GeekStreet Blog

Microsoft with their new OS will selectively disable software and hardware on the users system if that hardware could be used to violate the copyright of media being played back on the system. For instance a recent post by a Vista user revealed that his system was not HDCP compliant because he has an HD monitor plugged into a DVI connection Vista disabled the monitor when a Blu-Ray DVD is played back on a computer forcing the user to use a regular VGA monitor. Why would you watch Blu-Ray on a CRT if you have an HD high resolution monitor? Because Vista decides what hardware you can and cannot use. As for not owning the software – you have never owned a copy of Windows. You only purchase a license to Windows to use on a particular machine and that is all. If your machine blows up it doesn’t matter that you still own the CD you are not legally allowed to use it.

These are just some of the reasons why I keep experimenting with Linux. I am currently running Linux Mandriva on a Sony Vaio PCG-FRV25. Mandriva is a very nice distribution but it has some flaws. The Sony Vaio’s sound card is defective but there is no way to disable the onboard card in Mandriva – at least not one I can figure out. I attached a Creative Labs Extigy to the USB port but it doesn’t work with Mandriva. On the upside all the office applications I need are there to be used.

What I want from a Linux distro and would like to have delivered preconfigured in a brand new laptop ready for use. I would like to be able to do everything I do on a Windows machine with a Linux machine – and I don’t mind paying for software. So what do I do that I would like to continue doing in the Linux environment?

Functionality is the starting point. One of the frustrating things about Windows for years was the interminable search for drivers. It can still be an occasional problem with OEM hardware and Windows but it is not a common problem anymore. Linux still suffers from the driver problems that Windows had back in the days of 98 and 2000. So my first requirement would be that all my hardware – sound card, graphics card, mouse, keyboard, printer, SCSI card, network card, wireless network card, display, USB and IEEE connections are all recognized and installed when installing the OS. This is something which XP does with ease but I have yet to have 100% success with using Linux. Otherwise you are faced with looking up things like this:

#
# Use route plugin for applications that do support 24_3LE
# This lowers latency which the plug plugin introduces due to
# resampling.
#
# arecord -r 44100 -c 4 -f s16_le -D q4b -d 5 /home/xxx/q41.wav

pcm.q4b {
type route;
slave.pcm “quattro”;
ttable.0.0 1;
ttable.1.1 1;
ttable.2.2 1;
ttable.3.3 1;

}

ctl.q4b {
type hw;
card 0;
}

#—-

Umm – o.k. I have no idea what any of that means. I want to click something and have it work. Lazy I guess but I am guessing I’m not alone in wanting/expecting this from an OS.

Graphics editing – Nothing complicated here. I use Photoshop CS but Photoshop Elements is more than sufficient to my needs. Gimp should cover it.

WYSIWYG Web editor – Currently I use Dreamweaver MX. Nvu should be a good match here.

Video Import and Editing – This is complicated because the computer has to recognize an IEEE or USB connection to the computer to import the video from a video camera. For video editing itself I like Ulead 10 or Pinnacle Studio 10.5. Your guess is as good as mine as to what could be a replacement software here.

Automatic recognition of digital cameras so I can import my digital photos. This can be a problem with XP too. XP did not recognize my Canon Powershot sho I’m not sure what my chances are with Linux.

Sound editing – This is very important to me though my needs are not complicated. Acoustica Mixcraft is my tool of choice currently – Audacity is a non starter for me it is not even close to Mixcraft in terms of features of ease of use. I have to be able to record sound from an external source such as a turntable, CD player or tape player.

Real Player, QuickTime alternative etcetera. Just for media playback.

A simple relational database management system like MS Access. mySQL is great if you have the time to write a program to interface with it or create an application using PHP/Apache and mySQL but let’s face it MS Access is a lot easier to use.

Automatic recognition of USB drives and ability to read and write to drives as long as they are FAT or FAT 32 format.

A file erasure program – I do all my financial stuff online over SSL links but I still erase cookies and cache to be safe.

The two most recent Linux distros I have tried Freespire and Mandriva are very close to offering the functionality I want. Freespire has an amazing support for installing applications which do not involve the user having to know how to TAR or UNTAR or create MAKE files to install programs. The fact that some distributions are getting close should be writing on the wall for Microsoft and end users but it will be a while yet before it gets to where the average use will be able to install and use Linux as easily as they do XP.