Windows still sucks

English Soapbox
#1

another Windows threat…

I bought a dektop computer a while ago, maybe 6 months or so. I did this, because I wanted to have a big screen and nice multimedia stuff and so on.

I did not care so much about the pre-installed Windows 7 64 Bit Home Premium, because I installed Fedora 13 on it at first on a separate HDD and afterwards, after I was finally done with Gnome (for me it sucks too, but not as much as Windows 7) I installed OpenSuse 11.3 on it. It is still in dualboot, but now I have to HDDs in it, one is running Opensuse and on the other HDD, Windows is farting around.
The first amazing thing about Opensuse I realised, was that it just bound the Windows HDD into Grub, without messing around… it was just there.

So since a few days I thought that I should open my mind and boot Windows, to see what has improved since XP (my last Windows before I left to Linux).
Summary: nothing, really.
The startmenu is still a nightmare.
The system needs driver Cds for anything.
It still asks for everything “are you really sure?”
It is slow… my goodness… Opensuse 11.3 runs like a rocket compared to this!
All the multimedia stuff: watching a movie in .mp4? No Codec. Just the sound in Windows media player… wow, installing VLC: works… in Opensuse? No problem at all with Packman, it plays everything in Kaffeine

for every tiny task you need to install a separate tool on windows. Unbelievable.

The taskbar: I do not understand that. I mean, I have (and I love) KDE on OpenSuse, but what´s that with the taskbar in Windows? Where is the progress? It groups everything together in one Icon. When you have more than one window of the same app open, you really need to search for the particular window you are looking for. Searching on the screen, scrolling and shifting through every window, because you can not see it anymore in the taskbar? Give me a break…

Updates: because it wasn´t booted since… I don´t know… last year (?) it pulled a big load of updates. As this is important, of course, I permitted it to do so. It pulled some 2 or more Gb data and this took ages. After downloading, installing took ages. And you can not do anything beside that. This system has managed to fully slow down a Intel Dual Core with 2x 2,7 Ghz and 6 Gb RAM! Until near standstill. Unbelievable.
Then you need to reboot. And during shutting down, it installs the same number of updates again. And during boot it also installs updates again… and this takes ages again…

So today I bought a USB 3.0 controller and mounted it into the computer. First trial with OpenSuse: no problem at all. This thing is just recognised, plug in the USB 3.0 Harddrive and copy data. Done

On Windows, it takes first of all ages to boot (even slower than “normally”) then it proudly presents a message that the new driver was installed successfully… plugging in the harddrive… nothing happens… trying again… nothing happens… opening the cluttered control panel or whatever, where the hardware manager is… And it shows a tiny little exclamation mark at the USB controller… Okay, driver CD inserted, installed driver… a message comes up that the device could not be installed and might not work. But it works anyway.

So finally: I did not find much difference to Windows XP. It still has next to zero drivers with it, it still has loads of cluttered menus, it is still slow.
The only difference is the taskbar which is now worse than everything I saw before.

Windows still sucks and I am really glad and relieved when the Geeko shows up on the screen and I have my lovely operating system on the screen again, which does what I want and it does it fast, accurate and without bothering me.

sorry, I had to vent some steam… :peace:

#2

In the whole process I can only see one major error you made: you should have repartitioned your disk right after you bought the system, removing all existing partitions and creating new ones for your Linux usage (whatever distro or distros). When you had done that, you wouldn’t have got the temptation (still strange, I never would have got it) to boot Windows and this thread would not have been there saving you and me time. lol!

I do not know what other openSUSE users think of this, but I am not in the least interested in the “sucking of Windows”. Shouldn’t you have posted this in a Windows forums (if there exists such a thing ;))?

#3

Obviously you should have transferred your install of Windows to your vacuum cleaner where it will do a good job and reformatted the disk space for Linux. :stuck_out_tongue:

#4

It’s great that you had such a good experience with KDE/openSUSE. Sorry about Gnome, I really like it even though I like KDE better, what did you find off about Gnome?

#5

I agree. My last windows was 1998 and the final. After 1998 I don’t use them(windows). Yeahh linux are better, faster and more effective than windows. But you know the reason why linux are not used for many users. In Hellas(Greece) we try to widely spread them(linux) and we have success.

#6

I get seriously depressed looking at off the peg PC’s now.
It’s more and more a (I was going to say monoculture) - But actually ‘Clone’ seems more in keeping.
I fail to see what even interests people. The hardware I guess might be interesting, just so long as I can wipe the HD

#7

The majority of “off the peg” PC buyers are mainly interested in applications, not operating system components. Eventually, I guess that same majority will only be interested in whether their “off the peg PC’s” can accommodate their preferred Cloud-based applications, with good performance when streaming to/from the Cloud, and near instant response times.

Hardware-wise, their only interest will be connecting in various peripheral devices, i.e. are they supported by the “platform” (whatever that device looks like) and will they work OOTB.

#8

Spot on. And it will be thin, light, tablet-like, touch screen, but with options to attach a big screen (or a projector), mouse, keyboard. And/or maybe to attach to a home dock.

#9

the latest versions of Gnome 2 have an annoying fault. Often there are icons missing in the panels. Also the dependency structure is sometimes beyond me. You uninstall (for example) Pulseaudio and it takes half of the desktop with it. All the “simplification” is sometimes frustrating to me too. So I think, personally I am better off with KDE. Gnome was okay to lead the way to Linux for me but in version 2 it is still the same as it was in 2007 or 2008 and everything around it has done progress, but Gnome itself… not really. Maybe I am wrong.

#10

regarding “off the peg” computers. Normally: yes, I should have bought a computer without OS pre-installed. But to be honest: I was too lazy to search for one. In Germany (where I come from) I know some good places where to shop for computers without OS and where you can configure the parts of it on your own, but over here in the US this is much more difficult to find, I think.
Anyway, I just wanted to have a slightly powerfull PC which has a good quality and thats it. I never thought that I will start windows on it… but hey, I did it and I couldn´t believe it, after all the praises you can read all over the internet, how amazing Windows 7 is. I just need Windows for Turbotax, while I really need to find out whether it runs on wine too or not. This sucks too: Turbotax is a java application which is available for Windows and Mac. It would be easy to do one for Linux too. But there is no…

#11

@ steffen13
It’s always possible to run a Virtual Machine, save all the rebooting to switch OS

#12

thats right and I also thought about this before. But there is one thing which holds me back from that: I just have this recovery partition on the 2nd HDD and to install it in VB I need the install DVD. So if I burn the recovery DVD from the recovery partition, I think that this is not possible to install in VB. But there I am not sure and maybe I am wrong with that. Anyway, if I would install this recovery DVD in VB, then there is the next task: registration again… All this is too much effort for me. I know, I am lazy in terms of that but this system is not so exciting that I would go through fires for it. And doing all this tweaking and stuff is a huge fire (in metaphorical sense) for me. Thats why it is sitting there and when I do not need Turbotax anymore, I´ll wipe the HDD anyway.

#13

You are correct.
You cannot use OEM in Virtual Box

#14

Thanks for the run down. I have Gnome on a laptop so I can keep abreast of it and KDE on a desktop for everyday work because I know it so well. Yes I prefer KDE to Gnome, but a few years ago I ditched KDE for the duration of openSUSE 11.0/11.1 because KDE4 was under construction and a real dog. that will soon happen to Gnome I suppose when Gnome 3 is full steam ahead.

#15

If its just for Turbotax why not doing it online. I do it everytime like that. But i am using TaxAct. :slight_smile:

#16

I don´t know… this year I did it with the program (was the first time) because I did not trust this (Turbotax) online tool and Turbotax was the only tool I knew at this time. Maybe I also try TaxAct the next time. Thanks for the tip! :slight_smile:

#17

I used it the second time online and it works for me. But i don’t have to answer a lot or can deduct anything. I am poor couch…
But i used to do it also with a program before, but settle on TaxAct. It cheap and works so far. Just my experience.

#18

I keep on typing away on my 2+ yr old Dell Vostro laptop - 64 bit , which cost $399! It runs 11.4 native pretty well and I prefer the Gnome components. I also have Win. 7 installed in a VM with it.

My other Dell, which is four years old, but much better video and sound, cost me 3 times as much and runs native Win. 7; I only use it for Netflix, so it rarely gets used. I have 11.4 installed in a VM with it.

On the whole, the Win. VM on the Vostro runs better than the 11.4 VM on the Win. 7 box; given that they have same ram (2 gb) and similar speed dual core processors, I attribute this difference to Win. 7; it can be a real system drain, but if you want to stream foreign movies with Netflix, you have little choice in OS.

#19

Java is cross platform which means that your program will work on linux the same as on windows / mac.
You will have to install the correct java version and that’s it.