Having recently tried the latest Debian testing distribution (pre-3.1 “Sarge”), I was curious to try Ubuntu, which, like Debian is completely free of charge. As their site proclaims: ‘Ubuntu will always be free of charge, and there is no extra fee for the “enterprise edition”‘. Always a plus, when you’re choosing a distribution to stick with long term.
Ubuntu is Debian based, which should say something for its inherent stability. It shares Debian’s power of package management and upgradability, while adding some extras that standard Debian doesn’t use like the 2.6 kernel and X.org X Window System (due to a licensing change, developers seem to be moving away from XFree86).
The installer (text based) asked minimal questions, and instead seemed to do its best to guess my hardware. If your computer–and in particular your video card–are 5 years old or less, this install will probably work reasonably well. Personally, I was a little surprised when no menu popped up to ask me to describe my video card and monitor. I was not at all suprised when the system booted to a blank screen (it happens a lot with my old S3 video card).
I sidestepped into a console login with Ctl-Alt-F1 and logged in with my regular user name (by default, there’s no root account enabled). Then, from the prompt I typed:
sudo dpkg-reconfigure xserver-xfree86
After entering my password I was able to check Ubuntu’s guesses. It did a good job in all but one guess, but unfortunately, that’s all it takes to have X fail. I changed the vertical scanning frequency range to 50-60 (to accomodate my old video card), saved, exited, pressed Ctl-Alt-F7 (to return to the blank, hanging X session), pressed Ctl-Alt-Backspace to restart Gnome, and VOILA. In like Flint.
While I am not a fan of the Gnome Desktop, Ubuntu has implemented a classy, customized theme (look and feel) which makes you feel like you really are in “their” operating system.
A useful but conservative assortment of software comes pre-installed for Internet (Firefox browser, Evolution email, GAIM, Gnomemeeting, Xchat, etc), Productivity (OpenOffice Suite) and Multimedia (CD, audio and movie players). It provides a basic useable system with plenty of space left over to add the software you want. For security, the root account is disabled by default. You can still use su or sudo to issue commands from a console as needed. GUI package management is done through Gnome’s familiar and comfortable “Synaptic” software.
Prior to the release of Debian’s new installer, I would have lauded a distro like this which offers Debian’s power in a simple install. However, the difference is very small between them now. If you want to install a Debian system and know almost nothing about your computer’s inner parts (other than which hard drive you want to install to), Ubuntu may be a fine choice to get going. You may still need some additional help to get your peripherals to work–none of mine were recognized (2 HP printers, 1 HP scanner, Labtec webcam, SyQuest removable drive, HP multi-card reader). Ubuntu says it strives for ‘a clear focus on the user and usability (it should “Just Work”, TM)’. Well, I’m sorry to say it didn’t work well for me. Your results may be better.
More seasoned Linux users would be best advised to go straight to the Debian distribution and install the “testing” version, upgrade the kernel (or better yet, have a menu of kernels in grub), and make other customizations.
NOTE: For the record, Madrake 10.1 Official is probably the only distro I’ve tried that recognized all my hardware perfectly on the first try. You may want to give it a try if you’re really struggling to find a distro that works for you.
SUMMARY:
Pros:
- Stable: Debian based
- Easily upgradable (Debian)
- 2.6 kernel and X.org
- Should install well with defaults
- No knowledge of hard drive partitioning or GRUB bootleader required, even with multiple disk drives.
- Basic software pre-installed without added junk.
Cons:
- Automatic hardware detection hit or miss (at least with my printer, scanner, webcam, removable drive, and multi-card reader)
Rating: 6 of 10
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