5 ms·

> the "just works" experience of Linux I am sorry to say that, but I never had such an experience (and i had to use Linux quite a lot in the past).

by greyman 16y ago

jgrahamc 16y ago
I've been carrying around laptop machines since just after the Osborne 1 and in more modern times I've had a succession of Thinkpads running DOS/Windows etc., other laptops running Linux (starting with SuSE and later using Ubuntu) and now I have a variety of MacBooks. The overall experience on laptops with Linux was horrid. Constant problems with drivers, upgrades and miscellaneous crap. The only truly good experience has been on the Mac with OS X. I have no trouble using all my familiar unixy tools and installing packages, but I do not spend my time with time wasting activities (oh, why doesn't the network driver work right now?(1)) and spend more on development. Overall, the Macs have been the most efficient machines I've used. Here's the thing: I'm not an Apple fan boy, I'm an effectiveness fan boy. The Macs win. Just last night I was programming a GSM/GPS module connected to my MacBook Pro via USB emulating a serial port. Module had to be programmed in Python and communicated with using AT commands. No problem at all using EMACS, Python, Tcl/Expect, make, etc. to get things working. (1) The usual response to that criticism is that its the hardware manufacturer's fault if there aren't open drivers for their device. As a user who needs to get stuff done, I simply don't care. The machine needs to work. Macs do.
- drats 16y ago
  Can you put a date on your Thinkpads? Have you used one with Linux in the last 5 or even 10 years? I am comparing my last OS X experience 10.4/2007 macbook to a X200 Thinkpad with Ubuntu 10.10 (along with the Ubuntu desktop versions for the last 5 or so years... pretty simple to just pick a motherboard with supported chipsets), it's like night and day on the software side and the hardware specs are amazing compared to what you can buy with the same cash in Apple's walled garden. edit: You don't say anything about a thinkpad in your reply, so I guess you haven't used Linux on a quality laptop in some time. Even at 5 years, that's still quite a way out. I am open to criticism that things have changed since my 2007 experience too, please point anything out.
  - jgrahamc 16y ago
    The last laptop I installed Ubuntu on was in 2005. I still have that machine and use it occasionally. edit: The machine I installed it on was a Fujitsu Lifebook. I don't recall the actual model number but it was absolute top of the line machine when I bought it. In recent years (2009, 2010) I've used Linux on a couple of Acer machines which we have in the office. The user experience does not appear to have improved when it comes to dealing with annoying problems.
    - deleted 16y ago
      [deleted]
  - AlisdairO 16y ago
    I installed fedora on a W510 a few weeks ago. It wouldn't suspend, because the kernel USB3 driver has no support for suspending. Having blacklisted the driver, I find that I can now suspend, but USB doesn't move back to the USB2 driver, it just doesn't work. Still working on that one. Fortunately, when attached to a base station the USB2 only ports on that work fine. Your other point that I take issue with is that you can get substantially better hardware outside of apple for the same price. In my experience, a laptop with similar power, battery life, weight, size, and build quality is not a great deal cheaper. Please note that I say this as a lover of linux in many ways. It's a fantastic desktop/server OS, and I think apple's desktop offerings are poor value in comparison, but I can't say I've ever had a good experience with linux on a laptop.
- grammaton 16y ago
  Couldn't agree with you more. A few months back when my previous macbook had an unfortunate meeting with some stray beer, I was in the market for a new laptop, and I couldn't even bring myself to consider anything else - it just felt painful to even think about it. There are some very nice PC laptops out there - the Dell Adamo series, the HP Envy, and the IdeaPad immediately come to mind - but they're all more expensive than a comparable Apple laptop - and they don't run my OS of choice! Sure, you can try that shady hackintosh noise, but for the most part, that puts you right back in the endless tinkering camp with the Linux on laptops crowd. Apple makes great laptops that just work, they deserve the praise they get for them. (1) Couldn't agree more here. This "manufacturers need to make open drivers" is just a bunch of whiny noise. Grownups who have things to do don't have time to worry about that crap.
  - robin_reala 16y ago
    (1) Luckily the Linux Driver Project agrees with you, and will make the drivers for manufacturers if they ask: http://www.linuxdriverproject.org/foswiki/bin/view/Main/WebHome http://www.linuxdriverproject.org/foswiki/bin/view/Main/WebH...
  - mkr-hn 16y ago
    People have offered to write the drivers, and even agreed to sign NDAs. What more is the Linux side expected to do?
    - ericd 16y ago
      Maybe they could target a few specific machines, making sure those work perfectly, and then use those as reference machines that people can buy if they want a no-hassle experience.
    - grammaton 16y ago
      No one is questioning the community's dedication in this regard. It's just that, if the manufacturer nixes the idea, for whatever reason - from the users standpoint it just doesn't matter, the software doesn't work with their hardware. When it comes to devices working there's no such thing as an A for effort.
JofArnold 16y ago
+1 and I've used Linux for about 5 years (as my main OS until when I switched to OSX last year)
drats 16y ago
I used to have problems in the late 1990s and early 2000s, but then I did what Apple does with OS X and paid a little attention to the hardware and all the problems went away. Most Linux problems are people fighting against hardware, if you just pick your chipsets sensibly it all works out of the box. Beyond hardware I was simply staggered at how quickly I was up and running with a fresh install of Ubuntu 10.10. Everything was in the repository, Flash, Chrome, Gnome-do, codecs... I'd have been running around for an hour or two extra trying to get the same stuff for OS X. And then on the server-side you go to just about any software project and they have the recommended ways to install "sudo apt-get install oursoftware" there, as are copious post-install setup guides. Can't say I found the same experience on OS X (10.4) when I used it for a year and a bit, it was always a clunky struggle to get things installed.
- Tyrannosaurs 16y ago
  Some of the bundling of stuff with Linux is nice as a time saver on initial install. Having recently spent two days rebuilding a Windows machine (of which a large chunk was just tedious fetching and installing chrome, flash, shockwave, air, acrobat type stuff) this sort of thing is significant. I've never found OS X to be problematic for installs but the basic act of gathering stuff up to put on the machine is basically dead time. But the comment "if you pick your chipsets sensibly" - frankly most people don't want to have to do that sort of research. There are enough variables in the basic specification / vendor decisions without having to drop down to this level.
- demallien 16y ago
  Most Linux problems are people fighting against hardware, if you just pick your chipsets sensibly it all works out of the box You see, right there is the problem. I don't have to think about that when using a Mac. The drivers are always there, and they always work. Despite your claims, Ubuntu and the other linuxes out there do not "just work". I have not yet met a linux laptop that didn't do weird things when I close then reopen the lid. I have yet to meet a linux laptop that deals with finding itself on different networks in an elegant manner. To put my comments into perspective, for my day job I write userland applications for a Gentoo-derived system, and I do my dev work on a Fedora laptop. At home, I develop for my own company on a Mac, targeting Mac applications. I like to think that I have a reasonable handle on the pros and cons of the two environments. About the only time I find linux compelling is when I want to use an open source package that isn't available on MacPorts. But then, I usually just go and grab a gentoo ebuild for configuring the package in question, create a ruby script to replicate the ebuild, and then install from tarball... It's not a big enough pain to justify sacrificing all of those yummy Apple APIs. If you're an app writer, Cocoa blows GTK out of the water.
calloc 16y ago
I was installing Ubuntu Linux on a older machine but with a new Nvidia graphics card and Ubuntu because of the new nouveau driver showed me a black screen while installing. I had to find a forum post on the issue only to find out that I had to edit the kernel boot parameters by adding something to the end of the boot line. That pretty much ended that little escapade into trying to get that working... I don't want to tinker with my machines. I want to set them up and have them go for months if not years. Just set up Boxee on ArchLinux, don't plan on touching that for a long time. It does what it is supposed to do (play movies and tv shows) and that is that.

> the "just works" experience of Linux I am sorry to say that, but I never had such an experience (and i had to use Linux quite a lot in the past).

by greyman 16y ago

> the "just works" experience of Linux I am sorry to say that, but I never had such an experience (and i had to use Linux quite a lot in the past).

jgrahamc 16y ago

I've been carrying around laptop machines since just after the Osborne 1 and in more modern times I've had a succession of Thinkpads running DOS/Windows etc., other laptops running Linux (starting with SuSE and later using Ubuntu) and now I have a variety of MacBooks. The overall experience on laptops with Linux was horrid. Constant problems with drivers, upgrades and miscellaneous crap. The only truly good experience has been on the Mac with OS X. I have no trouble using all my familiar unixy tools and installing packages, but I do not spend my time with time wasting activities (oh, why doesn't the network driver work right now?(1)) and spend more on development. Overall, the Macs have been the most efficient machines I've used. Here's the thing: I'm not an Apple fan boy, I'm an effectiveness fan boy. The Macs win. Just last night I was programming a GSM/GPS module connected to my MacBook Pro via USB emulating a serial port. Module had to be programmed in Python and communicated with using AT commands. No problem at all using EMACS, Python, Tcl/Expect, make, etc. to get things working. (1) The usual response to that criticism is that its the hardware manufacturer's fault if there aren't open drivers for their device. As a user who needs to get stuff done, I simply don't care. The machine needs to work. Macs do.

drats 16y ago
Can you put a date on your Thinkpads? Have you used one with Linux in the last 5 or even 10 years? I am comparing my last OS X experience 10.4/2007 macbook to a X200 Thinkpad with Ubuntu 10.10 (along with the Ubuntu desktop versions for the last 5 or so years... pretty simple to just pick a motherboard with supported chipsets), it's like night and day on the software side and the hardware specs are amazing compared to what you can buy with the same cash in Apple's walled garden. edit: You don't say anything about a thinkpad in your reply, so I guess you haven't used Linux on a quality laptop in some time. Even at 5 years, that's still quite a way out. I am open to criticism that things have changed since my 2007 experience too, please point anything out.
- jgrahamc 16y ago
  The last laptop I installed Ubuntu on was in 2005. I still have that machine and use it occasionally. edit: The machine I installed it on was a Fujitsu Lifebook. I don't recall the actual model number but it was absolute top of the line machine when I bought it. In recent years (2009, 2010) I've used Linux on a couple of Acer machines which we have in the office. The user experience does not appear to have improved when it comes to dealing with annoying problems.
  - deleted 16y ago
    [deleted]
- AlisdairO 16y ago
  I installed fedora on a W510 a few weeks ago. It wouldn't suspend, because the kernel USB3 driver has no support for suspending. Having blacklisted the driver, I find that I can now suspend, but USB doesn't move back to the USB2 driver, it just doesn't work. Still working on that one. Fortunately, when attached to a base station the USB2 only ports on that work fine. Your other point that I take issue with is that you can get substantially better hardware outside of apple for the same price. In my experience, a laptop with similar power, battery life, weight, size, and build quality is not a great deal cheaper. Please note that I say this as a lover of linux in many ways. It's a fantastic desktop/server OS, and I think apple's desktop offerings are poor value in comparison, but I can't say I've ever had a good experience with linux on a laptop.
grammaton 16y ago
Couldn't agree with you more. A few months back when my previous macbook had an unfortunate meeting with some stray beer, I was in the market for a new laptop, and I couldn't even bring myself to consider anything else - it just felt painful to even think about it. There are some very nice PC laptops out there - the Dell Adamo series, the HP Envy, and the IdeaPad immediately come to mind - but they're all more expensive than a comparable Apple laptop - and they don't run my OS of choice! Sure, you can try that shady hackintosh noise, but for the most part, that puts you right back in the endless tinkering camp with the Linux on laptops crowd. Apple makes great laptops that just work, they deserve the praise they get for them. (1) Couldn't agree more here. This "manufacturers need to make open drivers" is just a bunch of whiny noise. Grownups who have things to do don't have time to worry about that crap.
- robin_reala 16y ago
  (1) Luckily the Linux Driver Project agrees with you, and will make the drivers for manufacturers if they ask: http://www.linuxdriverproject.org/foswiki/bin/view/Main/WebHome http://www.linuxdriverproject.org/foswiki/bin/view/Main/WebH...
- mkr-hn 16y ago
  People have offered to write the drivers, and even agreed to sign NDAs. What more is the Linux side expected to do?
  - ericd 16y ago
    Maybe they could target a few specific machines, making sure those work perfectly, and then use those as reference machines that people can buy if they want a no-hassle experience.
  - grammaton 16y ago
    No one is questioning the community's dedication in this regard. It's just that, if the manufacturer nixes the idea, for whatever reason - from the users standpoint it just doesn't matter, the software doesn't work with their hardware. When it comes to devices working there's no such thing as an A for effort.

JofArnold 16y ago

+1 and I've used Linux for about 5 years (as my main OS until when I switched to OSX last year)

drats 16y ago

I used to have problems in the late 1990s and early 2000s, but then I did what Apple does with OS X and paid a little attention to the hardware and all the problems went away. Most Linux problems are people fighting against hardware, if you just pick your chipsets sensibly it all works out of the box. Beyond hardware I was simply staggered at how quickly I was up and running with a fresh install of Ubuntu 10.10. Everything was in the repository, Flash, Chrome, Gnome-do, codecs... I'd have been running around for an hour or two extra trying to get the same stuff for OS X. And then on the server-side you go to just about any software project and they have the recommended ways to install "sudo apt-get install oursoftware" there, as are copious post-install setup guides. Can't say I found the same experience on OS X (10.4) when I used it for a year and a bit, it was always a clunky struggle to get things installed.

Tyrannosaurs 16y ago
Some of the bundling of stuff with Linux is nice as a time saver on initial install. Having recently spent two days rebuilding a Windows machine (of which a large chunk was just tedious fetching and installing chrome, flash, shockwave, air, acrobat type stuff) this sort of thing is significant. I've never found OS X to be problematic for installs but the basic act of gathering stuff up to put on the machine is basically dead time. But the comment "if you pick your chipsets sensibly" - frankly most people don't want to have to do that sort of research. There are enough variables in the basic specification / vendor decisions without having to drop down to this level.
demallien 16y ago
Most Linux problems are people fighting against hardware, if you just pick your chipsets sensibly it all works out of the box You see, right there is the problem. I don't have to think about that when using a Mac. The drivers are always there, and they always work. Despite your claims, Ubuntu and the other linuxes out there do not "just work". I have not yet met a linux laptop that didn't do weird things when I close then reopen the lid. I have yet to meet a linux laptop that deals with finding itself on different networks in an elegant manner. To put my comments into perspective, for my day job I write userland applications for a Gentoo-derived system, and I do my dev work on a Fedora laptop. At home, I develop for my own company on a Mac, targeting Mac applications. I like to think that I have a reasonable handle on the pros and cons of the two environments. About the only time I find linux compelling is when I want to use an open source package that isn't available on MacPorts. But then, I usually just go and grab a gentoo ebuild for configuring the package in question, create a ruby script to replicate the ebuild, and then install from tarball... It's not a big enough pain to justify sacrificing all of those yummy Apple APIs. If you're an app writer, Cocoa blows GTK out of the water.

calloc 16y ago

I was installing Ubuntu Linux on a older machine but with a new Nvidia graphics card and Ubuntu because of the new nouveau driver showed me a black screen while installing. I had to find a forum post on the issue only to find out that I had to edit the kernel boot parameters by adding something to the end of the boot line. That pretty much ended that little escapade into trying to get that working... I don't want to tinker with my machines. I want to set them up and have them go for months if not years. Just set up Boxee on ArchLinux, don't plan on touching that for a long time. It does what it is supposed to do (play movies and tv shows) and that is that.