Topic: Things I can do in Linux that I can't do on Windows.

[Bonk]

Try to do something simple like listen to streaming radio over the web.  Windows; it's very easy.  Linux; nearly impossible.

I just did a fresh Kubuntu install last night. To get mp3 streams playing I followed a few simple steps:

1) Google "play mp3s on kubuntu".
2) Read answer: http://www.kubuntu.org/faq.php#mp3s
3) Launch Adept packagage manager, enable the internet repositories (main, universe, restricted and multiverse) and select libxine1-ffmpeg for installation and apply the changes.
4) Go to http://www.radioparadise.com and click on the 16k mp3 stream (I'm on dial-up), launch in Amarok.
5) Listen to internet radio.

So I had to do a google search and install some codecs. A bit of a bother, but certainly not nearly impossible. Perhaps things have progressed since April.

(I am slightly ashamed to be using Kubuntu, instead of a classic like Slackware, FreeBSD or QNX... though I figured I'd see what all this Ubuntu fuss was all about, but I prefer KDE - thus Kubuntu)

EDIT: it's funny, come to think of it, one of the first things I do evaluating a new desktop OS is launch the default browser go to radio paradise and launch an mp3 stream in the default media player. QNX is still the winner for efficiency in such a usability test. The native web browser and media player in QNX are very tight and minimalist, and work incredibly well. You can run over 20 instances of the media player with ease, all playing simultaneously... the result is pretty freaky.

[Nemesis]

You dug pretty deep to resurrect this old thread. 

I've been using LinuxMint - KDE Community edition, it is a derivative of Ubuntu.  It is not legal in the U.S. and some other countries because it comes with codecs installed for MP3 and DVD players.  I'm quite pleased with it.  It pushed me over to primarily using my Linux machine instead of the Windows 2000 one. 

What do you think of the up coming KDE 4.0 release?  Current reports claim a 40% decrease in memory usage.

[Panzergranate]

A friend of mine runs Unix and has been "preaching" to me to "see the light" and convert.

What I find facinating is how fast Unix starts up compared Windows XP and that he can run for hours without a single crash!!

The thing is Windows is like an unhappy marriage, where the sexy girl at the altar ballooned out the moment the ink hit the papr on the marriage licence.

You know that she's now fat, slow and gives you hastle, but you stick with her because you're frightened to change and so just put up with all the failings.

At least with Windows you can guarantee that it will suck everytime you use it!!

So far my Windows Vista HP has only locked up 5 times since we had the laptop in June, needing the battery to be removed to break out of it.

Compared to the few dozen crashes one of my friend's has had with XP, this is an improvement.

[Bonk]

You dug pretty deep to resurrect this old thread. 

I've been using LinuxMint - KDE Community edition, it is a derivative of Ubuntu.  It is not legal in the U.S. and some other countries because it comes with codecs installed for MP3 and DVD players.  I'm quite pleased with it.  It pushed me over to primarily using my Linux machine instead of the Windows 2000 one. 

What do you think of the up coming KDE 4.0 release?  Current reports claim a 40% decrease in memory usage.

I was searching for something else, came across this and thought I'd comment.

I saw that story about 40% decrease in memory usage, but that story was a weak analysis of memory usage and should be taken with a grain of salt. That said, I am very much looking forward to KDE 4.

To be honest, what I want to see of KDE 4 is its suite of apps ported to windows (enabled by latest Qt4), ultimately I would like to be able to run KDE on windows and choose my desktop manager as on linux.

[Panzergranate]

One of the things in a hard drive's on board E2PROM is that it has two settings...... configured for Windows and not configured for Windows.

I've not tried it but if the hard drive is stuck on a HD E2PROM progaramming rig (1 own 4 of the things) and is re-configured to non-Windows use, will Linux work better on it??

I know that Unix does apparently, hence why the option is there.

This would make for an interesting experiment with a before and after time trial test.

[Nemesis]

Necro bump

1/ Boot from a live install on a thumb drive
 
then

2/ Run the install onto my netbook

while doing so

3/ Post online from the netbook

while

4/ Playing a  you tube video

All on the same net book.