Windows 7 Starter

[mchunt]

Windows 7 is much better than Windows Vista - but that ain't saying much! & Windows 8 getting bad reviews even before release.

Personally happily used Amiga through college before reluctantly switching to Win95 (for work) - then saw the light and used Mandrake Linux for years before switching to Kubuntu. First time I switched to Linux was due to my 1996 laptop no longer being powerful enough for latest windows and not wanting to throw away a good still working laptiop. I now have Macs at home and work (and many linux servers) - expensive but the Macbook Air is great for travelling and I could hardly refuse a iMac with 27" screen at work! (all I wanted was another cheap linux PC)

Windows just isn't functional for the sysadmin/coding work I do and far too heavy for just web browsing which is what a lot of people (most?) want to do.

 

[thnurg]

My experience of Linux Mint is that it's a bit poo. I prefer other versions of Linux.

Fair enough. It's not the one that I use either, but it is supposed to be one of the best newbie experiences, and one of the most popular which is why I recommended it. My favourite is Gentoo, but I'm not going to recommend that to a WIndows defector.

 

[Manonabike]

We have W7 starter on my daughter's Samsung netbook. It's fine, it does the job, requires little configuration and is very reliable. We threw away all the office starter stuff and put open office and Chrome on it. We put Ubuntu on an identical machine, which is my son's. It doesn't run any faster (although I haven't run any benchmarks) but he likes to mess about with linux.

Horses for courses!

You are probably right, however, you will notice a difference and quite easily when you start demanding resources from the machine. Say you have a browser with over 10 tabs opened + a word processor or similar application. Ubuntu can take the load much more easily and even cope with heavier demands

Hardly the main use of an operating system is it? Most people use one to run other applications, not use the desktop to view their piccies.

That was exactly my point.... to highlight something so simple that Windows Starter cannot handle well..... something that one could easily do even with Windows 95 - not my fault is somebody is running short on imagination, is it?
My wife wanted a picture of our grandson as a desktop background on her netbook when I realised Windows 7 Starter doesn't let you do that - but I found a way to do it by hardcoding the path of the picture in the appropriate area of the registry - I had recommended the netbook to her so at least the trick got me out of trouble with her

 

[david1701]

But say you want to work on it, maybe run something other than open office (which doesn't play nicely with ms office) you need to either fool around with wine or just abandon the effort. This is before you think about any hardware that wasn't out of the box.....

Windowsis much more flexible for those who domt want to crawl around in the command line, almost any problem is either in the help, obvious or google able whereas Linux problems require a lot of knowledge to solve because there are so many variants.

I say this running quite a few windows machines (win 7 is the best is yet, not installed the beta of 8 but I don't love the look of it) and several Linux machines Ubuntu, xbmcbuntu and I'm currently debating what to install on my file server (I want Linux but investigating internal and external vac options)

 

[Deleted member 1258]

But say you want to work on it, maybe run something other than open office (which doesn't play nicely with ms office) you need to either fool around with wine or just abandon the effort. This is before you think about any hardware that wasn't out of the box.....

Windowsis much more flexible for those who domt want to crawl around in the command line, almost any problem is either in the help, obvious or google able whereas Linux problems require a lot of knowledge to solve because there are so many variants.

I say this running quite a few windows machines (win 7 is the best is yet, not installed the beta of 8 but I don't love the look of it) and several Linux machines Ubuntu, xbmcbuntu and I'm currently debating what to install on my file server (I want Linux but investigating internal and external vac options)

I've been on Ubuntu for almost 4 years now, currently on 10.04, Ubuntu problems are rare, when they rear their ugly head theres plenty of online help, including an useful Ubuntu forum with plenty of knowledgeable people on it, if you can't solve it yourself. I like open office, When I've needed a MS office document I've just saved it as a .doc file instead of an .odt file and I've had no problems.

 

[Manonabike]

But say you want to work on it, maybe run something other than open office (which doesn't play nicely with ms office) you need to either fool around with wine or just abandon the effort. This is before you think about any hardware that wasn't out of the box.....

Windowsis much more flexible for those who domt want to crawl around in the command line, almost any problem is either in the help, obvious or google able whereas Linux problems require a lot of knowledge to solve because there are so many variants.

I say this running quite a few windows machines (win 7 is the best is yet, not installed the beta of 8 but I don't love the look of it) and several Linux machines Ubuntu, xbmcbuntu and I'm currently debating what to install on my file server (I want Linux but investigating internal and external vac options)

Probably you have not tried Windows 7 Starter.

 

[david1701]

Probably you have not tried Windows 7 Starter.

That much is true , I'm a photographer so tend to have juicy laptops/home built rigs so don't scrimp on os


Actually Dave r, I've never had an issue with online support on Ubuntu, it's xbmc and other funny distros that I've had issues with, I'm a Linux noob self confessed, fighting nudist scraper

 

[david1701]

Lol auto correct ndis scraper not nudist

 

[threebikesmcginty]

I'm still on Windows 2.1, is there a new version out then?




sent from my Olivetti M24

 

[MossCommuter]

self confessed, fighting nudist scraper

Best auto correct ever!

 

[david1701]

Best auto correct ever!

Gotta love apple tech, considering buying my iPad a pint if I can work out where tout it..

 

[swee'pea99]

I've no great gripes with W7, but the built in email - Windows Live Mail - really is pants.

 

[Deleted member 1258]

T
Actually Dave r, I've never had an issue with online support on Ubuntu, it's xbmc and other funny distros that I've had issues with, I'm a Linux noob self confessed, fighting nudist scraper

I've never come across XBMC before, I've just had a look on their website and my first impression is what a mess, I'm sure its not but thats my first impression and its something I'm going to stay away from.

 

[asterix]

Hardly the main use of an operating system is it? Most people use one to run other applications, not use the desktop to view their piccies.

I thought Windows was just DOS with pictures?

 

[thnurg]

I've never come across XBMC before, I've just had a look on their website and my first impression is what a mess, I'm sure its not but thats my first impression and its something I'm going to stay away from.

XBMC is the dog's wotsits. It's one of those projects that concentrates more on power and features than ease of use and installation, but the effort pays dividends.
A good way to check it out would be to get the Sabayon live DVD (http://www.sabayon.org/) which includes XBMC. I use it in conjunction with MythTV as my PVR in the lounge, and on the bedroom XBOX and I love it.