PCLinux 2009.1 impressions

[exploder]

I just had a look at PCLinux 2009.1 from the Live CD and thought some might be interested. The artwork is outstanding, beautiful selection of wallpapers and they all looked very attractive! All of the custom splash screens looked nice and complimented the other artwork very nicely. The default set of applications was complete and multimedia worked out of the box. OpenOffice was at version 3.0 rather than 3.0.1 but you can bet it will be updated in the future. Texstar chose to use KDE 3.5.10 rater than KDE 4.2 at this time, a wise decision at the current time.

The only thing I really did not care for was the default menu but that is just my personal taste. Texstar and the Ripper Gang did a great job on this release and it is pretty obvious why PCLinux ranks so well on Distrowatch. Great presentation, everything works and it is a rolling release. This release is definitely worth taking the time to have a look!

[rivenought]

I have been looking at both the KDE and GNOME versions over the weekend, too. They both load and run fine on my hardware. I have had issues with 32-bit Ubuntu 8.10-based distros, but nothing negative to report from PCLinuxOS at this point. I prefer the GNOME version, and if you are a fan of darker themes, you will like the slickness default theme. We all know that themes are easily changed, but first impressions can be important for some. I have not run into any snags with the Live CDs yet. I am unsure if I am going to do a physical install anytime soon, but everything seems to function without any show-stoppers.

[NoClue!]

I tossed it into a vbox partition, very nice, I like it. I didn't see pulse audio anywhere, whoohoo.

[exploder]

I did notice there were no wide screen versions of the wallpapers... I saw a discussion in the PCLinux forum about that too. Still, very impressive!

[GoustiFruit]

I haven't been able to install nvidia drivers on PCLinuxOS, it keeps failing. Everything seems to go ok in Synaptic, but after rebooting, X won't start anymore, have to put nv back :-\

[exploder]

I found some quirks in the installed system. When the installed system boots for the first time it has the regular PCLinux menu but if you log off and log back on, it has the Kickoff menu. The ATI drivers were included by default and work perfectly! The Live CD was extremely slow on the test machine but the installed system is fast. I will have to play around with this for a while and see what else I can find.

Edit: I found a serious issue with the installed system on the test machine. Only one core of the processor was being used! The test system has a duel core AMD chip, one core was hitting 99% while the other never went over 2%. This is a show stopper for me.

[piratesmack]

I found a serious issue with the installed system on the test machine. Only one core of the processor was being used! The test system has a duel core AMD chip, one core was hitting 99% while the other never went over 2%. This is a show stopper for me.

The kernel probably needs to be recompiled with smp (symetric multi-processing) support

Code: Select all

cd /usr/src/linux
make mrproper
zcat /proc/config.gz > .config
make menuconfig # Enable smp under "processor type and features" and save
make bzImage
cat arch/i386/boot/bzImage > /boot/vmlinuz
cat System.map > /boot/System.map
cat .config > /boot/config

[viking777]

I installed it two days ago to replace Opensuse (what a relief!). Hats off to their decision to use KDE3 instead of that dreadful disaster they have the audacity to call KDE4 (it is a disgrace to the KDE name). Also marvellous to see an rpm distro using Synaptic as default package manager (if you have ever used the yast package manager you would know what I mean). It is hard to criticise, it does everything I ask of it and does it well. The main reason it is not my default distro (MInt has that honour) is handling of Mobile Broadband. It works with Pclos, but it is about 6 months to a year behind the way Mint handles it. Not a problem for many, but a massive one for me.

Also updates are not that frequent, and manual only via synaptic. They claim it enhances stability, which is probably correct to some extent, but Mint seems to manage pretty well with both updates and stability. They also seem to frown upon third party software and repos. There only seems to be one repo that I can find.

Really though this is just nitpicking, it is an excellent second distro and one that I could thoroughly recommend. If Mint didn't exist it would be my main distro, indeed it was for some while until I left due to the Mobile Broadband difficulties.

If I had to mark them out of 10 then Mint would get 9 and Pclos 8. Though I am still waiting for that perfect '10' distro

[exploder]

Well, the duel core problem was my mistake! (I really need to get some sleep...) Everything works and I discovered that I could choose the Kickoff or the KDE menu. I like Kickoff because it looks more modern. The display drivers tool is really nice, it has different sections for different cards and even goes the extra mile to tell you what driver is for what card. I am going to play with this OS for a while!

[exploder]

Here is how I have PCLinux 2009.1 set up. This might make a good second operating system.

http://img244.imageshack.us/img244/268/36231399.png

I made a theme request to get Grub, Splashy, etc to have this look. If the request is honored I will give the remaster tool a try. I have been looking for something that is not Ubuntu based to tinker around with. With the new baby I do not have a lot of free time or sleep... This requires little maintenance and gives me something completely different to play with. LinuxMint main edition is my main OS.

[merlwiz79]

http://www.dedoimedo.com/computers/pclinuxos-2009.html
Looks great.
I just have problems with rpm distros.

[altair4]

For those of us who have spent a considerable amount of time with PCLinuxOS over the years this is sad news:

http://distrowatch.com/weekly.php?issue=20090330

[badmotor]

For those of us who have spent a considerable amount of time with PCLinuxOS over the years this is sad news:

http://distrowatch.com/weekly.php?issue=20090330

Just a little bit of turmoil there!

[exploder]

It is unfortunate that PCLinuxOS has lost some developers but I do not think it will hurt the development of the distribution in the long run. Things like this just happen sometimes. I have PCLinuxOS 2009.1 installed along side Mint 5 and I like it, everything works and I like the idea of a rolling release.

[badmotor]

I thought I would share my experience.

Have been enjoying PCLInux OS 2009 Gnome version in the last week. I had heard that the mods were pretty heavy-handed in the forums and they don't like telling people what is going on - I read a post that asked why OpenOffice wasn't in the repos,and they said they were working on upgrading it. Next thing you know, the mod is locking the topic so no one will comment. Next post that comes up asking the question, since it advertises that it has OpenOffice. I added my piece saying that I wasn't impressed with the topic locking.

The thread was promptly deleted.

[exploder]

I agree that the moderators need to mellow out a little. In the past I had a small issue with one of their moderators, we resolved the problem between ourselves and things have been just fine since then. I think a lot of the heavy moderation comes from the large volume of people on the forum. Flame wars can erupt pretty quickly and I have seen it happen.

[badmotor]

Hmmmm.... OK. Guess I shouldn't take it to heart.

[monkeyboy]

I used to use and recommend PCLinux 2007 edition however the lack of a 64 bit edition and the repressive approach of the forum motivated me to switch OSs. As to the 2009.1 edition its ok, fairly stable and my friends who use it are happy with it.
The departure of some of the volunteers from the project is hard to comment on because most of the process occured out of sight. I do however look forward to seeing what the some o9f the departing volunteers do with the Unity process. http://unity-linux.org/ Enjoy

[exploder]

monkeyboy, I appreciate the link to the Unity site. It could be interesting to try and build something with the foundation they are creating.

[badmotor]

Yeah, I'll definitely be keeping an eye on Unity as well.