Feb 272007
 

So far, Ubuntu rocks. Sound (SB Live 1024 Platinum), USB (it recognizes my cardreader on my USB-hub, whereas Windows does not), video driver (ATI Radeon 9700 Pro), SCSI (Adaptec 29160) and all features work without any tweaking. I only needed to modify xorg.conf with my monitors maximum refresh rates, since it’s hooked up via coax and can’t be probed the way you can when connected via D-Sub. And I found and used a xmodmap hack to get the buttons of my Microsoft Trackball Explorer working the way I want it.

Evolution does not live up to it’s name. It’s not an Evolution. It’s trying to look like Outlook, but it’s not. And it shows. Thunderbird will be my mail-client.

Gaim is a great MSN-clone. And it can Jabber/ICQ/etc too. That’s nice. Now how ’bout Google-talk as well?

Tomorrow I will look into mounting the other disks. Since that’s where all my data is. And I need to install VMware for certain commercial programs not available for Linux. Like my Corel PaintShop Pro X, or Borland Delphi6.

 Posted by at 01:52
Feb 262007
 

In my previous post I mentioned that my Atlas 10K3 disk crashed, while in fact it was the 10K2. That one was a bit older, but still.
I had the 10K3 still in my system, but not hooked up. That was because of previous Windows errors (not hardware related). So I connected it, and verified that indeed it could not boot that disk. But the system recognises it, so I decided to give it a go.
Ubuntu 6.1 for Desktops has been installed now, and is fetching the latest updates. The only thing to solve for now is the “sudo” annoyance.

 Posted by at 22:25
Feb 232007
 

The disk with my C:-drive (bootdisk) just died on me. I was opening Thunderbird, it took forever to open, and CTRL-ALT-DEL did not work anymore. So I bounced the system, and now SCSI-ID 6 (an Atlas 10K3 disk, for heavens sake!) does not come up. Fortunately, that’s only my C:-drive. Don’t you just love Microsoft Windows registry, and having to reinstall EVERYTHING again?

I guess that was another Windows installation gone forever. I’m not sure if I want Windows XP again. Perhaps I’ll give my Windows XP Pro box to someone I really hate.
The only thing I will need to get used to, is Gimp, which (in my opinion) sucks in the GUI department. There is a modification called GimpShop, a heavily modified version to resemble Adobe PhotoShop as much as possible (restructured menu et all).
For e-mail I already recently switched to Thunderbird. Firefox is my main (99,9%) browser. OpenOffice.org is more than enough for the documents I create on my personal PC. So what will I miss? Perhaps Canon’s Zoombrowser?

 Posted by at 01:39
Feb 182007
 

At the moment I’m testing whether I can live without Outlook. I know I can’t synchronize my iPaq with Thunderbird, but I merely use the functionality other than for backup purposes.
When I started using Thunderbird, I had all my e-mail accounts in different inboxes. That’s not the way I like it (now) for all my accounts, so I moved some messages to the global inbox and other folders, and switched that account to “store incoming e-mail in global inbox”. It gives you a warning that you should move your e-mail there first, but I already did.
To my surprise, the e-mail I moved was NOT in the global inbox, but the other inbox was gone. WTF? Close Thunderbird and start again. Nope. No mail. SNAFU. Until I right-clicked on the Inbox and saw “Rebuild Index”. Right. Bloodpressure and heartrate are back to normal again.

 Posted by at 23:56
Feb 122007
 

Just this evening, I installed Seamonkey, Mozilla’s internet suite (Browser, Mail&News, Chat, HTML editor). I did that, because it features Mozilla Thunderbird 2.0 stuff, but…after installing I found Thunderbird (2.0 beta 2) itself better in appearance.
But the browser is a different story. I tried a couple of sites, and the browsing experience is great. It looks like the sites just pop on to the screen. Not sure if it’s the way Seamonkey renders the pages or if the network-layer is really great. But that’s not what counts: it feels fast. So, I’ll stick to it a couple of days and I’ll keep you updated.

 Posted by at 02:12