Absoloute dogs bollocks!

[copyright_1978]

I recently purchased Mandrake 7 from a local computer store and I'll get straight to the point - these are the things that do not work:

No printer - I have a Lexmark 3200 colour jet printer, but I haven't found a way to make it work with Linux.

No sound - Sometimes I can't even access my kmix, it says "... blah, blah, blah... no permission ... do a chmod a+rw /dev/mixer to change the ..." that didn't work, so I don't have sound. I have an ESS 1868 sound card.

No modem - I have a supraexpress 56i Pro but I'm yet to find a driver for it.

So I ask you, what good is Linux if 90% of the worlds home computer using population have un supported hardware?????

I mean come on, my printer doesn't work so I can't do any work on it, my sound doesn't work so I can't listen to anything, my modem doesn't work so I can't browse with it. I'm also not going to install network adapters on it, chances are that even though some say it is supported it won't be on my machine. Most people might get Linux because of the kewl interface or to leran unix but I will tell you this, if you want GUI's that look like Linux, get a different shell for you Windows OS, something like Litestep, also if you want to get a unix machine on your computer then get software that transforms your dos into one, I use one thats called Dos2Bash - Now I have a windows OS with the same look and feel as a Linux, and I have all my original programs. If you want this stuff go to www.litestep.net (http://www.litestep.net)

So if you haven't got Linux yet and your wondering whether to get it, then I would suggest you do not, simple as that.

[mairving]

What is dogs bollocks? It doesn't sound good.

I use Mandrake 7.0. There were some frustrating times in the initial set-up. It does have a cool interface (kde desktop) but that's not all that is there. It's kind of like a Ferrari. Looks good on the outside and a great engine under the hood (bonnet?). As opposed to Windows which may look like a Ferrari on the outside but the engine is a couple of hamsters on a wheel inside.

I don't know about the printer and the sound card but I know that the modem will work. You may have to disable PNP in the BIOS.

I personally think that it is worth it. I have not rebooted my system in about three months now.

Here are a couple of links that may help your setup. http://sunsite.auc.dk/linux-newbie/ http://sunsite.auc.dk/linux-newbie/FAQ.htm#setup_soundcard http://sunsite.auc.dk/linux-newbie/FAQ.htm#setup_printer

Hope this helps.

[Joe Auman]

Hey copyright_1978, if you want to talk about frustartions, check out <a href="http://www.pcmech.com/ubb/Forum11/HTML/000353.html">this site.</a> I know what you are thinking. This was going to be a no brainer when you looked at the box. YEAH RIGTH! There is one thing that I found out why Linux doesn't support much. It's because most computer hardware was desinged and is supported for Windows, which kind of let any other OS's high and dry. By the way, if ANY of you guys know ANYONE that works or is in correspondence with ANY manufacture or soon to be manufacuter of ANY form of Linux, tell them please, no PLEASE to increase the support of Linux. If they do, that will be the very first thing I will buy. I will run to the nearest store, even if I have to elude the cops to get it.

That reminds me, I reinstalled for the 10th time. Lets celebrate!! Still haven't gotten the video dirvers to work, and i haven't even touched the sound card yet. I begining to hate this.

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FATAL ERROR!!

Non-System brain or brain error!!
Replace and strike any key when ready.

[shafe1]

hey Copy_Right,
I have the ESS 1868 also. I also had some trouble getting Mandrake 7.0 up and going. Try to logout from the Graphical screen, then press CTRL+ALT+F1 (or F2 through F6) to get a console (TEXT login screen... these screens are anther cool feature of LINUX/UNIX machines because if the graphical page hangs, you can switch to the consoles, login as root and kill the hung process. Try that in Windoze) Anyway, after you login on a text (console) screen as root try running sndconfig. and let it find the card. I had tried this several times, but until the last time ( I had just reinsatlled the OS) when I made sure I wasn't logged in anywhere else, it wouldn't work (even Lothar wouldn't config the card right. It kept finding it as a "Generic.Sb Compatible.... I assume the Sb means Soundblaster).. The last time I ran sndconfig, it found the card, and both sound tests worked fine (it took about 3 -5 min on a 200 Mhz Cyrix PC). I was then able to play CDs in the graphical mode with no problem. The only problem I have is when I tried to play system sounds for events (like loggin in) they wouldn't play... but truthfully, I didn't take the time to check into what was wrong... but like most problems I had It's probably just a matter of configuring it correctly.
Oh, BTW.... Since I moved this machine to LINUX instead of Winblows 98, I haven't had one nasty "Program has caused a general protection fault..." type problem. And guess what else... there's no retarded registry to get fouled up and make you reboot repeatedly. In Win 98, we'd be palying a game (freecell) and this PC would freeze and we'd have to forcibly reboot. When the system came up it would give a message that there was a registry error and you had to reboot to fix it. This would happen about 5 times in a row, then finally it would boot fine BUT we'd have to immediately scandisk and defrag or the 200MHz PC would run like it was 25MHZ or less. Yeah Windows is Great (sarcasm). Also, If you read some other testimonials for LINUX you'll see people saying they thought their PC was dying when Windows was on it, because the hard drives were making all kinds of noise. BUT, since they've put LINUX on the machine, it's just purring along. I'm new to Linux myself, but I've worked with UNIX and have always preferred it to Windows (even when I mostly used the non-graphical interface). I expect, as with any new OS, we'll have growing pains getting to Know the ins and outs of LINUX, But I think once we do the stability and reliability of the OS will be worth the trouble. OR at least I hope it will. :-)
Oh and as for that hamster under the hood of the Windows engine.... If I had a hamster that was in as much pain as the one running the Windoze engine, I'd have put it out of its misery long ago :-). But Unlike Billy-boy and his redmond cronies, I have a
conscience.

[copyright_1978]

Guess what? I also have the ESS 1868!!! Lol, okay on a serious note.. I have managed to make the CD-ROM play CD's but what about actual wave sounds?? I bought this pakage to help a friend study the ins and outs of Linux, one of the great things about that piece of software is that it had guiding wav files to help in the process of learning, but it doesn't friggin work... so what was the hole point of buying it in the first place?!?!!? Anyway I thought Linux was freely available, why did I have to buy mine??

[HAL9000]

You bought it for the luxury of a manual (read it) and while I can't speak for everyone, lots of people do not want to download a 650Mb file. If you're on high speed,it's not too bad, but if you're downloading at ~4-5Kb/s.... I would go buy it too.

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If it ain't broke, you're not pushing hard enough!