more linux testing

Since I miss using Linux so much (oh, so very, very much), I am in the process of testing a number of different flavors.

Back in 2008, I had the same idea. That would have been a better time to switch over than today, as I now have many gigabytes of additional software installed. And then there are still more gigs occupied by music and photographs.

With only two gigabytes of free space, it will be a tricky job shoehorning Linux in. But I did it back in 2000 with Red Hat 6 on a 1996 Gateway with a much smaller hard drive. It was packed with software and pictures, too, but I managed to migrate most of it to Linux over time.

Today's testing has thus far produced these results:

CentOS 5, from Spring 2008, booted up well enough. The monitor could only be set for 800x640 or 640x480 and CentOS could not find my wireless network adapter, even with my help.

Mandriva 8.0, from March 2008, could not start its GUI, claiming that there were "no screens available," and explaining that yes, it found a screen, but no, it could not be configured properly.

Kubuntu 8.04, also from Spring 2008, started up properly. The network manager found my wireless card and displayed all of the wireless networks within range. I selected ours and connected to it. (That actually did take a while; there are a number of ways to approach network configuration.) Even the trackpad works - including the edge-scrolling feature.

I am writing this from Kubuntu (which is Ubuntu Linux with a KDE interface instead of the standard Gnome GUI) in the Konqueror browser. I am so happy.

All of these have been two-year-old releases. The next step is to try OpenSUSE 11.3, that distro's latest release, with a KDE4 front end.

I will have my Linux, no matter how long it takes. He he he he haha haha!