Its Time For Windows Users To Switch. what do you think about this open letter

[qwijibow 0]

This driver was from the MANUFACTURER.  It is possible that it still wouldn't work, but if you read my post, there was a different problem long before that came up.  Specifically, that the driver required multiple steps to install, and executing those steps was non-intuitive and buggy.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

the only MANUCATURER that provides linux support that i trust is nVidia.

 

Having a DEVICE supported by LINUX is always much much better than a MANUFACTURER providing a linux driver.

 

Supported by LINUX, and Linux driver available are not the same thing.

[MajesticTreeFrog 0]

In which case Linux, in my mind, still loses out. As a user, if I have something that is a driver, then it should work. Granted, windows doesn't always do this well either, but then again I never claimed that windows was that great. Still, the real ideal is that I plug something in and it works. Thats an ideal, but I shouldn't, as a user, have to mess with drivers unless there is a good reason to(like doing custom driver edits or something similar).

[cryptwizard 0]

Generally it is not a good idea to play with hardware while the machine is on. I know I was having trouble with a hard drive freezing Win98 whenever it booted, so I decided to plug the hard drive in after booting was complete and I completely fried the drive (smoke, the whole bit  ) I'm glad it was a POS drive, and I've learned from my mistakes... Just like they say to avoid static... DO IT 

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

What's a POS drive?

Also, those special motherboards include something called a hotplug controller.

They automatically detect new hardware, are very expensive and are present only mainly in servers.

Once I plugged and extra IDE hard drive to my home computer (which is obviously non-hotplug) and I attempted to mount it and to my suprise, everything worked. I could browse and read and write from the drive.

And, yes, there are always restart-to-take-affect updates, commonly know as kernel updates.

The kernel is Linux (the core of the Operating system). Most of the rest of a basic system is GNU. So, it is also only fair to call "Linux" GNU/Linux.

[qwijibow 0]

to the tree frog:)Maybe the windows driver system is better, maybe it is not.the advantage of the Linux driver system, is the driver is written and maintained by the Kernel hackers, these drivers are usually insanely stable, and are constantly being maintainsed.the dissadvantage, is that some exotic hardware is not always supported.the advantage of the windows driver system, where windows has very few drivers built in, and its upto the manufactutrer to make a driver is good because it means there is a driver for everything..although its dissadvantages include... if a company goes out of buisness or drops support, the drivers stop being maintained. so my modem which worked under window98, is useless under windows2000.ALSO... i cant remember the statistic, but a sygnificant number or windows BSOD's are actually caused by fautly drivers, and are out of microsofts control. nomatter how stble the OS, a bad driver can bring it to its knees.MS is trying to combat this with Digital Driver signing... as a result, windowsXP has recomented againsed me installing my Fuji IDE hard drive, my network card, my Printer and sound card.Some of us buy the cheapest componnets when upgrading, you have to ask what are the quality of the drivers when you buy low quality hardware... in linux, even though you are using cheap hardware, you know you have a high quality driver.the different systems both have advantages and disadvantages...If gaming is important to you, then you have to be more slective with graphics hardware under linux... ATI and NVIDIA are good.and if you want wireless intrnet, again, you have to be selective with hardware, check compatability before you buy.Linux is Harder, Linux is Free, Linux has a better securety record, Linux has a shorter Securety hole to fix time, Linux requiresyou read the documentation.Each OS has its good and bad points...i dont think the Linux Driver system is bette, or Worse.. just different, with strengths and weaknesses in different areas...And for a user like me, who knows how to check compatability before buying, the compatability issues are Nullified.Dont forget.... although they are rare.. some computers ARE sold pre-installed with linux... like ones sold in poor countries. or the under 100 $$$$ PC...installing windows on them wouldnt be easy, you would need to hunt drivers on the iinternet.most people are install linux on machines sold with windows only hardware.

[MajesticTreeFrog 0]

Oh, once again I am not claiming that windows does this well. I do know that everything I have plugged into my mac has simply worked, no need to even install anything. This includes non-mac hardware like mice and keyboards(from microsoft no less), as well as a couple of more exotic things. Granted, thats not exactly stressing its abilities, but the thing was I never had to think about drivers. I plugged it in and it worked. No installation or anything. Thats the ideal. Now, with windows you can at least install stuff easily, by clicking a file, and this will at the minimum make something work(granted, once again there are exceptions, but that means don't buy cheap hardware). In my case, with my wireless card, it was a common card built by motorola. Like I said, I would love to kill windows, and if you would like to help me, that would be great, I am just pointing out the problems as I see them with linux. -That being said, feel free to open up a thread bashing windows, and I will happily join in there too.

[qwijibow 0]

Yeah.. but the mac has a very unfair advantage...the same company that makes the hardware controll's the hardware.

[MajesticTreeFrog 0]

Well, they do control some of the hardware, but I was talking about hardware I plugged into the mac, not video card drivers and such.In any case, the 'it just works' thing should be able to happen anytime a driver that works exists. Once a driver is common(as opposed to available, but the hardware is rare and therefore it makes a bad choice given any form of space consideration), then I should be able to plug something in and have it work.For instance, a game pad. I should be able to take a typical game pad, that operates in a normal fashion, and plug it into a linux box, a windows box, and a mac box and have it work on all of them without special drivers(unless I want to use features specific to that game pad. I also assume that the gamepad makers haven't been dicks and made their hardware work in weird non-standard ways that require a special driver. Manufacturers who do that should be dumped and not supported).

[Herbert1405241469 0]

What's a POS drive?

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Hehe. POS = Piece of Sh*t... It's nothing new

[Brian1405241474 0]

thanks for that translation!

[meself88 0]

Majestic, I agree with you partially. There should certainly be some basic drivers, and there are. There is a standard VGA driver and a VESA driver in linux that will support any card with VESA or VGA capability (or at least most). I don't know too much about wireless network cards, but I know that linux has a lot of drivers built in for normal hardware NICs, especially since many of them use the same driver (whole families of NICs frequently do.) Windows comes with a lot of drivers, but many still have to be manufacturer supplied. I understand your irritation at the "make config" ordeal, because that is a VERY unfamiliar process for a windows person. I was about to throw my computer out the window the first time that happened. Linux is definitlely not for the average user. In order to run windows executables, you have to manually install WINE, a set of windows DLLs that linux can run, and therefore run windows .exe files. Linux operates very differently, but I have never had it crash on me without it being my fault. It can crash during setup if you have older hardware or are not exactly sure what you are doing. The concept of 'runlevel' is also unfamiliar to most. I think on stability, Linux is more stable if you have widely supported and actively developed hardware drivers. Many web servers run Linux, and most corporate web servers don't run Windows, even IBM's OS is supposed to be better for servers. For the office user, I would say Linux would be a good fit, but it is certainly different. After using Linux for a little while (this could be because it was a slow machine) I had an urge to go back to Windows, becasue it is so familiar. It is also much easier and FASTER to find help for Windows. I am thinking about doing a dual boot on my Laptop (Sony), but am unsure about hardware, since I am sure much of it is proprietary. Also, I've had my windows xp laptop give two BSODs over the ATI video driver, which was provided by ATI but apparently not very well supported by ATI. It is for the IGP345 chipset (onboard video), which is not even listed on their website (only IGP340 is on their site). When I tried to install an "updated" driver from their website, strange things started happening. And for whoever said GIMP is not good, have you tried it? It is plenty powerful for me, but I am not a developer, so maybe there are tools in PSP that I am unfamiliar with. GIMP 2.0 is certainly easy to use. Many Linux distros also choose Gnome as the default window manager, which could annoy some people, since KDE seems to be clearly superior. With windows, the desktop shell (explorer.exe) is a crucial part of the Kernel (go try to shut down explorer.exe, it will just restart it). In linux, if your desktop crashes, you can fall back to the command line shell entrance to the kernel and start up the window manager again. Linux is just different, and is not yet ready for the general public, in my opinion.

[MajesticTreeFrog 0]

Majestic, I agree with you partially.  There should certainly be some basic drivers, and there are.  There is a standard VGA driver and a VESA driver in linux that will support any card with VESA or VGA capability (or at least most).  I don't know too much about wireless network cards, but I know that linux has a lot of drivers built in for normal hardware NICs, especially since many of them use the same driver (whole families of NICs frequently do.)  Windows comes with a lot of drivers, but many still have to be manufacturer supplied.  I understand your irritation at the "make config" ordeal, because that is a VERY unfamiliar process for a windows person.  I was about to throw my computer out the window the first time that happened.  Linux is definitlely not for the average user.  In order to run windows executables, you have to manually install WINE, a set of windows DLLs that linux can run, and therefore run windows .exe files.  Linux operates very differently, but I have never had it crash on me without it being my fault.  It can crash during setup if you have older hardware or are not exactly sure what you are doing.  The concept of 'runlevel' is also unfamiliar to most.  I think on stability, Linux is more stable if you have widely supported and actively developed hardware drivers.  Many web servers run Linux, and most corporate web servers don't run Windows, even IBM's OS is supposed to be better for servers.  For the office user, I would say Linux would be a good fit, but it is certainly different.  After using Linux for a little while (this could be because it was a slow machine) I had an urge to go back to Windows, becasue it is so familiar.  It is also much easier and FASTER to find help for Windows.  I am thinking about doing a dual boot on my Laptop (Sony), but am unsure about hardware, since I am sure much of it is proprietary.  Also, I've had my windows xp laptop give two BSODs over the ATI video driver, which was provided by ATI but apparently not very well supported by ATI.  It is for the IGP345 chipset (onboard video), which is not even listed on their website (only IGP340 is on their site).  When I tried to install an "updated" driver from their website, strange things started happening.  And for whoever said GIMP is not good, have you tried it?  It is plenty powerful for me, but I am not a developer, so maybe there are tools in PSP that I am unfamiliar with.  GIMP 2.0 is certainly easy to use.  Many Linux distros also choose Gnome as the default window manager, which could annoy some people, since KDE seems to be clearly superior.  With windows, the desktop shell (explorer.exe) is a crucial part of the Kernel (go try to shut down explorer.exe, it will just restart it).  In linux, if your desktop crashes, you can fall back to the command line shell entrance to the kernel and start up the window manager again.  Linux is just different, and is not yet ready for the general public, in my opinion.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

KDE seems better because it is closer to windows than gnome, in ways both good and bad. I like gnome more because it strikes me as having better human interface guidelines. It needs some more work, but long term those guidelines will make it easier to reach the ideal: mac like useability or better. KDE will have to change and basically...not KDE anymore in order to get that good. That said, both of them have a long long way to go.

[thatguycalledrob 0]

It will not be 'time' for windows users to switch for some time now. For the enthusiast, for the programmer, for the hacker, for the guy who knows anything about what he's doing at all - ok maybe it's time for him to switch. But that's maybe 10-20% of personal computers. For everyone who enjoys not spending they're sat afternoon, then sat.night, sun afternoon after they woke up late, sun night, mon morning when it's still not working., etc. it's not time for them to switch. Yes, I know all the things about drivers, ,and why they're not on linux. And, yes I know how wonderful linux is... but people aren't going to switch.Because linux is not easy. I know there's great distros, but they aren't easy enough. I work in an office where people have trouble creating mass e-mails. I don't mention the word 'linux' to them. And the fact is most people are like that. Linux is dream for those willing and able to take the time. But, remember they're are people who are scared to log into their email, and others who need to hear the words on the screen spoken to them. Linux is not for them. 'Evil' as MS may be, they're the only one's helping the technologically ill-literate. Also, consider this: hackers, malicious code, and virus's attack users - most users use windows - why is windows down more?

[qwijibow 0]

The marke for older poeple on the internet is increacing.many of them are alien to computer technology, many of them dont care to learn.With a Linux / MacOSX you shot them what to click for internet, you show them what to click for email, you show them how to turn it off. end.with windows you do same as above plus... do not open strange attachments in emails, ebven if they apear to come from a frend.. you CAN click .jpg's and .png and .bmp's but make sure it isnt .jpg.exe, you can also open .txt's and .docs, never click a .exe .dll .ocx .bat .pnmdownload a virus scanner update, scan your computer's hard drive for virii, dont uinstall anything of the internet unless its trusted,defragment every month,when your computer has degraded to an unuasabl state, use a floppy disk to fomat the C dirve, enter the Bios and change boot device to cdrom, boot the install cdrom.. install this driver than driiver... the list is endless. Linux/BSD/MacOSX is only hard when you start re-compiling kernel's.my girlfrends family has a computer they cannot use because its soo bogged down with virii and spyware. all she needs is email, and internet browsing.

[MajesticTreeFrog 0]

The marke for older poeple on the internet is increacing.

many of them are alien to computer technology, many of them dont care to learn.

 

With a Linux / MacOSX you shot them what to click for internet, you show them what to click for email, you show them how to turn it off. end.

 

with windows you do same as above plus... do not open strange attachments in emails, ebven if they apear to come from a frend.. you CAN click .jpg's and .png and .bmp's but make sure it isnt .jpg.exe, you can also open .txt's and .docs, never click a .exe .dll .ocx .bat .pnm

 

download a virus scanner update, scan your computer's hard drive for virii, dont uinstall anything of the internet unless its trusted,

 

defragment every month,

 

when your computer has degraded to an unuasabl state, use a floppy disk to fomat the C dirve, enter the Bios and change boot device to cdrom, boot the install cdrom.. install this driver than driiver...

 

the list is endless. Linux/BSD/MacOSX is only hard when you start re-compiling kernel's.

 

my girlfrends family has a computer they cannot use because its soo bogged down with virii and spyware. all she needs is email, and internet browsing.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Well, that only works assuming they can even get on the net with linux. Linux drivers and such for tech(that old people DO buy btw) is sorta sketchy, especially plug and play. For instance: Linux drivers for my USB wireless card supossedly exist, but getting them working quickly(even with the help of a friend who has been running linux for a long time) proved to be more than a few hours work(and since that was all we had, we gave up).

 

Yet more gui cleaning, better help files/wizards/etc and easy driver stuff is what is needed.

 

And while I would be willing to help with help files/documentation, I don't know enough to do so.... because its too hard to get started.

[cfusion2k 0]

Compatibility with major vendors as well as reluntancy of people still largely contribute to the use of Windows in the software market. Most vendors still prefer to provide support for updates and patches to windows than other platform. With this, it is practically impossible to shift Microsoft Windows away and start making another OS prominent.