Stop Microsoft

Miscellaneous => Applications => Topic started by: AD on 7 July 2002, 17:49

Title: Alternatives
Post by: AD on 7 July 2002, 17:49
Now,after I recognized MS wants to put all of us in some nice littles cages, his .NET and Windows crap,... I only want to use Win for games,not for work anymore, so I need a free OS!
But what
Title: Alternatives
Post by: creedon on 7 July 2002, 19:56
quote:
Originally posted by AD:
Now,after I recognized MS wants to put all of us in some nice littles cages, his .NET and Windows crap,... I only want to use Win for games,not for work anymore, so I need a free OS!
But what
Title: Alternatives
Post by: SpeeDFreaK on 7 July 2002, 20:52
Red Hat Linux isn't too bad to use if you're just starting out, but I would have to tell you to go with Mandrake Linux 8.1 powerpack. Installs nicely, and comes with lots of software. And when you say you want a replacement for Outlook, if you just need a mail client, KMail works fine. If you want everything, i believe ximian evolution is what you're looking for.
Title: Alternatives
Post by: Calum on 7 July 2002, 21:25
use IBM PC-DOS, it's fab! actually, if you want a graphical environment, use IBM OS/2Warp! It's a bit expensive though.

Maybe you should look into using ITS...

If you do choose to use GNU/Linux, then i'd say get Mandrake with KDE or Ximian/GNOME installed, or else use red hat, debian, suse and so on.
Title: Alternatives
Post by: Aaron Ni on 8 July 2002, 05:06
If I'm right the Mozilla browser has an Outlook similar program built within itself.
Title: Alternatives
Post by: AD on 8 July 2002, 16:25
right, I discovered mozilla yesterday, so didn
Title: Alternatives
Post by: foobar on 9 July 2002, 03:05
creedon, i think that linux nowadays does hardware support better than windoze for the average pc.
i've had mandrake 8.1 on an amd athlon 800 and it detected everything on it, even the wacom tablet mouse / pen thingy. It simply worked when i started kde.
Title: Alternatives
Post by: creedon on 9 July 2002, 18:33
quote:
Originally posted by -=f00bar=-:
creedon, i think that linux nowadays does hardware support better than windoze for the average pc.
i've had mandrake 8.1 on an amd athlon 800 and it detected everything on it, even the wacom tablet mouse / pen thingy. It simply worked when i started kde.

Oh yeah, I agree; there was a time when there was a serious threat of setting your monitor on fire if you screwed up Xconfig.  Those days are long gone, but the problem now is the makers of add-ons rarely consider Linux (MAJOR exception: Epson >bravo, Epson< ;) , so you may end up with a piece of hardware that has minimal support in Linux.  Case in point; I have a UMAX Astra 3400 USB scanner, although there's support for USB scanners in the 2.4.xx kernel, because UMAX won't release the code for their driver so a specific driver can be written for Linux my options are: use Windows (ugh), write my OWN driver (maybe), or use the scanner as a paper weight.  The point of my thrust wasn't to dicourage anyone from using Linux, just to be selective about hardware.
Title: Alternatives
Post by: foobar on 9 July 2002, 19:02
quote:
Originally posted by creedon:
Oh yeah, I agree; there was a time when there was a serious threat of setting your monitor on fire if you screwed up Xconfig.


Haha lol  :D

With a slackware distro from '96, (3.1.0 w/kernel 2.0.0) i could make my ol' p133 with brand X monitor
go intro 1024x768 !
Windoze wouldn't get higher than 800x600, or it would garble like heck ...
i did have lots of trouble guessing the right frequencies for it  (http://smile.gif)   (http://smile.gif)
Title: Alternatives
Post by: creedon on 9 July 2002, 19:34
quote:
Originally posted by -=f00bar=-:


Haha lol   :D  

With a slackware distro from '96, (3.1.0 w/kernel 2.0.0) i could make my ol' p133 with brand X monitor
go intro 1024x768 !
Windoze wouldn't get higher than 800x600, or it would garble like heck ...
i did have lots of trouble guessing the right frequencies for it   (http://smile.gif)     (http://smile.gif)  

I have a copy of Slack 2.03 from '93-'94; I'm scared shitless to try it, but I'll fire up one of my 486's and an old monitor and give it a go one of these days.
Title: Alternatives
Post by: foobar on 9 July 2002, 19:40
Or put a new monitor on it and make it run X in 1600x1200  :D
Title: Alternatives
Post by: creedon on 9 July 2002, 20:59
quote:
Originally posted by -=f00bar=-:
Or put a new monitor on it and make it run X in 1600x1200   :D  
If I did that, you'd be able to see the glow from your house!!
BTW; LOVE your sig; I'm in 56k hell too.
Title: Alternatives
Post by: voidmain on 9 July 2002, 22:17
I used Slackware 1.0 and RedHat 1.0 when they first came out.  Before that I used the SLS distro which I believe was the "first" distro.  Before that you had to just put everything together by hand and if you were lucky you could find a FM to R.

I always saw warnings regarding damaging monitors but I was never successful in blowing one up as hard as I tried.  There was a utility that you could use to figure out the sync rates by entering the VC clock freqs etc.. Then it was plug in the numbers. There was no program even as basic as "xf86config" to generate an XF86Config file.  It had to be built by hand. Getting monitors and video cards working properly was probably the single biggest pain in the ass. Today it's cake.
Title: Alternatives
Post by: foobar on 9 July 2002, 22:27
I remember having some tool for X which could define your sync rates.
Strangely enough it was an X program, so when you had guessed a VC clock number for the 838502th time and got X started, this handy program could if you were right or not  :D
Title: Alternatives
Post by: foobar on 9 July 2002, 22:32
quote:
Originally posted by creedon:
If I did that, you'd be able to see the glow from your house!!
BTW; LOVE your sig; I'm in 56k hell too.



Thx !

I'll be looking forward to a major light blast.
'56k hell' is indeed the correct phrase for what i am in, but thank heavens i've got two friends with
ADSL. I got them both Mandrake on their pc's, and one simply erased windoze when i said he could !   :D

[ July 09, 2002: Message edited by: -=f00bar=- ]