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View Full Version : New Ubuntu user here. Switched from XP after 2 years.



Wolfmight
April 8th, 2008, 11:16 PM
I had windows on this laptop for 2 years, and 1 year before that, but I was downloading too much off p2ps and eventually got a virus that did too much damage to the system. The Bagel.32 or something, it completely modified many so-called sensitive files under the all-powerful Windows File Protection (my ***), and basically the only option left was to either clean install or work countless hours to fix about 5% of the problem. so I decided I'll go with Linux Ubuntu this round. I still have linux on my gaming PC, but this is my laptop and I don't need 2 copies of windows of course., AND all my personal data is backed up and also saved to a seperate ntfs partition that survived the blow to Windows, so that's nice. And, I'm getting to like this linux os. All my photos, documents, videos, etc already work great...even my odd-ball video formats in Ogg and DivX and MKV apparently work too! The media player just gave me some codec updates...nice!

Only problem I had was configuring my Wifi Broadcom 4813 card, but I finally got it working and I'm officially writing this baby online wirelessly! I used this wiki https://help.ubuntu.com/community/WifiDocs/Driver/bcm43xx/Feisty_No-Fluff
then I had to set my wifi settings to Wep-Shared. Sucks how I couldn't get the WPA-2 encryption working for now, BUT...that'll have to do, I don't live in a super high-tech neighborhood anyways, so my stress over a hacker sitting outside my home isn't too much to worry over at all. I do, however use MAC Filtering too, just to compensate for having to use WEP and SSID broadcasting is disabled, so ya have to know the complicated network name too (kinda like a password also in a sense haha)

I highly suggest that wiki for your wifi broadcom 4318, because I tried over 6 other tutorials (i'm hardcore like that) and that wiki was the only thing that worked for me...just letting you know :D.

So yeah, I'm having a blast trying this baby out. I originally tried the Gutsey version, then I decided to downgrade to Feisty Fawn, which was working much better, but then I decided to just upgrade again to Gutsey using the update package. Everything is actually running much better now than it did from a fresh install of Gutsey alone.

For one, the start-up Ubuntu loading progress bar actually shows still, unlike when I installed from the Gutsey ISO alone...I had a problem with a black screen on each startup that took FOREVER to bypass...but it's all faster now after using Feisty, then updating with the internet package. (strange? i know.)

I like some gaming, video editing/encoding, music and editing, and internet apps like messengers and stuff too.

What's some really nice stuff that's not included with Ubuntu's default installation of the Feisty or Gutsey editions right now?

How's that Hardy Heron Beta doing? Pretty buggy or actually quite nice with a few little slips?

I'm curious as to what are the differences between Ubuntu and Kbuntu and stuff. There's so many different ones, it's crazy lol. I also saw that Mobile Internet edition, wow...that's keeping up with today's latest technological innovations. incredible.

I'm no Terminal commands expert in Linux, but It's becoming more and more familiar as I try stuff out. It's nice how someone can just past a whole set of instructions for it online and bam, you can past em in there to execute it! (unless the directory locations vary or something, but even then...you can drag and drop a folder into the terminal so you don't have to go typing out the whole directory either. It's really powerful too, I'm guessing it's waaaay more powerful that Microsoft's Command Prompt system (DOS and Emulated DOS) . I mean, i've already done tons more in the Linux terminal than I ever did in Windows' Command Prompt and it's hella faster to just display the text. Also...I don't remember the last time Windows XP's command prompt asked me for my password before I executed certain commands. Hahaha, even in Windows 98, you could easily execute the "deltree *.*" command that'd totally BOX your entire system into a sleeeewww of complete destruction. What a mess that was...people would post that crap in chatrooms saying it'd make your system elite or something..that's terrible lol. Hell, you could create a shortcut in windows that'd screw your whole system in a matter of seconds without any confirmation or display or nothin.

Vista seems to ask for passwords now, but still...that registry is pretty damn wide open from what I see. *cough* that's bad. and the registry? Damn that thing is cluttered and it's only within a few files too...talk about dangerous. What does Linux use to store settings? I'm assuming something similar to the old days before Windows 95 when all settings were stored in .ini files instead but in linux probably some other format, am I correct? That's sounds much safer. maybe the registry was created to save disk space, but it sure sucks when it comes to security and everything in it is always in the same location so any system running windows is SOOO vunerable to dangerous registry modifications alone. Of course those .reg files ask to confirm first, but not the installation programs...therefore an attacker could emulate a silent installation that could place the codes in the victom's registry. Registry Cleaners...Registry Cleaners! I was using 5 of them to keep it spiff and span, but the damn thing still had left over software entires from crap I uninstalled...so it's just a huge mess. No way in hell you could look at all those entires. The COM and ActiveX entiries alone are damn confusing! DAMN CONFUSING. They are made up of...I'm assuming Hex code or just numbers? Now they also have Defrag programs for Registry's too. Defrag the registry and make it smaller without removing any data from it? I never saw a perform increase, but sometimes a slight performance downgrade...probably because the defrag removed free space that had to be re-created.... just like those memory optimizers that free up Ram, but then the ram has to be relocated to it's original state and thus the system bogs down worse.

Windows is very compatable and fast with games if maintained, but over-all...still has major issues with it's registry system, vunerabilities (due to it's amount of users), anomolies (pop-up message appearing BEHIND the start menu? WTF?), and bloated file system....bloated over time with registry keys and left over files and temp and logs and cache and spam and this and that. Tweak the *******, but don't kill it, Clean the *******, but don't erase the operating system! feh!

I've been using windows operating systems for 10 years, mac for 1 year, and linux for maybe half a year in several different distros in the past I never settled with.... I find Ubuntu much more enjoyable now because there's SO much more opensource software these days.... what a free pleasure of the same fruits.

freebeer
April 8th, 2008, 11:21 PM
How's that Hardy Heron Beta doing? Pretty buggy or actually quite nice with a few little slips?

It's actually very good and usable as is, although I have limited time with it.

Welcome to the fold!

Ozor Mox
April 8th, 2008, 11:32 PM
Good to know you have it working well now, congratulations on your switch! :)

I have a Broadcom chipset in my laptop and I know how much of a pain in the behind they can be to get working, but wireless support is improving with every release and what used to take a lot of tinkering before now works out of the box.


I like some gaming, video editing/encoding, music and editing, and internet apps like messengers and stuff too.

What's some really nice stuff that's not included with Ubuntu's default installation of the Feisty or Gutsey editions right now?

Check the gaming and leisure section for gaming. Naturally there isn't as much choice as on Windows, since most commercial games are not released for it, but I find there is still plenty to get interested in. Try these for starters:

Freeciv (http://www.freeciv.org)
The Battle for Wesnoth (http://www.wesnoth.org)
Scorched 3D (http://www.scorched3d.co.uk)
Nexuiz (http://www.nexuiz.com)

Not too sure what's about with video editing. Music however, for playing there's Rhythmbox which comes with Ubuntu, or try AmaroK, the KDE music player (can be installed in GNOME fine). For music editing, I'd recommend Rosegarden, I've been playing about with it recently and it's great for many purposes. Alternatives to the included Pidgin are aMSN for MSN-specific IM, or Kopete, the KDE messenger. I'll stop here, as the choices are endless!


How's that Hardy Heron Beta doing? Pretty buggy or actually quite nice with a few little slips?

From what I've read Hardy is pretty stable now, personally I will wait for the full release and then nuke my system and reinstall from scratch...nice clean computer!


I'm curious as to what are the differences between Ubuntu and Kbuntu and stuff. There's so many different ones, it's crazy lol. I also saw that Mobile Internet edition, wow...that's keeping up with today's latest technological innovations. incredible.

As far as Ubuntu/Kubuntu/Xubuntu go, the only difference is the desktop environment. Ubuntu comes with GNOME by default, Kubuntu KDE, and Xubuntu XFCE. You can easily install another desktop environment from within Ubuntu using the package manager Synaptic, and which you like most pretty much comes down to hardware and personal preference.

And the terminal... Well, I never used the command prompt unless I had to in Windows, but in Ubuntu I use it wherever I can. It really does give you a unique kind of control over your system, and at the same time can be the easiest way to break it completely, as I have done a few times in the past!

kutjara
April 8th, 2008, 11:58 PM
I'm glad you're enjoying your Ubuntu experience. I remember how fun it was getting my first install running well. It was a feeling of satisfaction I never got with Windows.

A word of caution about wireless security. If you're not worried about someone penetrating your network, then you're probably fine with your current setup, but things like MAC address filtering and SSID hiding are very easy to bypass. Just about any of the freely-available wifi sniffers you find around the Web will be able to see "hidden" SSIDs by default, so that feature only really protects against the utterly clueless (who probably wouldn't know what to do even if they knew your SSID).

Similarly for MAC filtering. MAC spoofing software is also freely available. There are a number of ways an intruder can find out which MAC addresses are allowed by your router, but the easiest is simply to sniff whatever machines are wirelessly connected to the router at any given time and capture their MAC addresses. If the intruder doesn't want to wait for you to connect to your network, he/she can brute-force your MACs using yet another piece of (you guessed it) freely-available software.

You're then left with WEP as your principle security feature. Unsurprisingly, WEP-cracking programs are a dime a dozen too. An average-strength WEP password can be cracked in a few seconds. A strong one might take minutes.

While your setup is fine for a very low-security environment, I'd make very sure I have a good firewall on my PC as well, just to make sure your important personal info doesn't get snatched or (more likely) your machine get turned into a zombie on someone's DDoS or Spam network.

raymac46
April 9th, 2008, 01:49 AM
You should be able to get WPA working with Ubuntu. This document was very helpful to me.
https://help.ubuntu.com/community/WifiDocs/WPAHowTo

raymac46
April 9th, 2008, 01:49 AM
Sorry duplicate post