“Entertaining Transition [back] to Windows”?

i would like to find an old laptop to run linux any recommendations ?

I’ve stuck linux on loads of laptops and netbooks for mates & family and I’m yet to have any real problems – all were significantly improved. I generally use Elementary OS if they’re a new user – I wouldn’t run it myself but seems to chug along forever with no drama.

My favourite machine is my work Pavilion i7 15″, forget the model name, it’s been single-boot Fedora since new (2010 I think) – with an SSD and a bit more RAM it flies.
At home I’m running Fedora on a new MBP Retina – it doesn’t wake up from hibernate, and a couple of programs don’t play nicely with the hi res screen (weird programs no one else seems to use though!) – probably easily fixable but they don’t irritate me enough to spend the time on it.
My SO runs Elementary on an old unibody macbook, again with an SSD and extra RAM, works brilliantly and the hardware is really nice to use too.

When I bought the Pavilion, I just went into the local FNAC (the French version of Currys or something) with Linux on a USB stick and asked if I could try it on a couple of their demo machines. IME if there are any grave compatibility issues with the hardware, they’ll show up when you boot from the stick and they’re generally not worth persevering with (unless you already own the machine) – just try another. Plenty of online compatibility sites too.

Wife was loving linux last night after a hdd malfunction and a presentation today which was stored within …..Along with all her class work and presentations.

Fired up my trusty old eeepc(900mz with 512meg of ram and a 7inch screen – reminds me of a databank more than a netbook) with fedora on it.

Put in the corrupted HDD and retrieved most of the files.

She is to be backing up her HDD tomorrow and thus more on a regular basis…As the previous back up was dated 1 year ago…..

I still prefer windows for day to day use but the Linux machine had its benefits such is being able to access and use wireless networks no one else seemed to see when i worked in Africa 🙂

As a last resort, Photorec is a great tool for getting stuff back that the user accidentally deleted or when the drive died. I have it on a USB loaded with Puppy Linux, and keep a USB hdd caddy handy for when the computer is borked. It screws all the filenames but that’s a small price to pay.

Just because it’s Linux doesn’t mean its invulnerable.

I’ve been running Linux on everything I can for umpteen years, still not had any virus problems.

Cougar – Moderator
What’s “ETW”?

http://wiki.totalwar.com/w/Empire_Total_War

It’s just this sort of feckaboutery that boils my piss with Linux, I’ve lost half a day’s work because no-one could be arsed to tear down a two year old web page or put a note on the adLDAP github, and because the page that sent me here couldn’t be bothered to give a URL so I had to Google it.

This is nothing to do with linux, it is to do with package management on the distribution you chose to run along with a component you are not paying for not being documented well. And also it is a bit crap to get your piss boiled by a load of open source volunteers not doing something for free that you demand. It would all be a lot better if you spent some time working for free to sort it all out. But you won’t.

But you won’t.

Not won’t, can’t. I don’t have the skillset.

You’re right, it’s not the fault of Linux in itself (and nothing to do with any ‘chosen distro’ either), my complaint was that this sort of thing happens too often. The default assumption is that you have an intricate working knowledge of the system to start with.

I appreciate that I’ve little room for complaint as a “free user,” but if you’re going to take the time to create open source software you’d want to take the time to document it properly, no? Seriously, how hard is it to remove an out of date web site? Seconds of a job to replace it with an HTTP redirect.

It does feel sometimes like the Linux community relishes in making things obtuse. You google a problem and get 37 different solutions, 36 of which are declared “wrong” by everyone else. I’ve lost count of the number of times I’ve waded through pages of instructions to find that the ‘real’ solution is a one-liner no-one wants to tell you about. And gods forbid you’d ever ask a “stupid” question.

I really like Linux, but it’s a proper time sink for anything that doesn’t Just Work.

There’s a lot of tumbleweed on that adldap project.

And also it is a bit crap to get your piss boiled by a load of open source volunteers not doing something for free that you demand

But it’s a key feature of Linux. The fact it’s open source volunteers, mostly. You can be depending on some piece of software to enable whatever it is that you need to do, or hardware you need to use, and then suddenly its author finds something better to do with his or her time and you’re screwed.

ft.

It does feel sometimes like the Linux community relishes in making things obtuse. You google a problem and get 37 different solutions, 36 of which are declared “wrong” by everyone else. I’ve lost count of the number of times I’ve waded through pages of instructions to find that the ‘real’ solution is a one-liner no-one wants to tell you about. And gods forbid you’d ever ask a “stupid” question.

To be fair I don’t think that is different from any other technical issue. The number of times i have had to try a million different things on windows to fix an issue is just as high. The god thing is that it’s easier to get a deep understanding of Linux than Windows.

As ever it’s just a tool. Depends on your usage. I personally love the Linux / open source philosophy but still use Windows for lots of stuff. Linux wins for anything custom though.

As an update I have to say my Linux experience has deteriorated to the point I have ordered a new pc with windows.

Mainly because of driver support from nvidia being poor on linux and maybe my own lack of knowledge i still love the interface but i need to be working not tinkering.

I have been Linux curious for years, but never had cause to try it. I have a gaming laptop as my main computer, but I’m sure I have an older low spec one knocking about.

What version of Linux would be ideal for a first time user wanting to use it for downloading, web surfing, music, pictures etc?

Download Mint and try that but don’t come back to the thread until you do otherwise there’ll be loads of the usual KDE/Gnome oneupmanship geek shit going on and you’ll lose the will to live try Linux at all.

What version of Linux would be ideal for a first time user wanting to use it for downloading, web surfing, music, pictures etc?

Mint would be perfect for that. Am running Mint 18.2 Xfce edition.

One of the beauties of Linux is with most distributions you can install it to a pendrive (called a “live CD” for historical reasons) and boot from it, so you can try it out without making a single change to your existing PC.

As Ivan suggests, you could do worse than Mint as a first outing.

Ubuntu is worth checking out too, it’s (broadly speaking) what Mint was based on. Personally I can’t abide the Unity interface but plenty of folk like it.

I’m quite fond of Lubuntu. It looks a bit old-school but is designed to be more of a lightweight distribution, it’s essentially Ubuntu after it’s got home from a night out and got changed into a baggy jumper and pyjama bottoms.

Mint and Ubuntu probably the ones to try first, the Ubuntu unity interface doesn’t really bother me, I quite like it.

That said I currently run mint on my 2ndary PC, mainly as it works and I can’t be bothered to try any others just now.

Cheers, will have a look at Mint and Unbuntu 🙂

If you go Ubuntu stick with a “long term support” version like 16.04lts even though yo can get newer versions, and never update on the same day updates are available wait two or three weeks they always seam to create instability.

I’ve been running Linux on everything I can for umpteen years, still not had any virus problems

How do you know you don’t have malware though? You seem to be thinking of 1990’s style viruses – these days any decent malware is invisible to the user unless it’s picked up by an AV scanner.

I’m not a Windows fanboi, there’s lots about it that sucks and the first half of my career was largely thanks to it being pretty crap. I’ve used Linux on and off over the years but keeping going back to Windows, when I get home in the evening I’m past the point in my life where I want to piss about with things to get simple stuff working. Windows 10 just works and with a decent PC it flies, sure Linux has it’s uses but it also has a lot of limitations.

I use OSX at work, but all my home stuff…media server, file server and laptops are all Linux based. A combination of FreeNAS for storage, Debian on the desk/laptops and Elementary for the media server. All run great, but there are a couple of niggles you just dont get with OSX or more current versions of Windows. I love it, but i’m not sure its ready (or will ever be!) for the general public’s consumption….maybe they want to keep it that way?!?