various others for the simple reason that I was fed up with windows and all of it’s, well you know. I have an old machine and wanted to see how linux faired compared to a windows based OS. I am extremely new to linux and have spent alot of time in the wiki pages of each distro, except PCLOS, it did everything for me! I would have stoped with the first one had my wireless card functioned. Having to install ndiswrapper or madwifi inside a terminal is not only intimidating but confusing! I almost ran out and bought a new wireless adapter thinking that i had somehow damaged my card in my travels. Then boom wireless card starts up right out of the configuration tool that is built in to the install. It also lets you select your access point from a GUI, this is perfect! Anyway, I was about to write a few more lines but then realized they would mean very little to linux experts who know how to install everything manually. So I just want to say that PCLOS works great and runs ten times faster than windows did. I’m running 800mhz and 128mg of ram, and am a very happy camper and will continue to use a linux based OS!!!
May 13th, 2007 at 9:51 pm
I just wanted to put my 2 cents in…..
I had used PC linux (big daddy)on my old 400mhz celeron 128mb emac . I ran kind of slow but not as slow as mepis and way more stable. I do have to say that both ran better than ubantu and almost any other distro (10+ tested). Puppy and DSL are faster but i like some eye candy and I”m getting to old to read the small print. I do need to say I am a newwwwbie and have only know about linux about 8 or 9 mts. I’ve been pretty content with MS up to this point and was just looking for something to replace my Win98. It has taught me alot. I do have to point out a couple of things. KDE and Genome are big and run slow on old hardware. XFCE is faster so I currently use SAM (PC Linux based) and DreamLinux because they just work. I also like Dyne:bolic’s feature where you copy it to the hard drive in windows and just use the cd to boot. If someone would put something that just works together then add full winmodem support you would have a good MS replacement.
May 28th, 2007 at 1:27 pm
PcLinuxOS is a very poor rip-off of Mandriva,designed to look like Xp to attract n00bs. It has none of the quality and innovations present in a Mandriva release,2007.1 Spring blows this into the weeds where it belongs along with all the other clones of top distros. Take a look at all the cool app’s in Mandriva’s repo’s then check out what pclinux hasn’t got,for example Azureus…why ‘cos if Tex doesn’t personally like it you can’t have it!
Think you will be well treated in the forums as a n00b,think again,there are some very rude and unhelpful mods
and far too many instances of RTFM and why don’t you google it,if you make a n00b distro expect n00b questions….not only is this a sad rip-off it’s probably the most boring featureless distro ever.
May 28th, 2007 at 5:40 pm
PcLinuxOS is a very poor rip-off of Mandriva,designed to look like Xp to attract n00bs. It has none of the quality and innovations present in a Mandriva release,2007.1 Spring blows this into the weeds where it belongs along with all the other clones of top distros. Take a look at all the cool app’s in Mandriva’s repo’s then check out what pclinux hasn’t got,for example Azureus…why ‘cos if Tex doesn’t personally like it you can’t have it!
Think you will be well treated in the forums as a n00b,think again,there are some very rude and unhelpful mods
and far too many instances of RTFM and why don’t you google it,if you make a n00b distro expect n00b questions….not only is this a sad rip-off it’s probably the most boring featureless distro ever.
Spoken like a true grade schooler!!
September 6th, 2007 at 12:30 am
PCLinuxOS is great! It’s soon gonna beat Ubuntu and the clan. Let’s wait for its new kid, the gnome version.
September 16th, 2007 at 8:11 pm
. . . seems a LOT of folks are MAD at PCLOS. ummm… angry because its as easy to use [or easier] than the worlds leading OS, Micro$oft Windows. Well, I just got tired of fixing my mom’s PC all of the time, so one virus too many and I switched her over to PCLOS. She is 60+. I single-boot PCLOS and I can assure you that my PC looks nothing like hers or Windows. Geeks need to stop trying to hog Linux for the Nerd clique. PCLOS is a gateway drug.
November 2nd, 2007 at 4:14 pm
hey now all ya need to quit hating on Pclinux its the bomb!!! looks nothing like XP or any windows i’ve ever used and i’ve used them all. I just started using it 2 months ago and have installed it on high end desktop and a few laptops runs well on any and every thing i’ve installed it on,
November 13th, 2007 at 7:41 pm
I kind of have to disagree with most of the above. Tried it. No Network. No Sound.
And that on an old Toshiba-Notebook, which never had any problems with other distros (Suse, Ubuntu, Mint, Puppy, etc.).
If a LINUX-flavor can’t support this kind of older hardware out-of-the-box, I kind of put it aside right away because I personally don’t see the benefit in having to work hard to even get the system on-line.
Other than that, I’m not a big fan of neither KDE nor RPM-packages.
But that’s more a matter of taste than anything else.
I’m happy to say that UBUNTU did a great job for me for two years now and I consider switching to Mint 4.0 as soon as it’s released.
Don’t get me wrong: I can see the potential of the distro but it needs a bit of work in the hardware-detection-department.
December 4th, 2007 at 8:26 am
PCLOS is an excellent Linux distro.
It’s hardware recognition is superior to any other OS I have used, including Ubuntu and XP (Ok maybe it’s not a high bar t jump). But there is no hardware that I have
been unable to use with PCLOS.
Best Linux distro out there by a country mile.
March 23rd, 2008 at 5:45 am
Hello everybody, my name is Damion, and I’m glad to join your conmunity,
and wish to assit as far as possible.