U.S. PC retailer devotes floor space to Linux

IT World ^ | 2005-11-10 | Fred O'Connor

[N3WBI3]

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[PAR35]

They ought to bundle it with Open Office and the full Mozilla Suite. That would meet the needs of a large percentage of users. It would just leave out hard core gamers and folks with highly specialized needs.

[softwarecreator]

They should devote more space, if the demand is there.  It's simply smart business.  Products can't compete if they are not given the opportunity.  The last time I bought a PC from a chain store, they had maybe one or two that ran Linux and the rest were MS & Macs, with about 90% of that dominated by MS.  It's really the one way that the popularity of Linux can be determined ... in sales of PCs being run by them.

If however, they fail to sell, it will put to rest the fantasy that Linux will outsell MS in a side-by-side comparison for the average PC user.

[JSteff]

I need some Linux help. I bought a PC Linux live cd. Supposedly will run off just the CD. Does anyone know what the username and password that it takes?

I tried "admin" and "password", "user" and "password" and just hitting enter and enter. Nothing worked. Any idea what will make it work?

Thanks in advance.

[N3WBI3]

J,

Best guess: try the user name 'root' with no password. What is the name of the distribution CD that you purchased?

[martin_fierro]

I like Microcenter for peripherals and accessories, but have had negative experiences with 2 of the 3 XP systems I've bought there.

OTOH, being $250 out of pocket for a Linspire box that might turn out to be a turkey wouldn't be so bad.

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

Seems to be some confusion.....as this :

PCLinux Online News

Would seem to be an online news and online distributer.

However there is a specific distribution:

PCLinuxOS

***********************************

PCLinuxOS is one of the world’s up and coming providers of a Linux Desktop Solution. With a small but dedicated development team, PClinuxOS delivers Desktop Ready Software that harnesses the power of the Open Source Community. PCLinuxOS Preview .91 is an English only self-booting live cd that runs entirely from a bootable CD without installing anything on your computer. Data on the CD is uncompressed on the fly allowing up to 2 GB of programs on one CD including a complete Xserver, KDE 3.4.1 Desktop, Open Office 1.1.4, Thunderbird 1.0.2, Firefox 1.0.4, p2p filesharing and much more, all preconfigured and ready to use! In addition to the livecd mode, you can also install PCLinuxOS to your hard drive using our easy to use livecd installer, assuming you like PCLinuxOS and it runs well on your computer. PCLinuxOS is currently under heavy development and should be considered beta software. PCLinuxOS should work on most modern hardware and comes with advanced hardware detection. PCLinuxOS runs best on computers with at least 256 megabytes of memory. PCLinuxOS is released under the GPL license. ************************************* And from their FAQ: ********************************************

		This list may answer some common questions concerning PCLinuxOS. Q. When I boot pclinuxos from the LiveCD, Im getting out of space errors when trying to create /etc /home /root? A. You are running out of memory when booting PCLinuxOS. Recommended memory is 256 mb. Many directories need write access so PCLinuxOS copies these directories into RAM memory. Buy more memory. Q. What is the password for root and guest? A. The password for root is root. The password for guest is guest. Q. When I boot PCLinuxOS the cd hangs when probing usb? A. You might be able to get past this by typing livecd nousb at the boot prompt. Q. When booting PCLinuxOS, why do I see failed messages when probing for usb? A. This is normal. PCLinuxOS tries to modprobe different kernel drivers for your usb port until it finds the correct ones. Q. When I booted PCLinuxOS all I got was a black screen with a prompt? A. hwdetect could not determine the correct video driver for your video card. You might be able to boot my typing livecd xdrv=fbdev at the boot prompt. fbdev is a generic driver that should work with most video cards. If this option does not work, log in as root with password root, type XFdrake to set up your video card. Log out of root by typing exit, log in as guest with password guest and type startx to load the desktop. Q. Why does livecd hang at starting non-interactive mode and nothing else happens? A. Type livecd nousb or livecd nousb noscsi at the boot prompt. Q. Can I install software while running the livecd? A. No, the crdrom is read only, however you can install software from our repository after a hard drive install. Q. Why does my computer freeze when trying to boot the livecd? A. Some motherboards require additional kernel options passed at the boot prompt. You may be able to boot by typing livecd noapic nolapic acpi=off at the boot prompt. Q. I’m not setup on broadband, how do I stop the livecd from trying to bring up eth0? A. Type livecd nonetwork at the boot prompt. Q. I’ve setup my usbkey but when I log in as guest it doesnt have my previous settings? A. When booting the livecd type livecd home=usb to let the livecd know you have a key plugged in. Q. Where is the installer and the usbkey setup routine? A. Log in as guest not root and click the icons on the desktop. Q. How do I set my computer to boot from CDROM? A. This is a bios setting. When starting your computer you will see output on the screen such as Press Delete, F2 or F10 to enter setup. This will take you into the bios configuration screens. What you want to do is set the first boot device as cdrom and the 2nd boot device as the harddrive. Q. How do I restore the bootsplash with the progress bar on the hard drive install? A. Click on Master Control -> Boot Theme -> OK Q. PCLinuxOS doest seem to see my SATA Drive? A. SATA drives are NOT fully supported in this release. Q. How do I set up my desktop to see my other drives and partitions? A. Open KDE Control Center -> LooknFeel -> Behavior -> Click the Device Icons Tab and Check the box Show Device Icons. Click OK

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

Assuming what you have is PCLinuxOS then password for root is
root and for guest is guest...remember Linux is case sensitive so it could be Root and Guest.

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

Review of screens for PCLinuxOS .92 Test 3 here:

PCLinuxOS .92 Test 3

This might be the opening screen....interesting:

[chronic_loser]

How did it go?

"first they ignore you
then they ridicule you
then they fight you
then you win"

or something like that

[bmwcyle]

That is good marketing.

[chronic_loser]

I dont' know of any "main line" (RedHat, Mandriva, Ubuntu, Mepis, Novelle etc) distros of linux that don't come with Open Office.

Right now the ONLY reason for windows domination is familiarity and some website developers who still think in terms of MS scripts. All it will take is for some small segment of the mkt to go open source and both of those will vanish.

This will be good for MS and for the open source community. MS will not "die." It will be good for all of us.

[clyde asbury]

The PowerSpec 1415 costs $300 and comes with a Sempron processor, 256 MB of RAM, a 40 GB hard drive and a DVD-ROM/CD-RW drive.

There are excellent OSs available for lower-end systems. Vector Linux (#16 at distrowatch) uses about 1.5 gigs fully installed. On a system that isn't lower-end, it screams.

[Tribune7]

This is a big deal.

[PAR35]

I like Microcenter for peripherals and accessories, but have had negative experiences with 2 of the 3 XP systems I've bought there.

Right now I'm on a Microcenter box that I bought in 96 or 97. The cooling fan on the processor is a little noisy, but other than that it is working fine. I've added a little memory and an additional hard drive. Obviously, your boxes were bought more recently, so your experience may be more indicative of how things are now.

[ThePythonicCow]

It would just leave out hard core gamers and folks with highly specialized needs.

It also leaves out the Quicken/TurboTax crowd.

And it leaves out those needing seamless user interface and perfect document compatibility with a Microsoft dominated work environment.

[martin_fierro]

Obviously, your boxes were bought more recently, so your experience may be more indicative of how things are now.

Clarification: The 2 XP systems that gave me headaches are both laptops bought at Microcenter (HP & Toshiba).

The 3rd XP system is a lower-end Microcenter desktop (AMD Athlon 2800+, 2.13 GHz, 512 MB RAM), and it's been very good.

[2 Kool 2 Be 4-Gotten]

Good point - I have company laptop, and at home a windows box and a linux box side by side. I prefer linux but need the windows box for Quicken and also it's just easier when it comes to downloading digital pix from my camera.

[PAR35]

and perfect document compatibility with a Microsoft dominated work environment.

Except that isn't going to be present when the next generation of Microsoft Office comes out. So you can either buy and expensive new computer to run the expensive new Microsoft operating system so you can run the expensive new Microsoft Office for compatability with the portion of folks who have done likewise, or you can keep what you have now for partial compatibility, or you can upgrade to a cheap new computer with an open source operating system and open source productivity software with about the same level of compatibility.