ARTICLE

Review of SUSE 10.1
Contributed by Clement Lefebvre in Reviews on 2006-05-12 09:49:54
Page 3 of 5

Inside SUSE - Gnome 2.12

I rebooted the computer and I was welcomed by a nice grub menu. Then GDM started and logged me in automatically, with this splash screen.

The GDM Splash Screen

The default gnome desktop uses a theme called "Gilouche" which defines its own controls and window borders and uses the "industrial" icons. I though it was beautiful, classy and professional-looking. The background picture was nice as well. Blue is supposed to be the most popular color among distributions. Some studies showed that it was the best color for a background picture in terms of ergonomics. SUSE was traditionally green, and it moved to a blue theme with a little bit of green. This is very nice.

The Default Gnome Desktop

A lot of software is installed by default and SUSE included everything to make the distribution a nice desktop installation. OpenOffice and The Gimp were even customized to look more like the overall theme.

Evolution, OpenOffice, The Gimp and Firefox

The Gnome desktop preferences have also been redesigned. Along with YaST they offer everything the user needs to set up his environment.

YaST & the Gnome Desktop Preferences

The File Explorer has become very nice. With the "industrial" icons and the "Gilouche" window borders, it looks really good. A set of very handy applets were also included in the taskbar. A Desktop Search applet allows the user to search folders, files, applications and a lot of other resources by keyword. I believe it uses Beagle. A Software Updater also indicates whether or not packages are available for update.

And a very nice tool was added: The Screen Resolution applet. The user can now change the screen resolution by simply clicking on it.

File Explorer, Desktop Search, Screen Resolution and Software Updater

The menus are very consistent, well organized and they use a beautiful set of icons.

The Gnome "Internet" Menu

The overall impression I got from the Gnome desktop was one of simplicity and beauty. Some impressive innovations were made and the result is astonishing.



Article Index
Review of SUSE 10.1
Installation
Inside SUSE - Gnome 2.12
Inside SUSE - KDE 3.5.1
Conclusion
 
Discussion(s)
boot times
Written by halfmanhalfamazing on 2006-05-12 22:11:22
Great review! just one thing's missing though.....

what's the boot time from bootloader to usable desktop?(GNOME or KDE)

How's it compare to 10.0 and/or 9.3?
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Ou est la boeuf?
Written by Wil Barath on 2006-05-13 03:38:16
I came here to read a review of the latest version of Suse, to decide whether to replace my nearly-current 10.0 install. This review could just as easily have been of a 6.0 release, having touched only on facets of the install which haven't changed in 5 years.

I really wish the author had spent as much time using the different features and reporting on them as he did installing it.
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Sounds like a first time Suse user..
Written by Max Beauchez on 2006-05-13 04:56:17
I guess that's why he didnt compare it with other versions of suse.
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Unconscious Preference for Gnome
Written by marytee on 2006-05-13 05:42:01
On the desktop selection screen, you can choose Gnome or KDE. The listed applications for Gnome include the well-known and well-liked Firefox, rather than Gnome's default browser. The KDE listing only lists the default Konqueror and not Firefox.

New users, i.e. no previous Linux experience, will be tempted to select Gnome.

Just my take on it.
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to many problems
Written by podge on 2006-11-07 03:52:35
hi. im a nubie at linux, suse 10.1 is my first linux system. iv had so many problems with it.
first of all it froze when i tried to installed it, i had to start over. i got it installed and i started it (kde) i find gnome to complcated. it dident detect my sound card, my secondary grafics card, my tv card, no media player worked, i couldent play any videos on the internet, as soon as i inserted a usb device my computer crashed and wouldent start. i ran system repair an it dident work.
i had to start all over agen, this time the installation went fine but as soon as i booted it the kde startup screen rotated left and went purple. my computer is a brand new setup and works fine on windows xp. suse 10.1 realy so great?
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me
Written by dan on 2006-11-12 14:35:00
Quote:
hi. im a nubie at linux, suse 10.1 is my first linux system. iv had so many problems with it.
first of all it froze when i tried to installed it, i had to start over. i got it installed and i started it (kde) i find gnome to complcated. it dident detect my sound card, my secondary grafics card, my tv card, no media player worked, i couldent play any videos on the internet, as soon as i inserted a usb device my computer crashed and wouldent start. i ran system repair an it dident work.
i had to start all over agen, this time the installation went fine but as soon as i booted it the kde startup screen rotated left and went purple. my computer is a brand new setup and works fine on windows xp. suse 10.1 realy so great?





Its not really suse, its linux in general that you are frustrated with. I would recommend running linux under a virtualization program such as vmware to test it out before doing a normal install. That way you can become familiar with it, and learn how to install drivers for your devices, ect... You can't expect any operating system to be able to recognize every piece of hardware, and play movies without drivers/third party software. the only difference between linux and windows is that acquiring that software may be a little harder on a linux box. Don't let that set you back, though; learn it first, then install it fully!
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What about the real stuff
Written by Kurt Peers on 2006-05-13 07:50:24
What about decrypting DVD?
What about file encryption?
What about playing commercial DVD´s, videoediting and video and audioconversion.
Hardware support for scanners etc..., etc...
Why focussing so much on the look of a desktop.
It should be simpel light, lean and mean.
We are talking about computers and not about art!!!
Linux may be good but without a satisfying answer of those questions will linux always remain an operating system good for certain servers but not for the desktop.
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non-free software
Written by Ricardo on 2006-05-13 08:07:58
Congratulations on the review.

While reading your thoughts on this operative system one might misinterpret the phrase: "SUSE includes a number of non-free software such as Macromedia flash".

Macromedia Flash is still not supported by any Linux distro without running an emulator.

This does not mean that running flash on a linux system is impossible. It is with third party software.

Oh and by the way is this product ever going to be called Adobe flash?

Again please let us know of following reviews on further usage of this system, probably other OS comparisons.

Again thank you for this review.
(Note: by flash I mean Macromedia flash not flash player)
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reply to boot times
Written by Bill on 2006-05-13 09:44:38
I have had versions 9.3 to 10.0 to 10.1 on my notebook. I can honesty say the time to boot has noticable increased(running gnome). I wish I could give you some hard numbers, but honestly 10.1 is worth updating your installation. The best improvement in 10.1 is the handling of network connections, and the easy to switch to wired or wireless connections.
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Video and audio, PLEASE!
Written by Norman Costa on 2006-05-13 09:58:56
I am disappointed in this review. It tells me that SUSE 10.1 loads and looks terrific. But, when I pop in a DVD or click on a video link on CNN.com, am I going to be able to see something?
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SUSE 10.1 breaks Wi-Fi
Written by suser on 2006-05-13 13:55:40
http://digg.com/linux_unix/SUSE_10.1_breaks_Wi-Fi_(ath_pci_missing)
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the icon is tango
Written by clevin on 2006-05-13 18:18:00
all beautiful icons are from tango-project.org, not industrial.
away from that, I agree, Suse is the best ditro for normal user right now, i think, FC and Ubuntu are both litte bit not so friendly to end-user.
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Why reboot twice???
Written by Larry Stotler on 2006-05-13 19:34:29
I'm kinda confused as to why the reviewer felt that he had to reboot the system after YaST finished. YaST does a reboot after the 1st CD so that a reboot is unneccesary when the install is finished. After finishin the installation, YaST starts the system directly. A reboot is not needed and should not happen. I have to agree with the reviewer about the lack of being able to read the release notes during the installation. I'd like to see the installer start asking questions like the root password and other things while it is still installing. But, since I have used SuSE since v5.3, I can say it has definately come a long way. Now, if they could fix the bug I found trying to install on my old world Macs......
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NTFS support for SuSE Linux
Written by SuSEKing on 2006-05-13 20:50:31
If you wish to add NTFS support to Linux you may be interested in these pages:

http://linux.coconia.net/suse/ntfs.htm
http://linux.coconia.net/suse/captive.htm
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mr
Written by Pera Popadic on 2007-04-29 13:03:32
Quote:
If you wish to add NTFS support to Linux you may be interested in these pages:

http://linux.coconia.net/suse/ntfs.htm
http://linux.coconia.net/suse/captive.htm
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mr
Written by Pera Popadic on 2007-04-29 13:06:31
Quote:
If you wish to add NTFS support to Linux you may be interested in these pages:

http://linux.coconia.net/suse/ntfs.htm
http://linux.coconia.net/suse/captive.htm
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boot times
Written by Marbin on 2006-05-13 23:45:22
At least the 64 bit version takes a LOT of time to get from bootloader to usable desktop compared to previous versions 10.0, 9.3, 9.2 and 9.1. Almost triple later I will try the 32bit version.
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smooth upgrade from 10.0 to 10.1
Written by mw on 2006-05-14 02:51:22
Upgrading from 10.0 to 10.1 is just very easy and very smooth. Boottimes 'feel' the same (sorry, i never time my system). 10.0 already performed well, 10.1 seems to be just more polished. In my case, the upgrade removed JBoss, NVU, OTRS and xv from the system. 'xv' fortunately still lives on the 'addon' iso-cd. A new, great feature has been added: wireless networking has become much more comfortable with the new Networkmanager.
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Upgrading from 10.0 to 10.1
Written by Dani on 2006-11-20 11:13:45
Did you upgraded a working system ?
Was the upgrade clean ?
(Did you just boot the new cd and waited for it to happen ?)
10x,

Dani.
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typical clueless n00bie "review"
Written by truth machine on 2006-05-14 06:02:33
Computers are for using, not just looking at, yet you never ran a single application. And for someone so interested in appearance, you never even mentioned the XGL that the release was delayed in order to include.

Reviews should be written by people familiar with the subject, whether it's a movie, a book, or a Linux distro.
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Gnome or suse
Written by Martin on 2006-05-14 09:43:48
When you run SuSe with Gnome you don't run SuSe. It is sad to see Nat Friedman destroying suse by enforcing a Gnome policy.

It is time for Novell to stop that madness.

Same goes for GLX. RedHat has the better solution but Ximian's dirty marketing always advertises their own premature solutions.

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animated screen
Written by John Coombes on 2006-05-14 11:58:33
QUOTE
How did SUSE manage to animate that screen? I don't know. I was still trying to figure it out, when a boot menu appeared.
END QUOTE

Humm - ever hear of Animated Gif's and these days there are Animated MNG's (from PNG) - plus it could have been just a Flash Animation - I am sure there are other things

So the quote was not a very cleaver comment by the author
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boot times
Written by boottimer on 2006-05-14 13:52:53
The boot times seem the same as in 10.0 and 9.3. With every recent release people have said boot time has become faster, but in truth it seemingly has not. SUSE is a lot slower to boot than Ubuntu or Mandriva 2006.

Also on the slowness side, I can't understand why people don't more often mention the slowness of Yast tools. Just starting the software selection takes "ages". And also I think that still in 10.1 the Gnome menus are a mess, with Yast in 5 different places and no consistency in the configuration tools.

Ok, this was just negative rant, SUSE is still a very good distro, especially now that it became OpenSUSE and clearly distinguishes OSS software from the rest and has a more open development model.
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gnome people assume that
Written by vm on 2006-05-14 14:17:06
anything that doesn't start with a K can be claimed. So they claimed GTK as a gnome product, and openoffice as well. Now its firefox, because gecko uses GTK now.
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Mr.
Written by Jeff on 2006-05-14 14:40:36
I installed Vector Linux on a laptop and was surprised to find that I can view video links on CNN.com. I didn't have to do a thing. Also, mplayer seems to have libdvdcss installed by default too.
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Distro Watcher
Written by Party pooper on 2006-05-14 15:14:37
Online updates and wireless are still major headaches in 10.1. For all the eye candy, 10.1 doesn't function any better than 10.0 and the updater is in need of an update. The codecs and libraries to play some media formats are hard to get and Kaffeine is the same 0.7.1 as it was in SuSE 10.1. Only this time around, it is nearly impossible to update and will be for a while.

For all the artistic flashes the reviewer was mesmerized by, SuSE 10.1 is still lacking in many important respects. Other distros function as well or better, and all that eye candy is hidden when a browser or another application screen is opened. All distributions look the same with an open window and a KDE or Gnome taskbar at the bottom.
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I am new mamber!
Written by Zuban on 2006-05-14 15:29:25
Nice resource

_________________

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Oł est le boeuf ?
Written by Johannes Eva on 2006-05-14 15:56:11
Ou est la boeuf?

@Wil Barath:
In french one would say "Où est le boeuf ?", but it do not understand the meaning of the sentence... and the link to SUSE.

Indeed, SUSE is great, the review is well written but could be more detailed :)

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real stuff
Written by hein on 2006-05-15 00:11:30
@Kurt Peers.

All possible with a litte bit of help. You need some packages from the internet for dvd support. I am not a computer expert and I installed dvd support within 15 minutes!

Videoediting - converversion and audioconversion also possible: not standard in SuSE: all because of legal implications.

Kino - imports DV video from your camcorder... It is still in development, but it shows what Linux can do.

Support for scanners: for a a whole bunch of scanners support is available. Not for all unfortunately.

If you install Gnome you have a simple, light and mean desktop.

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boot times
Written by Hein Hanssen on 2006-05-15 00:15:03
What about boot times???

How often do you have to reboot your Linux system? It's not windows where you have to reboot after every update, or software installation!

Boot times are very acceptable: on my machine a lot less than XP!

I am not (very) interested in boot times: I rather have a stable and fast running system that takes some time to boot than a crappy system that boots nice and fast... Just consider.
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Excellent work overall
Written by NoCalDrummer on 2006-05-15 01:32:15
While I had planned to upgrade from SuSE Linux 10.0 to 10.1 soon anyway, I ended up having to do so out of necessity this weekend on the computer at my summer home at the Russian River. Seems that (for some odd reason) when I defragmented the Windows [98se] partition it wiped out any ability to boot ANY operating system, Windows OR Linux on that disk. I'd tried a "rescue" on it, using my older 10.0 installation CD, but to no avail, and I wasn't going to spend too many hours trying to get it all back when I was ready to upgrade anyway. Fortunately, I'd backed up my home computer to a portable 40Gb USB drive, and was going to transfer that data this weekend anyway, so I wasn't completely up a proverbial creek.

So I decided to upgrade to the 10.1-GM ["Golden Master"] which I'd downloaded on Friday and copied to the portable drive. I temporarily installed a pretty minimal 10.0 system, but made sure that I had K3B to burn CDs. I'd forgotten the difficulties I'd had with that darn Intel 815 video chip and SuSE, but I only really needed it long enough to copy the .iso images and burn them, so I got it running in a little over an hour. Well, actually, about four hours - just as I had clicked for it to begin installation, the electricity went out for over two hours, so I had to go through the whole process all over again. Once I had my five installation CDs burned, I was ready to upgrade.

Since I'd been using SuSE Linux since v9.1, it had the familiar look-and-feel that I'd grown accustomed to having. The YaST-based installation setup went smoothly. Since I came from a Mac OS9 background, I preferred the look of GNOME over KDE. I'd recently found out that there's some common history and people for the old Mac Finder and GNOME, so I guess it's hardly surprising. Don't get me wrong, KDE is a fine product, it just seems more XP-like to me.

I chose to try to reduce the Windows partition size from 14GB to 10, but when the actual partitioning of the install process began, I was greeted with a box telling me that resizing that partion failed. I tried this twice, with the same results each time. To be honest, I suspect that whatever happened with the Windows defrag program contributed to the difficulty in trying to resize that partition. After three attempts, including one under 10.0 (which HAD successfully resized a Windows partion on another machine), I gave up and continued with the selection of packages. After all, I could still use the space on the Windows side if I really wanted it.

I added & subtracted the packages that I prefer in my toolbox. I happen to like Thunderbird as an email client, as well as Sunbird for calendaring. I also like adding gFTP, gThumb, and K3B and some of the dozens of fonts that are available. I made sure that I had support for my old Macintosh with netatalk, for some of the Windows programs that I still need with wine, and for checking my RAM with memtest. But I delete resapplet, eog, and a couple of other programs because I'd either had problems in the past with them, or I just didn't care that much about them.

Everything seemed to be going swimmingly, until the final stage of "Hardware Configuration" I don't know why, but SuSE Linux seems to have some difficulties with that old Intel 815 video. The screen went completely black, then the monitor went into standby mode. All I could do was reboot at that point. The system started up, tried to start GNOME, then came back with some message about me logging off within 10 seconds of starting my session. DANG! It was that old i815 problem again.

"Ctrl-Alt-F1". Login... init 3... sax2... Yeah, I know, will attempt to start the X-server... blah, blah. It knew I had an i815 as the video chip. It made a reasonable guess that it could run at 800x600 and 16-bit at 60Hz refresh rate. But it failed to save those parameters correctly. Oh, and I'd noticed but ignored something about "boot.videobios" being in red upon reboot moments before. Ok, set the refresh rate to 80 Hz, resolution to 1024x768, colors to 16.7million. Continue... Adjust the size and position. Save. Quit. Halt.

This time, the system ran just fine. I have the generic GNOME window with the panel at the bottom, which I quickly move to the top (an ex-Mac guy, remember?). I copy my favorite panel menu items from my "Menu" directory on my portable disk to the panel, move my desktop icons around, and soon I'm back in business.

So far, the only thing that doesn't seem to be working "right" is gThumb. I generally prefer inspecting my images "full screen", with smaller ones filling the screen. There's a preference control in gThumb for that, but it doesn't seem to work anymore. If I double-click on an image, it opens just that image now. Before, the whole directory would be available - to get the directory, I have to click "Alt-End". And if I request a full-screen version, I get it in its original size, no matter what the preference is set. Oddly enough, if I start gThumb from the "Start menu", I get the image folder by default, but I still don't get smaller images shown "to fit".

Is SuSE Linux 10.1-GM and its associated programs perfect? No. Is ANY Operating System and its associated progams perfect? Definitely not. But other than it having difficulties configuring the Intel video chips, it's worked well. My primary home computer (with an nVidia chipset) installed and runs flawlessly with SuSE Linux.

For those who complain that Linux is getting too mainstream, too pretty, too easy, I say, "That's what needs to be for it to become 'accepted' as a viable alternative." As long as Linux distributions retain the powerful underlying OS and the ability to communicate with that OS through a command-line interface, it should be suitable for a number of non-graphical functions. But ya' ain't gonna get people to try it if they feel that they MUST be able to use a DOS-like interface. And right now, most people think of Linux the way the do of Unix - a powerful, command-line driven, impossible to learn, geeky operating system.

SuSE, Red Hat, and several others are making the face of Linux much more familiar to those who are used to seeing XP and Mac-OS. Congratulations to Novell/openSUSE.org for making the installation and use of their distribution at least as easy as that big OS out of Redmond.
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Gnome and suse
Written by dionisis on 2006-05-15 05:03:19
I agree.I really don't like Gnome.And that Spatial thing..
As Linus said just use KDE.
If Novell continue to use Gmome as default i 'll use another distribution.
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Xen on OpenSuse 10.1 anyone?
Written by Jimmy PIERRE on 2006-05-15 06:25:02
Greetings,

There was not a lot of literature on Xen in the reference manual in pdf.

Who successfully instally installed Xen?

Cheers
Jimmy
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Glad Vector caught up...
Written by devnet on 2006-05-15 14:42:35
Glad Vector Linux finally caught up to PCLinuxOs and MEPIS!
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Boot times?
Written by Linux User 147560 on 2006-05-15 16:23:38
Who cares about boot times! Suspend and wake times are more important for the mobile users (such as myself). Boot times? Only time my desktop get's shut down is once a year for annual cleaning, that's it.

I have SuSE 10.1 on my Toshiba laptop. And I do have times for booting Linux.

Times are an average of 3 boots using a stopwatch and not scientific BUT a good indicator of performance.

System is a Toshiba A15-S129 Satellite 2.4GHz Celeron with 1GB PC2700 RAM and a 7200RPM 80GB hard drive.

SuSE 9.1 Pro : 2 minutes 53 seconds from cold to KDE logged in and k-mail open.

SuSE 9.2 Pro : 2 minutes 49 seconds from cold to KDE logged in and k-mail open.

SuSE 9.3 Pro : 2 minutes 44 seconds from cold to KDE logged in and k-mail open.

OpenSuSE 10.0 Pro : 1 minutes 38 seconds from cold to KDE logged in and k-mail open.

OpenSuSE 10.1 Pro : 1 minutes 28 seconds from cold to KDE logged in and k-mail open.

So these are laptop times. My desktop is probably much faster, but since I only boot it once a year... who knows!
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re: Gnome and suse
Written by pingus on 2006-05-15 18:18:06
me too, if Novell continue to use Gmome as default i 'll use another distribution. I hate Gnome
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I hate KDE
Written by Dan on 2006-11-12 14:52:16
Quote:
me too, if Novell continue to use Gmome as default i 'll use another distribution. I hate Gnome




How can you hate Gnome? KDE looks too much like windows. Its not even the looks, but the software accompanied with the gui. KDE supports an unheard-of amount of programs, all beginning with the letter 'k' with goofy names that all do pretty much the same thing. do you really need 5 browsers in one OS? Gnome uses popular open-source third party software from mozilla, sun, and adobe to name a few that far surpass cheap remakes with goofy names that hide the OS's power. go Gnome, or don't go. its that simple
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suse user...
Written by keenetik on 2006-12-14 20:58:37

i've been using Linux for the past 4 years. Out of many distros out there it seems that SUSE runs best on my pc architecture...i also stopped using kde and switched to gnome since v.9.3..Kde makes my box much too unstable...and especially since 10.0 came out, the Gnome works much better and has more options than before, plus is faster and more stable than kde...

my box: 1.4 AMD Athlon, Abit mainboard w/ 1 gb ddr, 1x SATA 200mb drive (runs xp), 1x IDE 80 mb drive (runs suse 10.1), ati radeon 7500 video card 64mb, creative labs SB live!...

for some reason is harder to enable the DVD playback in 10.1 than it was in the 10.0..for some unknown reason the system doesn't recognize the libdvdcss file...so i had to use vlc player to watch dvd's..though i prefer xine or mplayer...and i can play mp3's only with real player...the "legal" issues are becoming annoying...
I must say that version 10.1 is more polished than 10.0. I like the new package manager. It looks like ubuntu's synaptic and is very easy to use...People have complained about how slow yast is...i hardly have problems with yast...it works pretty well..similar to the one in 10.0...
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Too many rough edges, needed another mon
Written by Diogo Castro on 2006-05-15 20:27:38
After a very polished and almost fully usable Linux distribution in 10.0, SUSE seems to have rushed things a bit with this 10.1. We're all used to unusable wireless under Linux (so much for linux being "ready for the Desktop", it is not, and users are moving to Laptops anyway), but 10.1 ups the irritation scale another notch by making it impossible to install its own recommended updates, among other problems.

There are so many things that don't work or are unstable in this release (YaST, wireless, the updater, USB storage support, printing, you name it) that it really looks like a rushed-out-of-the-door beta and not a final version of a major linux distribution.

Linux is already hardly usable for day-to-day computing - I spend more times getting the system to work properly with my two-year-old, plain ordinary off-the-shelf PC than I do getting my own work done.

I know how bad windows is, but at least it doesn't get in the way of your work. SUSE Linux 10.0 was almost there in terms of NOT getting in the way; 10.1 sends the SUSE team right back to the starting line.
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The real stuff...
Written by Fredde on 2006-05-16 02:50:18
Hm... I installed linux for the first time 2 week's ago (Suse 10.0 eval 64 bit) the install was flawless everything was detected. After the install I realized dvd playback and codecs where missing. (Wich is the same in windows! not many codecs come right out of the box and only region dvds). So i used google and it took me less than 10 minutes to get all codecs (including wsv) to work and play videos inside the browser (firefox/mozilla) I used mplayer with mplayer mozilla plugin. Today i have got rid of my xp partion as using wine got me running every win application i needed. In my opinion linux desktop is kicking windows look an feel back to stonage. And every win application (except shockwave and some games using directx9) ive got working with help from the great doc's written by linux peapole. And then i guess most of directx9 apps can be used by (caldera or cindega or what the name of the prog was). I dont think I ever again are going back to a windows system. And the main reason of this is beacuse of the beautiful desktop, and offcourse the great documention. And every buddy i had home since i installed linux are now asking for it. Everybody who sat down at the computer wants to get rid of windows... Why? beacuse they feel that linux looks so great, and that the applications are simple to use. I guess that in a month me and all my pals are using linux, and we are ordanary peapole who don't ever thought about operating systems or whats on the computer, just it works, and here evensoo we switch to linux. I think linux is going in the right direction and when peapole realize how easy it is to use, how splending it looks and feels they will switch to it from windows. Especally when (if cedega?) becomes free, then there would be no reason not to. Linux fan
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Unconscious Preference for Gnome
Written by Rincewind on 2006-05-16 06:22:56
I've been using Linux since 1998. At first I used KDE because it is the default on a lot of distributions. It is only when I became more experienced that I switched to GNOME. KDE is nice too, but I prefer GNOME.
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Still waiting
Written by Zio_Ugo on 2006-05-16 12:45:36
I'm trying to throw out of the window of my publishing farm my WinXP but I'm still waiting for a really-desktop-oriented distro. I don't care too much to nice icons or amazing splash screens but I would like to have a really working OOorg that can hyphenate in three languages at a time, a tool to use my scanner, a software to make CMYK selections and Pantone settings... Or have an easy way to configure a dual screen environment with a Matrox P750 -- or have the possibility to dialogate with my typographer or other people using Windows or MacOsX, withot feeling a stranger, or a fool. Or, at least, the possibility to use all my laptop (now in a wireless and now in a wired network, for istance) and all the gadgets I bought with, like firewire, remote control, useful extra keys... All things easy to do with XP and funny to do with MacOsX.
Still waiting for more concrete upgrades, and less smoke. Smoke in the eyes is the Gates' way of computing, and smoke is dangerous.
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Works nicely for me.
Written by Douglas Hadsock on 2006-05-16 20:44:04
HI,
After trying many Distro, SUSE 10 or 10.1 is pretty easy to config and run, little things are trick if you auto-boot you can't easily change from Gnome to KDE, antoher trick is finding the grub loader in the menu under yast, the more I find out about SUSe the better I like it , I have dedicated my Secondary hard drive to SUSe 10.1 and will only try new SUSe Dist after the GM is released I will leave the Beta Testing to the experts.
Been checking around the two main forums and the update links are a little shakey so update with care. it may break somethin..I give it a B+ with potential when Yast has clean Mirrors. It does seem to fix itself better after conflicts it dosen't allow updates if it breaks somethin else.
Doug
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Application, applications, please....
Written by Kurt Peers on 2006-05-17 07:53:53
If these applications are there then it is up to suse to let them download from their website, and not letting their customers waisting valuable time finding it out for them self.
Ofcource if these are proprietor then one has to pay. Why must someone be a linux geek to just download and install an application that in the window environment is just common use.
Instead of loosing precious time looking it up and messing around with dependencies and god knows what kind of other stuff, it should be as simple and straightforward as in windows.
If linux can not manage that, then it will always remain in the environment of technical skilled people ( for exemple highly skilled system administrators).
It will find no use in desktop and small business environments.
Especially it lacks a lot of valuable applications like certain cad cam applications, in order to give you an example.
So for the moment we are cursed to use one OS of only one provider (Microsoft) to get the freedom of choice of hardware and software.
From a business prospective, being dependent of one provider is not a healthy situation, but face it, microsoft has the monopoly on the desktop and a monopoly is not a healthy market situation.
Their should also be a choice in OS as it is for hard- and software.
Yes it is good that there is a free operating systems, but in certain things can not come for free.
The question is not one of free versus proprietor, no the question is, is their a market, is there choice, so that the consumer is not ripped of.
For the moment if one wants to get acces at applications and even hardware, one must have windows, like it or not.
Look at apple, OS X may be the best desktop around for the moment , but it does not provide you with a choice of software like one finds in windows.
And if you find software for OS X, it is mostly much more costly.
And their is the apple hardware, it simply costs arms and legs, while better can be obtained more cheaply for a PC.
Has someone bought an apple and for one reason or another he wants to change certain components, then..., well it is not posible to go to the free market as you do it with a regular PC.
For the regular guy, he asks himself what can I run with an OS, what choice of hardware do I have, is it easy, etc..
Linux has travelled a long road in user friendliness, but it now must focus on SOFTWARE (applications, drivers, etc...)
By the way:
For a desktop manager, I prefer Ice, it is super light and it does not get in the way of the applications.

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What? Suse did you review
Written by Mike on 2006-05-17 12:53:45
I am sorry, but after 4 trys and many problems I removed Suse and put Fedora back on. 10.0 was fine and 10.1 is like a bad alpha version, but i was using the gm.

From 10.0 to 10.1, my printer stopped working and I could no longer connect to the internet?

after more time the I ever spent on windows xp, I give up
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down on suse
Written by IcyJ on 2006-05-18 17:29:06
I used to be a big Suse fan, but I became fed up with problems I would have after installing certain apps. My solution to those problems and to the missing codecs and dvd playback was Fedora Cora 5 and Yum. Fedora never crashed after installing any program through Yum, and it was as easy as openening the gui Yum Extender and checking all the programs and codecs I wanted installed. Simply add the flash repo to install the flash plugins. Yum simply downloads, checks dependencies, and installs everything you want for you! Very Easy. As far as Suse 10.1 goes, I tried installing the x64 version with no success, just a black screen after booting. Oh well, maybe i'll wait til it is more polished and less buggy.
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n/a
Written by Homeboy on 2006-05-18 20:14:36
Why is it that everbody and his mother who don't have a clue feel compelled to tell the SuSE engineers how to do their work?

What do you know about how to write an installer?
Obviously nothing.

Are you aware that during installation there is a Linux system running entirely from CD? I.e. the root file system of that system is on CD (CD1 of the install set)? What do you think would happen if you could simply eject that CD with the root file system on? And how else would you insert CD2, CD3 etc. to install packages from there?

Or would you rather see the hardware requirements increased by another half Gig of RAM to be able to run all that from a RAM disk?

Sometimes it helps to THINK before writing.
Engage brain. Think. Then write. Observe the sequence.

And if that fails, why not try a simple Google search to find out what you fail to see?
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whats gnome? whats kde?
Written by stolennomenclature on 2006-05-19 07:16:53
When people say they prefer either Gnome or KDE, I keep wondering what they are referring too? The applications? The desktop? The file manager? The wallpaper? The menu structure? The whole thing?

Every time I have ever tried KDE for more than one minute, something has crashed.
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Nice review...
Written by wstryder on 2006-05-19 12:17:22
Nice review on what SUSE looks like. How about doing a review on what it actually does?
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I also want KDE
Written by Pietro on 2006-05-20 18:36:36
I still prefer KDE to Gnome.
Maybe in the future I will change my mind, but at the moment I WANT KDE!
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RE:animated screen
Written by Nour on 2006-05-21 03:07:56
John, animated Gifs and animated MNGs work when the kernel has booted and the libraries are loaded. The interesting part about the animations in SuSE is that they work before any kernel is in memory i.e. the bootloader is animating. That is pretty cool. Well written review.
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d
Written by Deku Nut on 2006-05-21 13:42:46
Wow! Imagine flash player integrated into ISOLINUX. Amazing. Talk about bootloader bloat...
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No FLASH support by default. REMEMBER?
Written by I don't think you were reading on 2006-05-22 15:32:57
I will point out that they have already mentioned that there is NO flash support by default. It has to be installed. Remember?

Installing the necessary codecs is not difficult, people. I was as surprised by anyone that it didn't have immediate support for MP3's, AVI's, etc. But there are already PLENTY of guides out there for getting these things done.

Even installing GLX drivers for nVidia cards is a snap. (Anyone who has any experience in Linux should know that it either works good...or not at all. Just init yourself into the command line and install, load module and run Xserver again.)

IF you're having trouble with Wireless adapters... Instead of whining about it... Find your Windows drivers for the WiFi device and use NDISWrapper on them. (Find instructions on the net. They're EASY to find. Use search terms in Google involving ndiswrapper and the model of your adapter. Helps to use the name of your distro, too.) Then 'modprobe ndiswrapper" and use knetworkmanager (http://en.opensuse.org/Projects/KNetworkManager_Screenshots ) to detect and connect to your wireless networks. (For secured networks use the HEX KEY option in the dropdown menu when it asks for the WEP encryption key.) It's easy.

Here is a fairly comprehensive guide for you newbies out there. It's very helpful. :)

Anyone may experience systematic issues installing/running ANY version of Linux. Some distros are built better for certain system configurations than others. What works for YOU on one system may not work so nicely for OTHERS on different systems. If you had a clue what you were talking about you would recognize that and check what you say before saying it.

Example:
There is one individual here who complained about it giving a black screen...

"As far as Suse 10.1 goes, I tried installing the x64 version with no success, just a black screen after booting. Oh well, maybe i'll wait til it is more polished and less buggy."

Have you considered that the way your disc was burned is the problem? I made a DVD of the distro at first and tried to use it on my laptop. It wouldn't get into the installer. Fine. I tried the 5 CD's burned at the slowest speeds possible.

Worked fine after that.

It's situations like this I have found that idiots who are not willing to learn...are NOT willing to work through to accomplish the mission.

Do some thinking before you give up. That's what Linux and the open source community are all about. Innovation.

Innovation does NOT = perfection because it is in a constant state of change.

Remember that the next time you get a black screen when trying to install a distro... Think about what you could do to analyze and troubleshoot the issue. I mean...REALLY THINK.

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LINK
Written by Thought you weren't listening. on 2006-05-22 15:37:33
Here is that link for setting SuSe 10.1 up to be a FULL working desktop system...

http://www.thejemreport.com/mambo/content/view/254/42/

Forgot to post it earlier with my other post...

:P
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Hate?
Written by FewClues on 2006-05-23 12:41:42
How can one hate an application? You may and obviously do prefer another, but to hate? I find that each desktop offers something that I appreciate and make use of both KDE and GNOME. As is the case with most "hate' I suggest you simply don't understand it. If you prefer something then use it because you prefer it.
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Novell demolishes SUSE 10.1
Written by zippozappo on 2006-05-23 16:35:16
I agree. Not much there and that does not work. Almost as bad as XP in providing a development environment. Much work required to recover broken packages.
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Aimlees_e
Written by Aimless_E on 2006-05-24 12:06:50
Flash Requires the OS be loaded this is before that stage. Its also before Linux is actually loaded. It might not be awe inspiring but come on your comment is no more clever than his
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Someguy
Written by CyberBoB on 2006-05-26 19:29:09
Gnome and KDE are the versions of a GUI ( graphic display ) you can choose to run on your desktop. KDE looks some what like windows and Gnome is diffrent and is for more advanced users and is great if you like short cut keys.
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bogus
Written by r on 2006-06-01 09:45:59
Must be a phenomena,I too installed 10.1 on a amd64 without any problems (even with Xgl).
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Thank you Suse
Written by Ian on 2006-06-13 20:37:30
Quote:
Must be a phenomena,I too installed 10.1 on a amd64 without any problems (even with Xgl).




I agree. I have Athlon 64 X2 /w 3GB of RAM. I experienced amaroK crashing every 2 hrs. I execute it again and it is good for another 2 hrs. Nothing else crashed. It also shows 2 CPUs in Performance Window not in Suse 10. I like how My Computer gives hard drive info.
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Chill dude, the real problems
Written by Abic Shadar on 2006-06-13 23:39:48
You are right, its just that he said he didn't know why not that he was complaining, My main problem with the installer was that between 10.0 and 10.1 a few things seamed to have become more broken. THe installer liked to freeze on me (if i changed the partitioning and the packages, it would freeze, so i had to solve it by changing the partitioning only, and adding stuff after the install)

Sadly (and i'm not the only one who had problems) As in the installer the package managment in the real thing seams broken too. You can install things from the SuSE cd's, however rpms keep giving me errors, at least thru yast, and if you install things from the SuSE cd's they take almost 6 times as long as if you did it from the installer, and the installer while it was putting stuff on too, was much slower compared to 10.0.

On the upside, SuSE 10.1's boot time was cut nearly in half compared to 10.0 for me, on 2 different computers, both KDE and gnome
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Graphics Issues and SuSE
Written by Abic Shadar on 2006-06-13 23:50:33
in my experiance SuSE has always had problems with giving you the right graphics driver, I don't know if you tried it or not, but with 10.1 they did fix a very annoying problem (sort of) if you try booting and once it goes black just hit the ctrl alt backspace
then once it lets type commands type sax2, i did this to set up the right drivers on a freinds computer i was updating (well testing 10.1 on them first). And to my pleasant surprise after it loaded sax it automaticly came up with a fixed resolution and asked me if this was ok, i clicked ok, and exited sax. This was enough to finish the install ( i had to do this between disk 1 and 2). And on my own computer 10.1 unlike 9.3 and 10.0 did it came up with an appropriate driver for my monitor so i was able to start with normal resolution.

They did much better with the monitor drivers this time around, still needs a little fixing for the next release but that may be what was the problem, of course I'm not sure when he said "black screen after booting" which boot is my question
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that guys is a tool of the microsoft
Written by Abic Shadar on 2006-06-14 00:19:27
Dude, software and lots of it exsists for linux, for free, and alot of smiple apps can for windows can be run under wine with almost no problem and almost no hard work, as long as you aren't afraid to to type wine and drag the exe you want to run into the console, Wow that simple photoshop installed, and is now available thru the k menu, and Age of empires(the first one), Same thing, fireworks and flash, in fact most apps work almost perfectly (and if you download winetools, you can even deal with activex , you will know what that is once you get told that a program needs it).

I'm confused with what he means by no sofware, dude if you even tried SuSE, any of them you had the option in the install to install from almost a hundred programs, that do almost all the work you would ever need, and just a little bit of googling you can find all the plugins and libraries, (most of them some are hard to find) you can play videos, dvds, burn cd/dvds, rip music, email, FREE VOICE OVER IP PROGRAMS, several amusing games (nothing like FPS, but good games). Any ways i'm trying to make a long rant to counter the long pro windows rant.

Yes if SuSE 10.1 was your first linux you've tried, you picked the wrong one to try, 10.0 is probally better suited for you, you can do all the work you want, most hard ware will work for it, and if you must try using wine, or the cedega time demo ( that you can trick the time count down on it by changing the date)

SuSE is a damn good OS, just 10.1 has its issues, they rushed it too soon, and its package managment rides the short bus
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Written by Abic Shadar on 2006-06-14 00:29:31
Le boeuf est avec KDE et SuSE 10.0 mais ce n'est pas avec 10.0.
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screen resolution configuration (not wor
Written by Thomas Wolff on 2006-07-14 08:35:01
Hi, I don't get the screen resolution properly configured. Sax2 just
fails to install what I tell it to use :(
I'd like to try if the Screen Resolution applet you mention might help.
Can it be started on KDE as well? How would it be run?
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abot suse
Written by vagos on 2006-07-18 02:10:44
you can try suse 10.1 it has 3 options first is gnome and second is kde and third something else i don't know either maybe you creat your own enviroment,i guess
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sb x-fi drivers please help
Written by ned on 2006-10-14 12:41:17
hi
I am a newbie to linux i downloaded the live cd for suse 10.1 but could get any sound i have a sb extreme x-fi/music card listed (sb x-fi(ceeo))does any one know where i could get it
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ALL BROKEN
Written by All Broken on 2006-10-25 10:32:53
Dear friend,
I read your review. As a simple desktop user i was tempted to give it a try and take break from fedora (which my parents find difficult to use). I installed suse10. It worked ok but had bugs.
I borrowed a dvd from afriend, upgraded to 10.1.

It was all broken, even worse than 10. I could not even upgrade using yast. This ws so disppointing. I restored my fedora. I then came to know that this month suse have regreted and remastered their cd/dvd iso.

There is no way i am trying any other version in near future, and suse, perhaps never again.
Had you listed such issues in your flowery review, i would have been prepared for problems rather than thinking , i will have an out of box working system.
But than you for taking pain to write this flowery review for SUSE.
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Prof
Written by T.L.D. Jones on 2006-11-13 08:57:30
First of all I should say that I have been working on writing my own programs, building and repairing my own PC's,since the days of the ZX81 which must be something like 30+ years. However I am decidedly a newbie at Linux although I have dabbled with Linux in the past.

In recent years I have become very disillusioned with Windows XP even though it has some good points.

I decided again to try Linux. First of all with Ubuntu 6.06 which in fact I am currently using. The only problem that I hit was that I have been unable to print over my wireless connection as we have 5 computers on a wireless network, even though I could easily connect to the Internet and I want to use a shared printer (Some of these PC's have Windows XP on them.)

However I read that SUSE was probably the best Linux OS at the moment, so I purchased SUSE 10.0 At first I was delighted until I discovered for some reason or other I could not get onto the internet as I had so easily done with Ubuntu. Everything else I tried, I really liked. I was using Gnome because that is what I started with in Ubuntu and it's always easier to change if part is already familiar, not because I am against Kde in any way. However I have not given up because I know that there is a way of doing this, its just that I haven't yet found out how to. If anyone out there could give me a pointer or two I would be very greatful. I am using pcmcia Linksys card on a Toshiba Laptop.

It is very easy to blame the software for any problems but this should not be done by any newbie because like me the problem is almost certainly a lack of knowledge. I like what I have seen to date.
However I should say that getting onto the internet with Ubuntu is so easy even using a wireless connection. It's a pity all Linux systems cannot come together with all their best bits and then we would have a truly brilliant system. The problem as always is of course, what I like someone else may not. An O.S. delema. I have purchased The Linux Bible, Linux for dummies,Linux in no time,Linux in easy steps,Beginning Ubuntu, novice to professional, but have yet to solve my problems. Any advice would be geatfully received.
Thanks in anticipation.
Terry
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Chameleons and Penguins and Microsoft...
Written by FG on 2006-12-07 17:29:22
Bit of a dissappointing review.


I ran suse 10.x. Then I removed it. Zen is still buggy as hell and Yast is so bloated it ain't funny. To top this Beagle-Helper pegged my CPU to 100% for an entire week... etc, etc.

Actually, the whole experience of GUI linux stinks. Both Gnome and KDE are slower than Win2k, NT and even XP by a large margin. And microsoft products are still a great deal more cohesive, intuitive and offer comparatively risk-free upgrades.

In GUI linux apps you have multiple informal layers written and maintained independently and when you install a new application its dependencies can mandate a change to one of the lower layers which in turn knocks out several previously installed apps due to version differences. In my first day with suse 10 I installed three standard apps and the dependencies knocked out Yast completely... for a beginner this would be game over, insert another quarter to play again. Comparatively, windows can take one hell of a beating from the user before finally turning up its toes.


I'm not bashing linux here, I do use linux professionally and personally as a CONSOLE BASED environment - and it is here (and only here) that linux can be said to be more stable and faster than M$ offerings.,, but then, it IS console mode... MSDOS was pretty damn stable too, even with third party task management it gave 5x9's uptime. Compare Linux Console to MSDOS and Linux GUI to Microsoft Windows and you quickly spot that the two platforms have very different strengths and complement each other well. Linux sucks at GUI, TCO and overall mass-market friendliness... Microsoft have no competing slim server environment (or indeed ANY console-mode offering)


Still, for people still banging on about linux being faster and more stable - lets call a horse a horse... Linux is only faster than windows when you unfairly compare the basic non-X environment with the windows GUI. Linux is great as a console based environment for getting business done but it has a LONG way to go before its ready for general uptake in the domestic desktop market.

Personally, I'd like to see what would happen if M$ resurrected MSDOS under an NTFS filesystem complete with all the task management bells and whistles... a sleek, slim and robust microsoft offering for the server environment... The immediate out-the-box interoperability with windows platforms and the cohesive view missing from linuxs hodgepodgery would almost certainly give linux a run for its money. The only worry is that it could probably start pushing linux out of the server room, and that would be sad.

Don't get me wrong... Linux is great, I love it... but no matter how much I wish it were so - it just ain't desktop calibre yet and without heavy formalisation it ain't gonna get there.

Keep bundling it with gnome and kde and try selling it as something it isn't and it may even get as buggy as M$ 9x ever was. Indeed, some of the misbehaviour I've seen in Gnome tells me the decline has already begun.


-FG,
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Smell like....
Written by Steban Quito on 2007-03-19 09:48:28
All its beatifull...
all its great in this conclusion.

Mybe you mut to compare whit another distributions or something.. but the conclusion smell like... :(
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