Mage Grimau wrote:
> The reason Win95/98 are so large and slow is that they
> WERE supposed to be backwards compatible as much as
> possible. Win2000 is not the next step in the Win95/98
> chain, its the next step in the NT chain. Windows
> Millenium is the next step in 95/98 chain, and it has
> the same problems 95 & 98 do, plus the obligatory new
> bugs MS introduces with each new product.
> I like Mandrake BECAUSE it's not backwards. If I
> wanted to run Linux on a 386, I wouldn't have bought a
> PIII 500, yet most of the Linux (binary) distros I see
> are for 386s. Since I'm new to Linux, I didn't want to
> have to figure out how to do a build just to take
> advantage of my hardware.
> If Mandrake doesn't install on my old hardware
> (haven't tried it yet, but I will) I won't be
> heartbroken - heck, I won't even be annoyed. There are
> enough distributions out there that DO support
> obsolete equipment by default. :)
>
Just my 2 bits worth:
I can see both sides of this VERY clearly, since I work with M$ os's
(3.11, 95, 98, NT) on boxes ranging from 486's to PIII's every day, and
breath a sigh of relief every evening when I come home to Linux!,
B U T
I have 2 quirky problems that I haven't been able to solve yet - my
sound card (which worked on MDK 6.0) won't go on MDK 7.0-2, and this is
a CMI8330 on a computer less than 12 months old (ie not old hardware)
and my CDrw which the author of cdrecord insists has a firmware bug, but
the manufacturer says is "perhaps a Linux issue" since they only support
M$ os's and it works under Win 95. I also have a SiS 6326 video which
has never been well supported by Linux, and still occasionally causes me
grief (OK so I ccan't count - that makes 3 problems <g>)
S O
1) I understand, and agree with, the "it worked under ver xx but not
under xx+1, so xx+1 must be buggy" argument.
2) If it works under Win95 but not under Linux, this implies Linux is
buggy (even if it really is a h/w bug).
3) Linux h/w support is not as good as M$ for newer machines, and I
suspect, won't be for a long time.
OH,
I nearly forgot, I also have one of those unfortunate lobotomised
Windows/GDI printers that will never work under anything else (including
Linux, DOS, Win NT/2000, etc...) and an internal modem (thankfully isa,
not pci) which has worked perfectly with every Linux distro I have tried
first time!
Unfortunately, my funds are very limited, so I'm stuck with the hardware
I have, and just have to try to find the time to get it all working as
best I can. It is here that lists like this one are invaluable, so
people,
PLEASE lets get back to helping each other & quit the squabbling over
things beyond our control (and really, are those differences of opinion
so big that they need all this???)
Trevor
