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View Poll Results: I have used Linspire 5.0 for more than 2 weeks, my opinion is:
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4 stars – Easy installation of OS, easy productivity, easy installation of applications, low cost solution (Post good things)
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18 |
45.00% |
3 stars – Excellent distribution, I am still using Linspire today (Post good things)
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10 |
25.00% |
2 stars – Needs Improvement, but it is still a good distribution (Post suggestions)
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4 |
10.00% |
1 star – I have installed Linspire 5.0 and chose to uninstall it. (Why?)
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8 |
20.00% |
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09-02-2005, 09:03 AM
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#46
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Moderator
Registered: Nov 2002
Location: Kent, England
Distribution: Debian Testing
Posts: 19,192
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Here is something I want you all to go away and think about. If Linspire is such an awful distro, why is it that this forum has around 190 threads in it and install/usage problem threads are just a tiny minority. Most threads are started to say "Linspire is great" or "Linspire is awful".
LQ is a help site and a community. This forum is for the Linspire community. If this continues, this area of the forum will just be an opinion piece area, from people who say they don't even use it. If you don't want to use Linspire, fine. Leave this section of the forum and post/answer questions in areas you do use. If you want to post technical problems here or answer technical questions, do so.
Opinion pieces are getting old and tired in this forum - it's not free, <link to GPL> yes it is, it sucks, no it doesn't, CNR is a piece of junk, no it isn't/don't use it then, you have to run as root, no you don't. Am I missing any arguments, I don't think so.
Incidentally, Linux Format magazine in their Security article this month pointed out that despite the fact you have to be root Linspire is still one of the most secure desktops - it only opens one port by default.
Last edited by XavierP; 09-02-2005 at 09:08 AM.
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09-02-2005, 09:18 AM
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#47
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Member
Registered: Nov 2004
Location: Adelaide, Australia
Distribution: Lindows/Linspire, SuSE, PC-BSD, ubuntu, puppy
Posts: 239
Rep:
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Sorry if I was out of line; I do agree with you whole-heartedly.
As a matter of fact I enjoy trying different distros.
Currently I'm rebuilding an old IBM Aptiva as a Linux machine; its 500 MHz processor even with 256Mb of RAM doesn't handle the bigger distros very well. So I may well settle on ubuntu (which is sooooo fast  or slim it down to DSL if I can work out how to use it lol.
Linux is all about choice, I believe. And each fellow's choice is different from the next in most cases. As a community we should really support those who offer choice, particularly with help for those who ask for it. Dragging down never did anybody any good.
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09-02-2005, 09:58 AM
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#48
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Moderator
Registered: Nov 2002
Location: Kent, England
Distribution: Debian Testing
Posts: 19,192
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Actually, it wasn't aimed at anyone in particular - it was a general nag. It occured to me this morning that of late I only ever seem to see the same sorts of threads started in this forum. The opinion pieces are far far outweighing the technical pieces and that's not what this forum is for.
For anyone who wishes to moan about the various shortcomings of Linspire, go to this page and register your displeasure: http://www.linspire.com/lindows_about_contact.php. Remember: LQ!=Linspire
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09-02-2005, 05:22 PM
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#49
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Member
Registered: Nov 2004
Location: Adelaide, Australia
Distribution: Lindows/Linspire, SuSE, PC-BSD, ubuntu, puppy
Posts: 239
Rep:
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I get this...
(Customised 404 error; I rather like the wording as it points towards their sitemap...
Quote:
The page you tried to find is not available. You may have used an out-dated link or typed in the web address (URL) incorrectly.
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Last edited by eagles-lair; 09-02-2005 at 05:29 PM.
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09-02-2005, 05:28 PM
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#50
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Senior Member
Registered: May 2005
Distribution: Ubuntu with IceWM
Posts: 1,775
Rep:
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Quote:
Originally posted by eagles-lair
I get this...
The page you tried to find is not available. You may have used an out-dated link or typed in the web address (URL) incorrectly.
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Try this:
http://help.linspire.com/cgi-bin/lin.../ask.php?p_li=
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09-02-2005, 06:52 PM
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#51
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Moderator
Registered: Nov 2002
Location: Kent, England
Distribution: Debian Testing
Posts: 19,192
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Or this: http://www.linspire.com/homelink50 and then check the url of the contact page against the url I posted. Very weird.
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09-02-2005, 08:26 PM
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#52
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Member
Registered: Nov 2004
Location: Adelaide, Australia
Distribution: Lindows/Linspire, SuSE, PC-BSD, ubuntu, puppy
Posts: 239
Rep:
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delving deeper, it appears that the forum software is changing the link to include the closing tag... quite wierd... wonder why I'm the only one seeing it?
Quote:
http://www.linspire.com/homelink50[/url]
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I noticed in the post I made just before going to bed that I clicked on the "close tags" button on the page and it put an extra one of those into what I posted. I then edited it again and bingo! the link worked.
Gremlins in the forum?
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09-02-2005, 08:46 PM
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#53
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Member
Registered: Sep 2004
Location: LOUISVILLE KENTUCKY
Distribution: mandriva 2006
Posts: 155
Rep:
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i have not installed on my hard drive but the live version is nice. my only complaint is that if you are a reseller you dont get price breaks for ordering bigger lots. outside of that i think linspire is a good idea (even though its not for me) and as a company they do good things , refer to the thread on linspire in schools. not every one is going to be a power user, some need the point and click to ease them into linux. once in a while they slowly learn terminal power. as far as price, i see nothing wrong with charging. if they are donating to schools (putting cupons so you can downloaad for free), tech support, and programmers, they havee to pay for it somehow.
linspire gets thumbs up from me for being a good company
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09-03-2005, 03:51 PM
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#54
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Member
Registered: Aug 2005
Posts: 115
Rep:
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Is it just me or does this poll seem a bit lopsided. I mean 4 stars=post good things, 3 stars=post good things, 2 stars=it is still a good distro and post suggestions which implies post good things....
1 star=uninstalled and tell why....
It should just say, if you are a lin-pire cheerleader, how pumped are you about the big game or soemthing.... funny really!
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09-17-2005, 11:46 AM
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#55
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LQ Newbie
Registered: Sep 2005
Posts: 13
Rep:
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Linspire Five-O would be great for the new linux user, but anyone who is hardcore GPL/opensource will be frustrated. It is not difficult to use apt-get to install most software that you need. If you're a total linux newb, then go with linspire and use their CNR capabilities.
I attempted to edit the sources.list file that, by default in Linspire 5.0, has the sources commented out. This really causes stability havoc in Linspire when trying to update libraries. Apt-get basically just quit on me when I tried to do a total system package upgrade.
So conclusion: Great distro if you really know nothing about linux; however, if you really want to learn about library dependencies etc, Linspire doesn't force you to do that. A pay service is not a viable option to bring Linux to the "average joe." Perhaps the new klik service which comes pre-installed on OpenSuSE 10.0 will be an improvement. In the end, I went back to SuSE 9.3 with KDE.
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09-17-2005, 12:03 PM
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#56
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Senior Member
Registered: May 2005
Distribution: Ubuntu with IceWM
Posts: 1,775
Rep:
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Quote:
Originally posted by pagaporcristo
I attempted to edit the sources.list file that, by default in Linspire 5.0, has the sources commented out. This really causes stability havoc in Linspire when trying to update libraries. Apt-get basically just quit on me when I tried to do a total system package upgrade.
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Amen. I tried some tutorial on "hacking Linspire" to get apt-get working--didn't work. And Linspire doesn't say it will, either. They don't official support apt-get, dpkg, or alien.
I'd say for people who aren't keen on CNR, they should go to Mepis (for a Debian-based distro) or Blag (for a Fedora-based distro). Both support Synaptic.
If you're happy with CNR, though, Linspire's for you.
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09-17-2005, 12:15 PM
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#57
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Member
Registered: Jul 2004
Location: Belgium
Distribution: Debian Squeeze
Posts: 194
Rep:
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Quote:
Originally posted by pagaporcristo
Linspire Five-O would be great for the new linux user, but anyone who is hardcore GPL/opensource will be frustrated.
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True, Linspire is targetting the people who just want to turn on the computer and work with it (not worying about versions of packages, virusses, trojans, configurations, installation of software, etc. etc.).
If someone more hardcore asks me about a distro I will tell them about Linspire but will probably advise a more suited distro for them (like Debian or SuSE or whatever they want).
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09-17-2005, 07:39 PM
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#58
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Member
Registered: Nov 2004
Location: Adelaide, Australia
Distribution: Lindows/Linspire, SuSE, PC-BSD, ubuntu, puppy
Posts: 239
Rep:
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Quote:
Originally posted by aysiu
Amen. I tried some tutorial on "hacking Linspire" to get apt-get working--didn't work. And Linspire doesn't say it will, either. They don't official support apt-get, dpkg, or alien.
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It will work with apt-get. It is a Debian product. And any other Debian install system.
However don't expect to go back to CNR and find that works afterwards.
This is all very well documented all over the place.
CNR is provided for those who don't wish to know what goes on under the hood. The millions of frustrated Windows users, not geeks. It is effectively an either-or scheme if you don't want to be continually mending broken things like dependencies.
So I read, anyway. I may be wrong. I was once, or was I just mistaken then? 
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09-18-2005, 11:35 AM
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#59
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Member
Registered: Aug 2005
Posts: 115
Rep:
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Ok, I think I have been a bit rough on linspire  I was upset about the forum thing so now I choose to ONLY point out the bad things!  I apologize! I also apologize to cloudy since I took it out on him! I would apologize to richard.a aka eagles-lair but I felt I only defended myself from him!  I will ease up off lin----res back a bit. There are a lot of things I wish they would work harder on, including some they do not do anything about until it is shown to them when they are a big enough company and should go to greater lengths to handle anything that might be seen as un-kosher!
They do have a nice disto! Now if thy only charged 19.99 for the distro or maybe even 24.99 then that would be cool! Charge more for CNR for the people that need it!
How about a way to install some free software without so much company induced breakage? I mean if I go to install bluefish from a free source does it really need to rip out the internet suite, mplayer, mplayer plugin...etc...?
How about being upfront and open about the deal with SCO?
How about a dollar amount that shows how much 'support' is given to the open source projects?
Ok, I understand revealing money matters but some of the other stuff...
Also need some work on sound, instead of all that half working jack/arts/alsa junk.
Wireless - seems to be VERY hit or MISS
DHCP - their dynamic stuff seems to have a lot of trouble with DNS and resolv.conf, why add those search domain entries and so forth to it, is it needed?
HCL - either keep it up to date and correct or remove it!
More tools included or included on a second CD for compiling, and basic utilities that most distros include.
Yes, I realize that is complaining as well but it isnt just ranting these are my concerns, well my main ones anyway! 
Once again, I plan to ease up off lins----res back...some!
**sorry for being OT**
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09-18-2005, 08:45 PM
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#60
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Member
Registered: Nov 2004
Location: Adelaide, Australia
Distribution: Lindows/Linspire, SuSE, PC-BSD, ubuntu, puppy
Posts: 239
Rep:
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jaketate
Thanks mate. Appreciate your post.
You know, the "insiders" (beta testers) are not company men (and women).
They don't by any stretch of the imagination defend the product "come hell or high water".
All distros have bad points. I complained voraciously about some of them towards the end of beta testing of Linspire 5.0.
But the product seems to work on many machines. There are driver shortcoming. Most other Linux suffers from the same problem.
Linspire is aimed at newer computers with higher processor speed, more RAM etc. The sort of machine Windows users would already have.
The product is designed for pre-loading on some specific machines that will run "out of the box". Computers with hardware carefully selected to work.
Their (and other) forums are usually the fastest way to fix a non working machine you have just installed the distro on.
And like many of the testers, I'll download other peoples' ISOs and try them - partly to use a faster or better in some other way product. Partly to offer feedback to the engineers. Partly for the fun of doing it.
No, I never got around to looking at Freespire, but I'm not a geek, so maybe that's my excuse
Yes it is easy to focus on the annoying aspects. And it is easy to misunderstand something you thought was cast in concrete too. There was a time when I thought "free software" was "free as in beer". I was wrong once. Or maybe just mistaken
Thanks again mate.
Last edited by eagles-lair; 09-18-2005 at 08:46 PM.
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