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Message started by Oldfeller on 03/22/15 at 12:22:49

Title: Linux Mint 17 vs Windows 7
Post by Oldfeller on 03/22/15 at 12:22:49

I spent 2 hours last night at Grandma's house upgrading and virus checking and degragging the Win 7 laptop that we keep there. Two hours with the CPU pegged and the hard drive working constantly.

Two frickn' hours (a four step process involving two outside programs) --- on a laptop I cleaned up only 23 days ago and am told nobody used but once since then.

There were no viruses in motion on the machine -- MS itself was the only illness the laptop had as "update 8 of 34" froze the machine solid and forced a safe boot recovery and a redo of the upgrade. Finally the machine had to do the upgrade as a post-shut down/pre-reboot affair with nothing running to get the upgrade to go through.

This MS upgrade illness might have sent the machine to the repair shop if I hadn't been knowledgeable enough to go look it up on my phone and be persistent enough to keep at it and beat it .....

========================

Today, just for the frick of it I have upgraded/devirused/defragged my Linux mint box and I have recorded the entire affair for your analysis. I have provided the download elements and the CPU and memory usage required.

And yes, Virginia, the entire "upgrade the Mint 17 box" affair took less than ONE (1) minute from start to finish .... it barely moved the CPU usage or network throughput lines and took really only about 20-30 seconds to actually do the entire dirty deed.

And just think ..... I do this about 2-3 times a YEAR compared to having to do it every week or so.

Control + a few times to get the screen shot large enough to see the seconds.

Title: Re: Linux Mint vs Windows 7
Post by Oldfeller on 03/22/15 at 12:29:09

Comments? There should be some, you know.

There should be tongue in cheek questions from the Linux users, since I gave them a straight line to hit on.

:exclamation [smiley=engel017.gif]

Title: Re: Linux Mint 17 vs Windows 7
Post by old_rider on 03/22/15 at 14:09:58

Well, for me, I like the Linux ..... however... my games and my new camera program will not work with it.

I only use the large laptop now for gaming, and will probably use the little laptop for the security system thing.

I will however ask the wizards at Blizzard, if they are going to make a Linux version of their games. :)

I'll look around in the forums there and see whats up, I know there is a mac version and a windoze one.

Title: Re: Linux Mint 17 vs Windows 7
Post by Oldfeller on 03/22/15 at 15:24:10

Go to your distro, download Steam. All distros have Steam in their "programs to download" under games.

Crank it up and sign up for a Steam account linked to your charge card (so you can pay for purchases painlessly).

Look at what triple AAA big name games for Linux Steam is offering for less than $10 this week.

Buy one, play it .....

Repeat as needed.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yr2GdRBDOmU

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LaBgdnNoJE4 go ahead, you know you want to look ......

Title: Re: Linux Mint 17 vs Windows 7
Post by jcstokes on 03/22/15 at 17:20:54

Oldfeller, like I said before, I wish I could understand most of what you talk about, however, I use Windows 7 and am heartily fed up with the automatic stuffing of my computer with Windows updates. I frequently have trouble accessing the internet after these things push themselves into my computer. It does settle down after a while. I noticed that after the last lot of updates, my computer would freeze up from time to time, particularly when reading emails. I wish it were like Windows 98 where you were advised of updates and had a choice of when and if you wanted to install them. I won't change my system 'till I buy a new computer but I will be looking at another operating system if that's what it's called.

Title: Re: Linux Mint 17 vs Windows 7
Post by Oldfeller on 03/22/15 at 18:07:36

No, I guess you don't understand anything but Windows, never having used anything else.

People used to say they couldn't leave Windows because of MS Office, then Office equivalents came out and they found out Office itself would run under Wine.

Now MS OFFICE is a Chromebook title in the Chrome store, i.e. a native Chrome App.

Then they said it was games, but games run on Linux under Steam now too (1,000s of them).

Then they said they didn't have new hardware (Linux runs fine on a 10 plus year old box for me, faster than Windows ever did). The thought that a Linux OS could turn their old hardware into a race horse just didn't seem real to them.

Then they got an Android phone or a Tablet .... suddenly their eyes opened up to stuff that ran fast and didn't require weekly maintenance and you having to spend money/time on it all the time.

The bold ones loaded up a Linux Mint distro on their existing machine using a dual boot system -- and never looked back.

Steam does sales, BTW --- 80%-90% off type sales all the time. I never buy a Triple AAA rated game for more than $9.99, ever. Sometimes they have daily specials where the game is FREE to own for keeps, but the "daily deal" is open only for a few hours .....

If a game is a part of a series of same title games, a gamepack including ALL of the games goes on sale for $19.99 regularly --- and I mean all of them. I have seen all of the Valve games (60 plus of them) sold for $9.99.

Steam is crazy, which is where the movie clip came from. Remember --only shoot the orcs that are over 60% off.

Wait for the daily specials ...... and the free to play specials.

Title: Re: Linux Mint 17 vs Windows 7
Post by zipidachimp on 03/22/15 at 18:21:39

stopped using windoze when microshaft wanted me to pay for it(win 95?). switched to linux, used many flavors until I found Mint, maybe 10 years ago.
I never defrag, never have a problem or a virus or any problem with photos/music/downloads etc.
At age 71, I don't understand why most people aren't using it. Dead bloody simple! 8-)

Title: Re: Linux Mint 17 vs Windows 7
Post by Oldfeller on 03/22/15 at 21:08:27

I have discussed it with several on here and it winds up being that they don't feel like they are technically up to it.

I keep telling them that Linux Mint 17 (Mate Edition) requires NO technical knowledge and is easier to use than Win XP used to be -- and is much easier than the current Windows versions. Living with it, it just works much better than Windows.

Then I think how much I am going to grimace whenever people sign up for "free" Windows 10 knowing full well they are signing up for a subscription OS service that will hit them up periodically for a license fee and then will go do strange stuff to their computer without asking them about it (blame for that goes to the "customer requests" that nobody ever sees but MS).

Do you realize that over a third of the Win 10 Beta group ACTUALLY QUIT over one thing or another and MS just kept right on trucking over their typed protests followed by their feet walking away objections? Many things about Win 10 are NOT customer approved at all.

MS isn't interested in your feedback, they just want the image of your "buying in" to the new Win 10 set-up so they can point to it at roll out time.

:P

Title: Re: Linux Mint 17 vs Windows 7
Post by jcstokes on 03/22/15 at 22:12:24

Oldfeller, possibly some reluctance to change is , as you say, that people are scared of adapting to new systems and I'm one of them. I feel you made a very valid point some time ago, when you stated that most current computer users are interested in surfing, forums, gaming, facebook and porn and have little interest in Windows Office Professional thingy, or Your Accounting Software. Its a pity MS doesn't know this yet.

Title: Re: Linux Mint 17 vs Windows 7
Post by Oldfeller on 03/23/15 at 06:34:08

Given the very light uses people put computers to regularly, a Chromebook or Chromebox makes perfect sense for most "normal people".

One of the few areas that still lacks in the Chromebook idea is playing major games. Now, what folks consider a major game differs so I'll pick my own case as "Worst Case" and talk about that.

I like immersive large area first person shooters. These are the largest and most resource hoggish of the Triple AAA gaming world. Now that Steam is rolling those titles over to SteamOS (which is Linux based and runs on all major distros now) I can get what I want on my little $80 refurbie Dell unit using my $47 Radeon video card using mid range settings.

I can't do my Triple AAA games on Chromebooks, Chromeboxes or Chromekillers right now, but as processors and GPUs get stronger that may change in a year or two.

But, using the European trick of buying an old out of date American business PC and stripping the OS off the hard drive and then putting Linux Mint on it, I can get what I need (which will last for the rest of my life, most likely) for less than $150 put into it.

Steam is getting ready to do a major roll out push this summer on their own customized Linux boxes. "My trick" will become completely main stream soon and all the kiddies will be scoping up all the dead white boxes out of all the family closets real soon.

Steam OS, Linux (and ChromeOS) runs like a scalded cat on hardware Windows just sputters on.

Sad fact is that MS has shown no progress on this issue whatsoever during the entire Win 10 development process. Hell, they can't put much more than half of Win 10 OS on the Chromekiller laptops they are currently selling, so they had to develop a trick to constantly swap in and out the various pieces of the OS over the internet as you needed them.

This is absurd compared to a Chromebook or to Linux. My whole Linux Mint world fits inside a 12 gig partition very easily and my current puny 80 gig hard drive is HUGE compared to my expansion needs. I actually keep my old distro versions INTACT on my hard drive, should I ever need anything off the old version I can boot it up and go get it ..... it is all there sitting complete with the installed programs and data files.

I have room out the ass at 80 gigs of hard drive space.

And remember, you can buy sd cards now a days with 200 gigs of space on them ..... and I own a 1 terabyte portable USB drive too (hooked up to my Simple TV so I can store all the taped shows I want).

::)

Look at this and read #5 and realize that people are smart and can do whatever they want to spend the effort to do.

http://www.pcworld.com/article/2691209/5-powerful-things-you-didnt-know-chromebooks-could-do.html

Title: Re: Linux Mint 17 vs Windows 7
Post by old_rider on 03/23/15 at 08:25:51

OF.... um, just to load the minty's no tech knowledge is required..

But to add stuff to Linux, ya got to know how to unpack and engineer the install on a lot of stuff...

I'm not up to snuff on the line speak on Linux like I was on dos.

I did look up how to make my game work and can run it.... but not some of my other stuff.
They want me to load up wine and make a few "line inputs" and you know how that goes, I don't trust anything I don't truly understand and what it is doing to my system.
Kind of like doing a forum and someone telling you to open up your "reg edit" and insert line "so and so" into C://X86/windows/drivers/ whatever.....
That's why I was using my small laptop to do the Linux experiment, so I could learn a little more about it and how it works.
I do have a steam account and play Rust and 7days (zombie killer games) but don't use it for the other 12 or so games I had in the past, even though they are listed. (I have had steam for a long time)
I guess i'll look for a local Linux group down here and see if they can teach an ol' fart a little about packing and unpacking and dragging and dropping programs into the system.
I tried the "wine" in the past and did not like it, looks as though I might not even need it anymore anyway... if my system has the DRI drivers for video, its a drag and drop thing into a directory and then tell the icon where to look for the "game.exe".
Now that I have my security system loaded on the little laptop (well the start of my system), i'll have to play with an old PC I have in the garage. I have Mint 15 on it, couldn't get the next version to work with it, might have been my CD burn...not sure. Its so old you can't tell it to load from a usb, just drives, so I might still have to have win7 on it. (it might be xp on it, i'm not sure, so dang many versions of windoze).

I do see myself in the future having disc's of current Linux programs and dumping any OP on any system that has windows.
Linux loads quickly with just a few inputs needed, and once it was up, it recognized my Wi-Fi, all I had to do was put in the name and password and I was connected, took me about 15 minute though, because I split the drives for a dual boot.
I'll do an update on the old pc... maybe even do a video.... LOL :)

Title: Re: Linux Mint 17 vs Windows 7
Post by Art Webb on 03/23/15 at 11:28:59

Well I tried the chomebook, but you HAD to have wifi for the setup
guess who doesn't have wifi?
And my ISP want more for wifi per month
I could have set up wifi and then set up my chromebook IF my old comp hadn't been so buggered
I couldn't load the maint mate 16 i bought because the disc drive wouldn't work
no matter how you cut it, I needed a new PC, and guess what came on it? yup, win 8.1
seems to work ok, and I don't need to be a programmer to use it
it's a lot more computer than I need, but I needed one
right away cause my old Dell was about dead (it does live on, as a office only machine with no net access
no point getting the chromebook or box now, I done bought a new PC with a no brainer system so my stoopid self could use it
At some point I might go wireless, then look into a chromebook or box, right now there's no money

Title: Re: Linux Mint 17 vs Windows 7
Post by Oldfeller on 03/23/15 at 12:38:48

Old_rider, you do know what Software Manager is don't you?

Find it on your Mint machine and let it find and install the software.

You seem to want to do everything the hardest possible way.

Just click on the far bottom left hand icon it will open up your menus and one of them will be software manager.

Title: Re: Linux Mint 17 vs Windows 7
Post by Oldfeller on 03/24/15 at 06:06:14

Oooooh !!! a LARGE Linux Mint upgrade came through today, both of my browsers and a new Adobe Flash just came through as a major update -- and Fash never comes through complete, it always makes the unit go back to the repository after another update which is as large as the whole thing was the first time (duh, it is the whole thing all over again).

Two browsers and Flash (twice) -- how long do you think it took on Linux Mint 17 mate?

Answer is 40 seconds done without me having to stop working, reboot or DO anything -- jest think about this a bit next time you have to deal with a MS update.

..... while you are locked down for 5-10 minutes totally while just moving the updates -- just waiting to be allowed to proceed at all, knowing you have a forced reboot or two coming up, and then another two reboots for the Flash updates, then a defrag for the hard drive since everything on your drive got scrambled by the major update which re-wrote all your MS operating files and all those big log.bin files. Then comes the required virus update delay and then 15-20 minute "quick" scan to see if anything ugly came along with the updates.

I am done in 40 seconds with no reboot required, no defrag, no anti-virus scan, just painless and beautiful.

And with Chromebooks/boxes it would have been background all the way without you ever even seeing it at all.

just control + click a few times on the attached pic to blow it up big enough to see the seconds

Title: Re: Linux Mint 17 vs Windows 7
Post by Oldfeller on 03/24/15 at 06:31:54

Life with Linux. Life with Chrome. Why do you do this awful MS stuff to yourselves ???? And then you send them MONEY each year for torturing you ????

http://media1.santabanta.com/full1/Outdoors/Waterfalls/waterfalls-27a.jpg

Title: Re: Linux Mint 17 vs Windows 7
Post by jcstokes on 03/24/15 at 11:02:19

Maybe this is where I'm wrong, I have never paid MS any money since I brought the computer. I do pay Norton annually and am content to do so.

Title: Re: Linux Mint 17 vs Windows 7
Post by jcstokes on 03/24/15 at 11:02:44

Maybe this is where I'm wrong, I have never paid MS any money since I brought the computer. I do pay Norton annually and am content to do so.

Title: Re: Linux Mint 17 vs Windows 7
Post by 12Bravo on 03/24/15 at 11:33:53

The main reason I haven't completely switched over to Linux yet is the fact that most distros don't play well with my Creative Audio sound card.

Title: Re: Linux Mint 17 vs Windows 7
Post by zipidachimp on 03/24/15 at 12:09:16

jcstokes: I thought Norton was into commandos, not commands! ;D 8-)

Title: Re: Linux Mint 17 vs Windows 7
Post by jcstokes on 03/24/15 at 12:32:19

Yes Zipi, they are and also were into Featherbeads and other things too. There is a man in my country making total replicas of 1950's Nortons at great expense to the buyers. I will try and find out if he has a website and post it in a new topic.

Title: Re: Linux Mint 17 vs Windows 7
Post by Art Webb on 03/24/15 at 15:19:50

my updates usually install when i shut down, automatically
I never sent MS money every year
I do agree a chromebook or box would be better, if I had wifi, but I don't, and I already dropped money on this machine
i might make a dual boot out of it, if I get ambitious

Title: Re: Linux Mint 17 vs Windows 7
Post by Oldfeller on 03/24/15 at 18:57:49

[smiley=evil.gif]

I've never sent MS money each year ..... sez all the boys.

Win10 is your upgrade path now.

[smiley=evil.gif]

MS has force upgraded everybody at Win 8 --- forced them to Win 8.1 then just recently flat told them they are dropping all upgrades to anything that upgrades to Win 10 since Win 10 is your official upgrade path now.

Win 10 is FREE for the first year ..... to anybody using a legal copy of Win 7 or later.

IF YOU LIVE IN CHINA, Win 10 is free to you, any version upgrades to Win 10 FOR FREE, legal version or otherwise. Those that roll over to Win 10 are granted amnesty.

After that comes 2017 and MS says "We haven't decided yet what 2017 is going to be like a whole year AFTER our magnanimous FREE Win 10 has taken over the world and all your machines are all hooked in to our automatic (no notification) update system".

And they don't know how successful Win 10 is going to be and how much they can get away with charging for it.

NOBODY ELSE CHARGES FOR AN OS ANY MORE -- not even Apple. They do charge for software maintenance, so mebbe that's what it will get pitched as. But you will pay, somehow. MS is a for profit company that provides software products and they must get paid for their efforts.

Title: Re: Linux Mint 17 vs Windows 7
Post by Art Webb on 03/24/15 at 19:00:03

I'm still getting updates regularly

Title: Re: Linux Mint 17 vs Windows 7
Post by Oldfeller on 03/24/15 at 19:21:14

See if it continues after Win 10 comes out ..... remember, you are supposed to roll over to Win 10 as your upgrade path.

Art, is $11 too much for a router? It is a factory refurb with a full warranty.

http://www.amazon.com/Linksys-E800-Wireless-Certified-Refurbished/dp/B00NU6N6XE/ref=sr_1_5?s=pc&ie=UTF8&qid=1427250881&sr=1-5&keywords=router

$18 buys you a new router though, one with a better review set (lots more reviewers). I bought one of these to replace my current occasionally flaky router when it finally dies.

http://www.amazon.com/TP-LINK-TL-WR841N-Wireless-Router-300Mpbs/dp/B001FWYGJS/ref=pd_cp_pc_0

=====================================================

Now, confession time ------- I hate dealing with a new router.

A router goes everywhere, to every machine cabled to it and all the wifi boxes, phones, laptops scattered all around the house.

Get a new router and you can count on DAYS of fun getting it all switched over. Every cell phone, every laptop, every TV box, every computer.

Sometimes the fun goes even deeper as individual softwares have the router ID and password saved in their guts so they can start quicker.

All of them will show themselves before long, stopping you cold at some inopportune time just to sit there and laugh at you while you struggle to get it to changed over to the new router.

Months later, you will still be finding them (because you haven't used that particular software since you put in the new router ....)

:P

Title: Re: Linux Mint 17 vs Windows 7
Post by Art Webb on 03/24/15 at 21:22:58

11 bucks ain't too much, nor is 18, but only if it works with roadrunner
and then you talked me out of it lol
actually atm I have only 1 PC and a smartphone, but the phone already has 3g
I might look into it, but last time I went wireless I had to have help to get it going, and it got hacked, thought the hacker didn't cause me any real harm, just Borrowed bandwidth

It's kinda like the mint mate 16 disc I have
I've been assured it's a no brainer, and much better in every way, but I'm not comfortable doing the install for fear I might screw something up