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Bored at work (shh!) so I thought I'd write a blog post again. No doubt in the months and years since I was last active here, everyone has completely given up checking for new updates. If you are still reading, throw me a comment, it might even encourage me to post more regularly than... well... never.
I've made my first baby steps into the real geekosphere in that my old PC, having served me faithfully for over 2 years (with some minor upgrades and replacement parts) has reached the end of it's life as my "gaming rig". However, rather than cannibalise it for parts as I usually do, it's been given a new lease of life as a secondary desktop running Ubuntu Linux. Gone are the days when installing Linux required a degree in computer science, an infinite amount of patience and a week before you could even get X to work (the bit that displays the desktop and draws all the program windows for non techys). The install is, all things considered, even easier than your average windows install (although about equivalent to the Windows Vista install I did around the same time, more on that later). Like most Linux flavours, Ubuntu comes on what is known as a "Live CD", a fully functioning version fo the OS that runs from the CD without any install necessary. This is great if you want to "try before you buy" as it leaves everything about your PC intact until you're ready to hit that "install now" button. Everything works a dream, and looks a whole lot prettier (yes, I'm shallow) than my last encounters with Linux back in 2000-2003. I've yet to do anything more challenging than opening Firefox with it, but I'll keep you posted. The ultimate plan is to turn it into a media-hub of sorts, with a TV card and some TV recording software.
Replacing the old girl is a shiny new build PC running Vista. This also looks very pretty, but Aero is hardly the revolution Microsoft would have you believe it is. Sure, the frosted-glass look of the window edges, and the wizzy "stacked windows" task switcher look very nice and will impress your mother, but they not about to revolutionise the way you see and use the desktop. As with all new builds, nothing went quite as smoothly as it really ought to - from the graphics card arriving minus a capacitor, to the components I'd bought not fitting ideally into the case (they're all in there, it's just not quite ideal in some places). Vista itself seems stable and reasonably slick. UAC is proving to be annoying, it could really do with the option to "always allow" for certain programs/operations. Some of the new admin/troublshooting tools are pretty nice, but the sidebar is pretty useless. Windows built-in CD writing abilities now include burning movies and other files to DVDs, but still don't support writing an ISO image which is somewhat frustrating, but perhaps viewed as an anti-piracy measure (even if lots of people distribute perfectly valid ISO images - Ubuntu for example is downloaded in this form). No doubt I'll find more niggles, there's always plenty of those. But at least it plays all my current and future games, something unfortunately Linux still can't offer me.
I've made my first baby steps into the real geekosphere in that my old PC, having served me faithfully for over 2 years (with some minor upgrades and replacement parts) has reached the end of it's life as my "gaming rig". However, rather than cannibalise it for parts as I usually do, it's been given a new lease of life as a secondary desktop running Ubuntu Linux. Gone are the days when installing Linux required a degree in computer science, an infinite amount of patience and a week before you could even get X to work (the bit that displays the desktop and draws all the program windows for non techys). The install is, all things considered, even easier than your average windows install (although about equivalent to the Windows Vista install I did around the same time, more on that later). Like most Linux flavours, Ubuntu comes on what is known as a "Live CD", a fully functioning version fo the OS that runs from the CD without any install necessary. This is great if you want to "try before you buy" as it leaves everything about your PC intact until you're ready to hit that "install now" button. Everything works a dream, and looks a whole lot prettier (yes, I'm shallow) than my last encounters with Linux back in 2000-2003. I've yet to do anything more challenging than opening Firefox with it, but I'll keep you posted. The ultimate plan is to turn it into a media-hub of sorts, with a TV card and some TV recording software.
Replacing the old girl is a shiny new build PC running Vista. This also looks very pretty, but Aero is hardly the revolution Microsoft would have you believe it is. Sure, the frosted-glass look of the window edges, and the wizzy "stacked windows" task switcher look very nice and will impress your mother, but they not about to revolutionise the way you see and use the desktop. As with all new builds, nothing went quite as smoothly as it really ought to - from the graphics card arriving minus a capacitor, to the components I'd bought not fitting ideally into the case (they're all in there, it's just not quite ideal in some places). Vista itself seems stable and reasonably slick. UAC is proving to be annoying, it could really do with the option to "always allow" for certain programs/operations. Some of the new admin/troublshooting tools are pretty nice, but the sidebar is pretty useless. Windows built-in CD writing abilities now include burning movies and other files to DVDs, but still don't support writing an ISO image which is somewhat frustrating, but perhaps viewed as an anti-piracy measure (even if lots of people distribute perfectly valid ISO images - Ubuntu for example is downloaded in this form). No doubt I'll find more niggles, there's always plenty of those. But at least it plays all my current and future games, something unfortunately Linux still can't offer me.
posted by Sarum at
Thursday, July 26, 2007
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