Anyone here use Mint?

[navychop]

The Linux distro, that is. We can discuss Mojitos and Juleps in another thread.

Years ago I set up a PC with Xandros for someone else. I only used it a short time. Before that, it was Unix for me at work (Navy).

I am considering setting up an old PC I have laying around with Linux, and maybe an old laptop. I know nothing of this flavor of Linux, just read it was now #1. Will it likely work with wireless functions on an older laptop, say maybe a Vostro 2510? This hasn't been used in a year and the PW is misplaced. Might be best to start all over, especially since it was a Vista machine. IIRC the Xandros Desktop version 2 business was rather picky about hardware. Plain vanilla only.

Any thoughts or suggestions? There is no rush on this, I am just considering if I want to do it at all.

 

[harshness]

My daily driver is running Mint 14 Nadia with the Cinnamon GUI. All in all it is pretty serviceable.

I like being able to have the latest releases of Flash, Firefox and Thunderbird within days instead of something like Debian where the updates come only once or twice a year.

My CPU is an Athlon 64 X2 3800+ with 2GB of shared memory on an Asus nVidia chipset mainboard. Boot time is about 37 seconds.

I'm still not convinced that I don't want root access all the time (Ubuntu-based distributions seem to have a fascination with using sudo to do EVERYTHING).

 

[Hall]

It seems that Linux suffers from a flavor-of-the-month cycle when it comes to distros.

On modern wireless hardware, I can't imagine any up-to-date distro having issues nowadays. On the other hand, being an older piece of hardware, there's been plenty of time to develop drivers. Only problem might be is if it was an uncommon device and no one cared enough to develop one. Most distros should have a hardware database listing that you can check.

 

[Neutron]

Boot up on the live disc and see how it behaves.


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[navychop]

Bingo!


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[harshness]

It seems that Linux suffers from a flavor-of-the-month cycle when it comes to distros.

That's how innovation and progress happens. Otherwise you get what you get every five to seven years (possibly longer on OSX).

Since most of the distros are rooted in either CentOS or Debian, you're getting a tailored version of one of those distros as opposed to a completely different platform.

 

[Hall]

I don't pay much attention anymore (I started using Linux around '97 - Redhat v5.0) and stuck with it for 5-6 years. In between, I used Mandrake, Debian, probably some others in between, and the last being Gentoo. I've used Ubuntu's LiveCD a number of times but never permanently. Interesting to see that so many are Debian-based. I presume it's because of their packaging system that really is superior to anything out there (and must still be).

 

[Teehar]

Mint isn't bad at all,it was my first experience with Linux.Since then I moved on to Kubuntu,preferred it over Mint,currently I am running Zorin,of the 3 I like it best of all.Very easy to use out of the box,had all the required drivers for my laptop,samba share works great.The biggest issue I had with Mint,was missing drivers,and the learning curve to get them installed.Had a whale of a time getting the correct wifi driver installed.

 

[navychop]

Now that's good to know. Are all Linux distros difficult with drivers?



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[Hall]

Drivers (modules) are part of the core kernel so in theory, all distros should have the same drivers. Now, that's only if a) developers write a driver for a piece of hardware or b) the hardware maker provides a driver with full, open source code.

Now, some distros will include closed-source drivers (nVidia graphics drivers was a popular one in the past) on the disc while others are very strict about things like that. If it isn't open-source, they'll pretty much deny that it exists.

 

[Teehar]

I'm sure Mint has integrated more driver support since I last used it,Zorin on the other hand,is designed to have almost all drivers right off the bat.I liked it so well I actually installed it on laptop,and an old pc,didn't have to hunt for any drivers.Oh,I forgot to mention,Zorin already had the drivers for our Brother fax/printer,and an old hp printer.Was pretty surprised about that.

Not trying to pimp Zorin,just figured you might want to look at it.

http://zorin-os.com/

 

[Kraven]

Downloading MINT was we speak. Ubuntu here took a dump when I installed COMPBIZ, now the menu bar is gone and I cant close whatever I open (I have to log in as a guest).

Being said, am surprised there's no NETWORKING/PC sub-forum on this site.

Looking for one because i find it odd am i blowing through routers left and right (each seem to last 10-16 months). Linksys E3000 lasted less than a year, now the buffalo router is awol (getting less tha 2mb on a 30mb line).

cheers, k

PS- Been downloading MINT for 5 hours now.

 

[navychop]

Thanks for the warning.

And thanks on Zorin. I'll research both.


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[Stargazer]

I tried Ubuntu and had trouble getting drivers. I hope Zorin is a bit better. There should be alternatives to Windows. Would like a dual boot Windows/Linux machine.

 

[Teehar]

I tried Ubuntu and had trouble getting drivers. I hope Zorin is a bit better. There should be alternatives to Windows. Would like a dual boot Windows/Linux machine.

Zorin was great on my old ibm lappy.I made a dual boot on the pc.Really nice to have both on one machine.

 

[Kraven]

I tried Ubuntu and had trouble getting drivers. I hope Zorin is a bit better. There should be alternatives to Windows. Would like a dual boot Windows/Linux machine.

I dual boot linux and windows. Just use windows when am DJ'ing at the radio. Problem is, whenever I boot to Windows... am stuck updating.

 

[navychop]

Sing it loud, brother!

 

[Stargazer]

Is Zorin good for getting drivers on computers that are less than a year old?

 

[Teehar]

Is Zorin good for getting drivers on computers that are less than a year old?

I honestly can't answer you that,I would have to guess that it is.I can tell you they update it frequently.

 

[Hall]

Most distros should have a hardware database listing that you can check.

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