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View Full Version : If so, why isn't everybody using Xubuntu or other light Ubuntu's?



Majorix
December 28th, 2007, 03:43 AM
After having terrible slowdowns with the "original" Ubuntu, I switched to Xubuntu on my poor laptop.

The thing is, I have never run into any problems or felt the absence of anything. Everything works.

Most software for Gnome or KDE you can run under Xubuntu too. I, for example, couldn't leave my precious Gedit and am running it under Xubuntu too. Some people might want to install Restricted Drivers Manager too, but since I don't have any relative hardware, I didn't install it.

It is really lightweight. I am using appr. 120-130 MBs of RAM, while this number was around doubled with the "original" Ubuntu.

I also tend to think using less RAM would prolong the life expectancy of your PC... Am I wrong?

All in all, Xubuntu is next to perfect and I will most likely never turn back to the "original" Ubuntu again.

So, please do tell me, if everything is so nice with lighter Ubuntu's, why is everyone using the "original" or the KDE version of Ubuntu? :confused:

EDIT: Before you tell it, please let me explain: Its not a matter of choice, when you can do everything you want several times faster and healthier (for the PC and your brain :D)

jerrylamos
December 28th, 2007, 03:57 AM
I like Xubuntu fine except for:

browsing & copying files on our house LAN, three Linux and two XP's. Ubuntu has Places, Network and I haven't found out how to do it on Xubuntu.

Ubuntu has screen capture for internet graphics pages. I haven't found out how to do that with Xubuntu,

Other than those, Xubuntu has less overhead and is faster.

Jerry

LaRoza
December 28th, 2007, 04:10 AM
I also tend to think using less RAM would prolong the life expectancy of your PC... Am I wrong?

So, please do tell me, if everything is so nice with lighter Ubuntu's, why is everyone using the "original" or the KDE version of Ubuntu? :confused:


No, RAM doesn't work that way. But not using a lot of RAM is always a good thing.

As for why, several reasons:

* KDE and GNOME are the defaults on many distros, and therefore more widely used
* No compelling reason to change the defaults

Xfce is a great DM, in fact, I made a thread praising it. I recommend it often especially for laptops.

jken146
December 28th, 2007, 04:14 AM
For screenshots, I use scrot, with the PrtScrn key mapped to the command.

Thunar is a bit lacking in terms of ssh and the like (I am making do with hand-crafted bash scripts so far), but IMO it makes up for this in quite a few areas c.f. Nautilus.

I installed Xubuntu on this laptop I was lent over Christmas just to try it out and I have to say I am pleasantly surprised. The snapiness is great and I'm struggling to think what I miss from Gnome. Well, the menu editor is stupid and creating a launcher can be harder too. I had to install things to take screenshots and to lock the screen. Oh, and XFCE puts the trash in a silly place (~/.local/share/Trash).

I think Gnome is a bit more intuitive than XFCE and provides more functionality out of the box for the 'average user'. There is also more support for GnomeBuntu. For these reasons plain old Ubuntu is the one I would install for a friend or relative.

I think Xubuntu needs a few more features to get up to the usability level of Gnome (lack of 'Places' is a showstopper for many I'm sure), but I really hope it doesn't become a victim of feature creep.

vexorian
December 28th, 2007, 04:25 AM
I did not recognize any drastic speed up on my machine when I tried xubuntu. Both ubuntu and xubuntu go awesomely fast to me, so maybe that's the problem.

I am not a fan of the ultra light weight apps that aren't that great, If I installed xubuntu I would have to apt-get a lot of apps that would come by default on (K)ubuntu

I tried to try ubuntu the other day as a replacement for Gnome, but the already named apps situation + the fact that I couldn't resize icons (sorry but I love icons of different sizes in my desktop) made me run away. I also don't like that mouse obsession they got.

So, you see, gnome and xcfe are so close that such little things made me choose one over the other, right now I am hoping for KDE4 though.

--
Perhaps in the future the main ubuntu could use xcfe as the desktop and some gnome apps + firefox and open office by default, to stop the gnome dependency but hey, we are dreaming..

Majorix
December 28th, 2007, 05:13 AM
I did not recognize any drastic speed up on my machine when I tried xubuntu. Both ubuntu and xubuntu go awesomely fast to me, so maybe that's the problem.
How large is your RAM? If it's over 2 gigs, you probably won't notice much difference. But not everybody has a that large RAM you know.

II am not a fan of the ultra light weight apps that aren't that great, If I installed xubuntu I would have to apt-get a lot of apps that would come by default on (K)ubuntu
I had about 2300-2400 packages on my latest Ubuntu install. I had reached 2000 in 3 days and later I added some more packages. Now, I installed all the packages I used to use on my Ubuntu box on my Xubuntu, and the number of packages is slightly less than 1050. That, I hope, explains a lot.

II tried to try ubuntu the other day as a replacement for Gnome, but the already named apps situation + the fact that I couldn't resize icons (sorry but I love icons of different sizes in my desktop) made me run away. I also don't like that mouse obsession they got.
I don't know how you can resize the icons, but that must be possible. And even if not, that shouldn't be a problem I hope? We are adults, right? :D
And about the rat, I don't know the background but it's cute.


IPerhaps in the future the main ubuntu could use xcfe as the desktop and some gnome apps + firefox and open office by default, to stop the gnome dependency but hey, we are dreaming..

Maybe, who knows. But I hope they do, that will make more people have faster-running comps.

vexorian
December 28th, 2007, 05:27 AM
How large is your RAM? If it's over 2 gigs, you probably won't notice much difference. But not everybody has a that large RAM you know.
768 MB.


I don't know how you can resize the icons, but that must be possible. And even if not, that shouldn't be a problem I hope? We are adults, right?

I like big icons for my apps and place them on the top, except for the less important ones in which I use 1/4 of the "big size" for them. I also like different sizes for folders decreasing by importance, besides of looking nice it helps me actually have an organized desktop which to me would bevery hard without doing that. I also mass emblems.

Majorix
December 28th, 2007, 05:37 AM
My 512mb laptop boots (and becomes usable) at least 2 times faster with Xubuntu than with Ubuntu. There is also a minor improvement on my 1gb desktop. I don't know how you cannot see any difference with your 768mb machine. You should use a stopwatch :D

s3a
December 28th, 2007, 05:57 AM
CPU is the factor of speed...if RAM is not fully used then it is not a factor...in the Linux world, or at least for the *buntu's.

HermanAB
December 28th, 2007, 06:11 AM
The traditional problem with KDE/Gnome is their dreadful window managers. It is actually possible to run them with IceWM or Xfce as window manager, but to me doing so is just way too much effort.

The lastest KDE is actually somewhat better and the new window manager is significantly more responsive

ugm6hr
December 28th, 2007, 06:20 AM
I started with Xubuntu7.04, but moved to Gnome-Ubuntu7.10 when upgrading, because I couldn't download Xubuntu without errors at the time.

While I really like Xubuntu, and I have since installed it again on an older machine in my office, there are definitely features that it lacks in comparison to Gnome:
Default network access on thunar. Decent menu editing. Toolbar size (try shrinking width to less than about 24 pixels). Good-looking laptop "power" indicator. Default GUI wifi setup with WPA support.

However, it did have some nice Panel Plugins (especially mail-notify) - and I think those and thunar were it's best positives (other than speed).

I also found that XFCE desktop management was a bit hit and miss (you can't just directly drag icons etc), and the panels used to intermittently disappear. These were sufficiently irritating to prevent me from choosing to install XFCE for my main laptop (which is now 1GB RAM).

Please note I have only ever used XFCE and Gnome in the default buntu flavours, but this has been my personal experience.

LaRoza
December 28th, 2007, 06:29 AM
I use Dolphin and Thunar in Fluxbox

Lostincyberspace
December 28th, 2007, 06:38 AM
I use Ubuntu since it is the one I like best every thing just fits.

Majorix
December 28th, 2007, 06:39 AM
While I really like Xubuntu, and I have since installed it again on an older machine in my office, there are definitely features that it lacks in comparison to Gnome:
Default network access on thunar. Decent menu editing. Toolbar size (try shrinking width to less than about 24 pixels). Good-looking laptop "power" indicator. Default GUI wifi setup with WPA support.

You can always install alacarte, which is actually Gnome based but would work on XFCE too. I use it.
And I thought Xubuntu and Ubuntu share the same network manager?

Also, shame you couldn't upgrade your Xubuntu 7.04.

ugm6hr
December 28th, 2007, 06:56 AM
And I thought Xubuntu and Ubuntu share the same network manager?

Also, shame you couldn't upgrade your Xubuntu 7.04.

Xubuntu uses Network Monitor, while Ubuntu uses Network Manager. You can obviously install anything on anything - but given that I have decided that I am doing a fresh re-install every release (i.e. 6 months), it is much easier to just stick with the default Gnome-Ubuntu that does everything out-of-the-box for me.

As for upgrading - as I said, I chose to do a full re-install (since there are plenty of opinions that this is probably better).

Majorix
December 28th, 2007, 06:59 AM
I am positive that Ubuntu and Xubuntu use the same network management tool. I know this, because this program didn't use to work on my Ubuntu and still doesn't on my Xubuntu. A bug with Hardy.

But maybe they changed the default network management tool since you made the switch, this is most likely the case.

ugm6hr
December 28th, 2007, 07:18 AM
I am positive that Ubuntu and Xubuntu use the same network management tool. I know this, because this program didn't use to work on my Ubuntu and still doesn't on my Xubuntu. A bug with Hardy.

But maybe they changed the default network management tool since you made the switch, this is most likely the case.

Maybe you are right. Must be a Hardy Xubuntu update. I have certainly done a Xubuntu Gutsy AlternateCD install, which still uses Network Monitor (which Ubuntu also has).

I am surprised that Xubuntu has gone this way, since the wifi control in Ubuntu is done with Gnome software (http://www.gnome.org/projects/NetworkManager/) I had hoped Xubuntu would chose Wicd as a lighter alternative.

Majorix
December 28th, 2007, 10:33 PM
After creating this thread, and playing around with Xubuntu a little, I got to see that it also produced a 4 times higher FPS in the glxgears test than Ubuntu (600-650 FPS vs 2400-2500 FPS), with the same crappy hardware. I haven't run any professional benchmark tests, because I believe my comp would output <1 FPS (yes I am serious) with such a test.

Tmi
December 29th, 2007, 12:57 AM
I'd really like to try Xubuntu out again, since I'm on a laptop with only 512 Mb RAM. Last time, however, I ran into way too much trouble with my wlan - If I remember correctly it didn't work with my WPA wireless network even though I used the same application for it as in gnome.

Well, guess I could try it out once more tomorrow. It's nice that it's so easy to uninstall in case it doesn't work.

Edit; Xubuntu would probably be nice too since I play World of Warcraft on this laptop.

Darkhack
December 29th, 2007, 03:09 AM
I'm using IceWM and I can't say enough good things about it. Easy to use, extremely customizable, and unlike other lightweight WMs I actually don't feel like I have to fight with it. Fluxbox (IMO, so don't flame) feels like I have to do a bunch of extra steps because it is missing features. I know that's a no-brainer, but it feels too limited where as IceWM gets rid of the junk while keeping enough to easily get work done and not feel like I have to do some special work arounds or extra clicks to get stuff done. I'm truly an IceWM fan though. It's great! I only have 512 MB (471 due to integrated graphics) of RAM and I almost never use swap. I can't remember the last time I've ever touched it. Boots up to less than 100 MB and even while running Firefox with a dozen tabs, xchat, Rythmbox, Pidgin and a bunch of other apps, it still stays quick and light.

jrusso2
December 29th, 2007, 04:25 AM
I tried XFCE once it was so buggy I could not continue to use it.

Besides the frequent lock ups I got tired of my tool bars going missing or changing each time I logged in.

fuscia
December 29th, 2007, 09:48 AM
on my old desktop (700mhz, 256mb ram), i had to use something other than gnome. i tried xfce, kde-core, fluxbox, etc. and ended up with openbox while using apps like dillo, claws mail, etc. when i got my laptop, with a gig of ram, the larger DEs were no longer slower than openbox, at least, not noticeably so (in fact, some kde apps loaded faster in kde than they did in openbox, which had not been the case on my old desktop).

once speed is no longer an issue, the next consideration, for me, is how things function. kde and gnome do things other environments don't. a lot of people like these things and that's a perfectly legitimate reason to use these DEs. i'm using wmii. i had tried using the console, but i like images. also, even in a text browser, most of the internet looks like tetris just before you lose. elinks is so much eaisier to read in x than it is in the console. i could just as easily wonder why anyone would use anything other than wmii, or any of the other tiling wm and, if i did, i'm sure i would get about five pages of response as to why.

theharshone
December 29th, 2007, 10:43 AM
i prefer e17, the best lightweight environment u can work in(in my opoinion). XFCE is just to minimalistic for me. I too am looking forward to kde4 tho. i built the svn build and it looks good.

kripkenstein
December 29th, 2007, 11:41 AM
Xubuntu is great, I used it for a few months. It does have some rough edges, probably because it gets less development attention than GNOME. For example, copy-paste of a directory after pressing control-l in thunar fails unless you keep the popup window open; there is no power-management dialog (which was a problem since there was no way to change the default behavior of putting my buggy monitor to sleep, which wouldn't wake up), etc.

Meanwhile I've moved back to GNOME. It turns out that the main reason I used Xfce - lower memory usage - was in fact mostly due to Evince and FIrefox. Using xPDF and Firefox beta 3.0 improved things enough so I can run GNOME again on this 512MB machine.

Zack McCool
December 29th, 2007, 12:22 PM
My 512mb laptop boots (and becomes usable) at least 2 times faster with Xubuntu than with Ubuntu. There is also a minor improvement on my 1gb desktop. I don't know how you cannot see any difference with your 768mb machine. You should use a stopwatch :D

On boot, my machine (Ubuntu 7.10, Gnome) is using about 260 MB of RAM. More or less RAM makes no difference. The larger the apps you use, or the more data you are working with, the more RAM you'll need.

I have 3GB in this machine. My VM's use about 1 GB. The rest is there for minor video work.

XFCE boots a bit faster, but I never reboot, so it has no effect. The apps I use run no faster or slower no matter which desktop environment I use...

And RAM is cheap. 1GB DIMMS can be had for under $20 on sale if you watch close enough. Micro Center had a special the other day for 2 1GB DIMMS, PC6400, for $30. It is more for a laptop, but my laptop has 1 GB, and runs fine with Gnome.

kelvin spratt
December 29th, 2007, 12:31 PM
I use only E17, But Xubuntu does make a good base for starting with E17 as you don't need Xfce or full Gnome. when you get more competent. you can the just use the Ubuntu base and build your own to your spec.

julian67
December 29th, 2007, 12:32 PM
I have Xubuntu 7 on my desktop (also running Firestarter and DHCP server for LAN), Xubuntu 7.04 on a laptop and Zenwalk 5 on another laptop. Xfce is a lot faster than Gnome or KDE, I believe the difference in speed is accounted for by the window manager and also Thunar is a much snappier file manager than Nautilus or Konqueror. Nautilus running a desktop seems to be a guarantee of slow speed. I like the features of Nautilus and Gnome but not the penalty, and anyway Thunar's capabilities are easily extended with custom actions to broadly match those of Nautilus. The only area where Xfce seems to be seriously behind Gnome and KDE is in browsing network shares which is done within the file manager in Gnome/KDE, but this is easily done by using pyNeighborhood. Xubuntu 7.10 uses exactly the same Network-Manager applet as Ubuntu so there is no difference in wired or wireless ability between Ubuntu and Xubuntu. It's also easily installed in Xubuntu 7.04. I use a lot of Gnome apps and they start quicker in Xfce than they ever did in stock Gnome/Ubuntu. It seems to me that if Thunar ever gets the capability to browse network shares then there will be no real difference in capability between Gnome and Xfce versions of Ubuntu. In the latest Zenwalk (version 5 rc) wicd is included so there is now a slackware based Xfce distro which can manage wireless WPA via a GUI.....it's an excellent distro and just replaced Xubuntu Feisty on one of my laptops (reason to change is that the Ubuntu upgrade process is still very problematic....Slackware and derivatives upgrade from version to version much more reliably then Debian or RPM based distros).

mrgnash
December 29th, 2007, 02:30 PM
Gnome is just a whole lot more integrated as far as I'm concerned.

julian67
December 29th, 2007, 02:33 PM
Gnome is just a whole lot more integrated as far as I'm concerned.

Integrated with what?

mrgnash
December 29th, 2007, 04:38 PM
Integrated with what?

The desktop and component applications -- e.g. evolution and nautilus, pidgin and evolution, pidgin and nautilus, etc.

happysmileman
December 29th, 2007, 04:42 PM
Integrated with what?

I assume he means that the different parts of it, and the default apps are integrated with each other, which is a good reason to use it.

Also the reason for me is that KDE goes fast enough for anything I've used it for so far, and the integration of it is good to have.

If KDE was too slow for me then I probably would use XFCE, but it's perfectly reasonable for me (even with just 512MB RAM while compiz-fusion is running, albeit with much of it's more useless effects disabled), so I use it