Linux - DistributionsThis forum is for Distribution specific questions.
Red Hat, Slackware, Debian, Novell, LFS, Mandriva, Ubuntu, Fedora - the list goes on and on...
Note: An (*) indicates there is no official participation from that distribution here at LQ.
Notices
Welcome to LinuxQuestions.org, a friendly and active Linux Community.
You are currently viewing LQ as a guest. By joining our community you will have the ability to post topics, receive our newsletter, use the advanced search, subscribe to threads and access many other special features. Registration is quick, simple and absolutely free. Join our community today!
Note that registered members see fewer ads, and ContentLink is completely disabled once you log in.
If you have any problems with the registration process or your account login, please contact us. If you need to reset your password, click here.
Having a problem logging in? Please visit this page to clear all LQ-related cookies.
Get a virtual cloud desktop with the Linux distro that you want in less than five minutes with Shells! With over 10 pre-installed distros to choose from, the worry-free installation life is here! Whether you are a digital nomad or just looking for flexibility, Shells can put your Linux machine on the device that you want to use.
Exclusive for LQ members, get up to 45% off per month. Click here for more info.
I am considering moving to a libre distro. What would you recommend to use? I tried FSF gnewsense and is relatively quite old. Could you please give me the pros and cons of this?
Before even considering a libre distro I would test if your hardware will run without proprietary firmware and drivers. On my laptop, for example, running libre is impossible, for one because of the Broadcom WLAN adapter, but also because the free radeon driver overheats my CPU.
The pros of a libre distribution? You are only running free software.
The cons? You are only running free software, limiting yourself to sometimes inferior solutions for ideological reasons.
Before even considering a libre distro I would test if your hardware will run without proprietary firmware and drivers. On my laptop, for example, running libre is impossible, for one because of the Broadcom WLAN adapter, but also because the free radeon driver overheats my CPU.
Even if you did not have overheating issues with the radeon driver, that driver also uses proprietary firmware.
I am using it on IBM R51. On the R61 I used at work the wifi is not detected. The rest is. Considering what you guys have said. I might just give up and use CentOS5.8
Before even considering a libre distro I would test if your hardware will run without proprietary firmware and drivers. On my laptop, for example, running libre is impossible, for one because of the Broadcom WLAN adapter, but also because the free radeon driver overheats my CPU.
The pros of a libre distribution? You are only running free software.
The cons? You are only running free software, limiting yourself to sometimes inferior solutions for ideological reasons.
Well, even Debian did not detect my wifi card, and some of the other did not detect my wifi, ethernet. I think in a real world this is really not working out.
Well, even Debian did not detect my wifi card, and some of the other did not detect my wifi, ethernet. I think in a real world this is really not working out.
There is only one reason why Debian is not considered a libre distro: Because the FSF think they make it to easy to install closed and proprietary software using their non-free repository. if you don't activate the non-free repository in your configuration Debian is basically a libre distribution.
If you want to use your wifi, look at the Debian Wiki how to install the drivers for it, most of the time it involves activating the non-free repo.
There is only one reason why Debian is not considered a libre distro: Because the FSF think they make it to easy to install closed and proprietary software using their non-free repository. if you don't activate the non-free repository in your configuration Debian is basically a libre distribution.
If you want to use your wifi, look at the Debian Wiki how to install the drivers for it, most of the time it involves activating the non-free repo.
Actually I did find a zip file with all the non-free firmwares for wifi devices and used it that way. One odd thing was that when probing for ethernet and wifi, the system became unresponsive and took forever to come back. Asked me to install the firmware and I did and yet again was darn slow searching for it on the usb drive. Overall took 45 min to install it with the net install CD. Just too much hasle.
LinuxQuestions.org is looking for people interested in writing
Editorials, Articles, Reviews, and more. If you'd like to contribute
content, let us know.
