Does anyone on here use it?

I've been using it for a few years now, and could never imagine going back to Windows full time. It also surprises me the amount of resistance to it, especially seeing as it's free, and highly functional these days.

Every day for the last 20 years or so.

The only bother is gaming basically, even thats making some headway now.

I think most computer users don't really have the will and / or confidence to change. I lived with computer programmers at uni, and my brother has been involved in IT, and I'm well aware that everyone advises against Windows, but I just can't be arsed to change. I haven't got the time to piss about with a new operating system that I will probably not understand. The average person who just does a bit of web browsing and such like, there's just no need for them to change. It's the same reason that Internet Explorer is still the world's most used web browser. I have managed to move on from that.

Theres still a bit of a myth going round that its hard to use or different from windows.

In actual fact if all you do is word processing and surfing the net then you'd prolly hardly notice.
Shortcuts work the same way and the desktop looks pretty much the same. If you can use an iphone/ipad then you can use linux.

Most of the little netbooks are linux now too.

I'm sure I could do it, Andy, I'm fairly IT literate, but if you say to the average person, "do you want to install a new operating system?" they just won't see the need to do it. I might get around to it at some point.

Half the time most people buy a new computer with windows on it when time comes around to replace it anyway I suppose

At the end of the day Linux will win out over windows but not in the standalone form, it'll be cloud OS like googles chrome OS which will be on most computer devices before long. Just a case of waiting for the fibre rollout lol.

andyh wrote:
Installing Linux on the PS3 old Model was popular a few years back.

People would use their HDTV's as monitors.

andyh wrote:
I've had a few decent games running on wine in the past, but even better is that steam has it's own Linux client now. I don't game much at all, but if football manager came out on steam, I'd definitely buy it.

wake_up_bomb wrote:
I think you'd be surprised just how easy it is. You can install the operating system to a 4 gig usb stick and then make your computer boot to that, so you don't actually have to install it on your computer until you're absolutely sure.

It's at least worth learning how to do it, just in case Windows packs up one day.

andyh wrote:
I honestly think they'll start giving Windows away soon just to try and keep up.

mild_peril wrote:
Yup 'live' versions stuck on a USB key using tuxboot to make it bootable or unetbootin eithers just as good.

we roll toward the future so fast. i got linux, and it is way better than windows for anything excpet games. you can wine some of them, but you can also tpb.se windows whatever and dual boot if you want to be a gamer too

i got this kerbal space program. its pretty cool. building rockets, fuckin up the sky. make my way to the moon, its a big accomplishment of trajectory, payload and thrust. if i get there, its a minor victory in a fake universe. but still it feels good, you never know, we are all one big simulation right, i read that website and it says we most certainly are, but i dont think thats the case. one day i can just use sheer force of will to alter reality and wake up. there has to be a way out, weaknesses. cheats, hacks. so how does one go about accessing this data

batou wrote:
You get a job as a banker

andyh wrote:
Forgot to ask, what distro are you using Andy?

I'm still a bit of an amateur, so I'm sticking with Linux Mint

Mint is quite good, ubuntu with the extra stuff installed I suppose.

I use mainly debian and centos but I dabble with openbsd too for some lamp stuff.

NB: I'm actually running vm's and still use windows for gaming.

I always wanted to try it back in the day but as it was a shared pc and mrs oioioi is about as comfortable with change as a whole episode of Mini Pops hosted by Jimmy Savile. And then, like WUB, I got too comfortable using windows.

That said I'm on my pc now, no sharesies, so could give it a wirl.

Firstly will I still be able to be fucked about by steam when trying to play FM2013?

Secondly can it be done as a dual boot up easy enough so I don't lose my FM2013?

oioioi wrote:
FM2013 isn't available on steam for linux yet. Supposedly fm2014 will be though.

Yes you can dual boot and yes you can try it without even installing it anyway.

www.virtualbox.org < install that then install linux on it by booting the vm from an .iso disk file.

Eg you would download the linux mint iso for 64bit or 32bit depending on your PC.
If its one of the older PC's without virt support then 32bit is the safer bet.
Greece has a few local mirrors
www.linuxmint.com/edition.php?id=131

Thats the 32bit list for example.

In network settings you set it to bridged if you want the vm to see your LAN, NAT if you want it firewalled off.

Its dead easy and intuitive and if you mess up you can always try again with no harm done if you use virtualbox.
Its not dual boot, its like running it as a windowed app.

andyh wrote:
Mint is just perfect for me, I much prefer it to Ubuntu itself. And other than play Champ Man 01/02, I don't really do much gaming barre the odd tower defence game or on my mates ps3. But that will all change if FM2014 is released onto Linux via steam

Mint Cinnamon is well worth a look if you haven't seen it yet also.

oioioi wrote:
The easiest way I've found to try it, is to firstly download the 32 bit ISO and then install LinuxLive USB Creator (<They're live links.) Then fire up LinuxLive USB Creator (It's exclusively a Windows program) and if you're semi computer literate, it will be self explanatory, (select your USB drive, ISO, etc.) You can even set it to persistent mode, so that any changes made in the session will be saved for next reboot, i.e. any application you've downloaded, or documents you've created - but that will ultimately shorten the life of you're USB stick.

And then when that's done, just reboot the computer and look for the boot menu option on the post screen (generally the first or second screen after the computer is switched on or rebooted) which is quite often a case of hitting one of the F buttons until you arrive at the boot menu, usually F11 or F12, or sometimes esc or delete, (you get the picture..)

If that's not an option, then you need to go into the BIOS, and either turn on the option to show the boot menu, or set it to boot directly from the stick before anything else.

Alternatively, you could burn it as an ISO with a free application like ImgBurn and follow the same instructions, only this time you'll be looking to boot from your DVD drive.

I did the USB boot thing for a while with Linux Mint. Was pretty good & easy to use. It didn't remain stable on the usb disk though - kept having to reinstall it. Also, my internet sessions weren't getting saved which meant logging into everything again every time I went on it.... which is pretty tedious. I'm sure there's a way to save your sessions though... I'm just to lazy to find out.