I got fed-up with Windows and wanted to install perm. on my disk some linux - fedora, debian, opensuse, ubuntu, you name it…
Started with Opensuse 11.2 x64 DVD
First of all it was a disaster
Opensuse was unable to boot after the start menu - black screen, none of those “smart tips” with sax2 didnt helped, had to boot for some strange reason in no-acpi mode
I couldn’t install with 4 hours of troubleshooting me Ati hd4770 card properly
I couldn’t install mp3 codecs for Rhytmbox, tried also Amarok, in the end I finally installed some gstreamer codecs, but still didnt work
After I week being really pissed of I downloaded Ubuntu and kicked opensuse from my disk.
Ubuntu had no problems at all with loading my hardware
Ubuntu had no problems installing the ati drivers, with that nice tool (hardware drivers)
I run Rhythmbox put my mp3 in the list, it asked me that I needed some codecs and voila mp3 were playing
So in the end I had in 30 minutes installed a ready-to-use Linux system without any problems.
From Look ubuntu 9.10 with new wave theme + notifier and some other tools to improve your desktop is much easier to find and install.
Sorry Novel your 11.2 back-fired really hard
Simply from user-friedly design, ubuntu is much better then Opensuse.
In my opinion if Linux distros are aiming for desktop users, they must offer approx. the same flexibility, stability and simplicity as windows. to this is much closer ubuntu, sorry suse you’re miles behind.
I dont care why that magical tool from novel - sax2 was unable
to configure my vga cars I care only for the end results. Still I wonder after installing ati drivers in opensuse got everytime after restart some anoying message with ICEauto cannot be read, ubuntu didnt had these problems.
I dual boot Opensuse 11.2 and Ubuntu 9.10. Ubuntu comes nowhere near opensuse.
It’s quite a nice easy distro but you can’t do much customisation in comparison with opensuse. You get what comes off the disk pretty much.
And as for finding software - well ppa.launchpad is a nightmare to search if you want anything that canonical hasn’t already chosen for you.
Hi,
Especially for a non power user, making the step from one Operating System to another is like opening yourself to a different world of experience. Many things are in common to what you ve already seen, others beg to differ.
While I would very much like to think my grandma will be able to run on linux and why not, install it on her own, I tend to think that “going linux” means you are at least prepared to make some efforts to understand a little more about the inner workings of your OS, and willing to invest some time, some digging and research.
Linux distributions have also many things in common but also some differences.
Before installing, I think it is a good practice to test with a live-CD before hand…
> ATI cards are known to be less compatible, because of the drivers and support provided by the vendor. (I bought an nvidia card for an older machine with ATI card to install Opensuse on, and dit not blame Opensuse for ATI considering the card a legacy product and not supporting it anymore)
However, at least with catalyst drivers 9.11, the ATI card you mention should work well after proper configuration. (those drivers were recently published, after Opensuse 11.2 I think).
> I also had to do a little search in order to make amarok play propriatary mp3 format (and itself not giving an error was not very helpful), as the Opensuse community one-click install for restricted formats (that I do appreciate they are left out of the initial system - they are propriatary after all) did not work for me. Through the reading of these forums, I was able to install a few more packages and it did the trick. Multimedia is mostly supported through Packman repository, that can be added very easily through Yast control center.
> For the installation problem, I understand that it is very frustrating to not be able and even go through the complete installation of the system, also with linux, many resources are are available through internet connection with a system up and running (and here for Opensuse I think there are pleanty resources to address any issue or try to find the best possible solution).
I wouldn’t go so far as to ask a new user to file a bug report, but it is indeed strange not to have asked for assistance if this is what happened?
I think with Opensuse 11.2, many details enhance the user experience, and are definitely in a good direction (this is partly due to KDE improvements as well as I use this DE).
Its great if you are finally happy with Ubuntu, and its very good for a new linux users first steps. Indeed, Opensuse has still some more steps to do in the user friendliness area, but I think its also a because of a different attitude towards the user : it does assume that you are willing to give some effort from your side as well. (many users that work on Windows for example feel they find their way around just because they use it for a long time).
When one becomes more experienced, I don’t think he will tend to stick with Ubuntu though, their offering has its limits. Opensuse approach has less limits and more options. For me its also more fun to use…
But in the end, its comes to personal taste and choice.
I don’t thing there is something terribly wrong with Opensuse offering as you seem to imply, but you indeed had a bad experience with it, at least 2 of the 3 points you mentionned are solvable wioth a little research and patience, for installation I cannot say…
Its not a matter of doing magic to make it work…
What do a Window$ user know about GNU/Linux??? ¬¬
> In my opinion if Linux distros are aiming for desktop users, they must
> offer approx. the same flexibility, stability and simplicity as windows.
> to this is much closer ubuntu, sorry suse you’re miles behind.
I was forced to install ubuntu on my work PC’s, and you are right,
Ubuntu offer the same flexibility (is as flexible as Vista), stability
(is as stable as win98) and simplicity (is as simple as win nt 4) as
windows do, and I was able to take a root shell with a 6 line code on an
ubuntu server, I’m not surprise that ubuntu users think is closer to M$
window$ and I’m VERY HAPPY that SuSE systems are miles behind that
VampirD
No in elenath hîlar nan hâd gîn
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There are always going to be a small proportion of people who have bad experiences with a particular version of a distro. I’m sure there are threads in Ubuntu forums about Karmic not working for them and threatening to go back to some other distro.
If the user is not keen on solving the problem, and fair enough, some people just want it to work, there’s not much you can do but consign the post to the rant bin.
FYI, I’m running this on an openSUSE 11.1 box, but typing at a Crunchbang 9.04 (Ubuntu variant) thin client on an old laptop. So both distros work for me, and without much setup either. Recently I put 11.2 on three computers and it worked on all. Added codecs via one-click-install and had multimedia playback. Of course this is just one user’s experience, but so is the OP’s.
The OP is hot under the collar, no question. What the OP is trying to say is valid, in it’s own way. I’ve been there, and the snarky answers never helped me. As snarky answers go, the repliers who fall in that category here are fairly mild, I’ll give ya that. But snark isn’t helpful, even when mild.
I’ve installed 8 or 10 distros on my machines this year, and some experiences have been less than fruitful. ALL of them were resolveable, but I didn’t always have the TIME it would have taken ME to solve them. Linux distros all around still have issues. Some have more than others. Some work better “out-of-the-box” than others, and a lot of times that changes with different hardware. We all know this. My personal experience with openSUSE is not that of the OP - in my experience it was every bit as good as Ubuntu, and in some ways easier. That was on my hardware. I also agree that is has more options, and they are more readily attained.
But, because of this experience, I can very readily relate to the OP’s frustration. OpenSUSE can improve. Shucks, it could improve TODAY with a better organization of the help material it has on the openSUSE site. It sounds to me (the OP actually says it) like the OP searched the forums and web for solutions, and couldn’t get any to work.
I would suggest we leave it at that, reinforce that NEXT time he needs help, a post in these forums would be a good idea (as previously suggested), and move on. Oh, and I will add that he may very well benefit by reading oldcpu’s posts in the forum “New User How To/FAQ (read only)”. There are four of them, and they have links that lead to resolution of many little areas of installation that can easily go wrong. Even if a poster is not new to Linux, if they are just new to openSUSE, they will benefit. Good stuff in there. New User How To/FAQ (read only) - openSUSE Forums
However a rant without any real questions contained in it doesn’t leave any room for helpful answers except some pointers to the material which you have helpfully provided.
Sometimes people just want to vent. Best not to get angry at them, it’s nothing personal. Maybe they will come back later with a better post, maybe not.
Sure openSUSE can improve. FOSS can always improve, that’s the fun of it. With proprietary software you have only the salescritter’s promise to improve.
I love Ubuntu, I’ve been a big supporter of the distro for the last couple years (when I first switched from XP to Linux, I did so with Ubuntu and loved it) and I’m still very pro Ubuntu and 9.10 was the best one yet… I always distro hop, but just end back at Ubuntu after a couple or so weeks, but if you’re a KDE or XFCE user (like I am), OpenSUSE 11.2 is incredible and is a clear winner for speed and stability and I’m whole heartedly impressed with 11.2. I’ve used OpenSUSE in the past, but always had issues that lead me back to Ubuntu, but I can say OpenSUSE 11.2 is the best KDE experience I’ve had and have no reason to use Kubuntu compared to this.
One thing I’ve always liked about OpenSUSE even when I greatly preferred Ubuntu to it, was that for some reason, fonts look much nicer on this distro. I can’t explain why, but they do.
please, show me where in this thread’s beginning post s/he asked for
help…s/he didn’t, instead simply moaned as /she moved to
Ubuntu…which is a right, i guess…i’m very happy another Redmond
Ship Jumper (RSJ) found a happy home in open source software, wherever
s/he landed…
but, didn’t respond or even acknowledge any advice/help
given…perhaps it is a failure of this forum’s format which seems to
make it do difficult for RSJs to return and find their thread…
what i’m not happy about is the troll-LIKE quality of the 5 Dec post…
In the first case I was trying to make a fully-functional linux distro without any help from google or even opensuse.
The reason for that is the fact that linux-distros are in current time so good at hardware detection and kernel-build-in-drivers that I assumed that there shoudn’t occur no problems.
After I discovered that the even booting-up opensuse will not be such an “easy-cake” I had to switch like 5 times between windows and booting up opensuse to try things out, which was a real pain in the ass. - sorry but after several test with sax2 -r -m 0=fglrx|ati|radeon I was so annoyed that I wanted to crack the **** opensuse 11.2 DVD.
As a mater of fact I read that the development of sax was stopped by novel, because it was not proceeding as planned. so… xD
I got several points that are a real mystery to me:
Its a not way of the forum to solve such hard-errors which were made as it seems in development parts
are the people from novel also tried the linux solution from other rivals?
understand this like me there are millions of users which are trying out Linux as an alternative to Windows and they want somethin like windows that simply works out-of-box, which sadly isnt the case of opensuse
Why always the flames with KDE and Yast,
I tried in the earlier version of OS 11.1 KDE version 4.3 I assume it was, aside I got plenty of those errors and the lower taskbar for some unknow reason was long from the left to middle part of my screen was, wtf? sorry got none of there errors with gnome
Yast is a nice tool, but I focus as many other people doing stuff by commands
why such a BIG diff. between the abilities of Opensuse and ubuntu?
now I really wonder how are you enteprise class products working (SLED and SLES)
PS: I dont know wanna say that wanted to buy the new box with OS 11.2, cause wanted to make some contributions, I would get a real present if I would get a black-screen after confirming the installation
