Mandriva 2009 + 1872 IBM T43 = pure awesome

[stuartf]

I hope this isn't too far OT... I am new to Linux and accept that there is a learning curve. I consider myself of intermediate competence when it comes to Windows but am having a steep slope trying to figure out how to get my Intel 2915 wireless card working in this OS. I have downloaded the firmware and seem to need to put it into lib/firmware but am running into a brick wall. Most of the instructions assume I know more than I do.

Any help here (I am running the free, downloaded version). BTW, a previous try with Fedora went without pain and the reason for the switch to Mandriva is the need to sync by Windows Mobile 6.1 phone.

stuartf

[t140568]

I've been using Mandriva since early 07 on my TP R50, but recently switched to Ubuntu 8.10 and in the process switched from KDE (which I've LOVED for so long) to Gnome. Different worlds, indeed!

Personally, I've noted things about both that I like better than the other. IMO, Mandriva has a much better "Control Panel" that has things very nicely organized.

I've also found that Ubuntu is much nicer in that it starts you off with what you need and nothing more. It keeps me from having to uninstall all the stuff that Mandriva loads from a fresh install. I've also run into packages that wouldn't work in Mandriva, while Ubuntu seems to maintain them better.

I haven't tried Mint... isn't that a variant of Ubuntu? What would you say are its strongpoints?

KDE v. Gnome? KDE 3.5.x and Gnome are good, solid desktop environments. KDE4.x seems to be a bit buggy/quirky yet, though it is VERY pretty! I'll definitely try it out again once it's regained some of the stability that I was used to in 3.5.x.

Just my $.02... though it's probably worth <$.01

[Blue Thunder]

I run Mint on my T60. I tried Ubuntu on on of my desktops... it was ok, before I had some video card driver problem (I'm pretty sure it was my fault) anyway that gave me an excuse to switch it over to Mint.

My brother runs Mint on his R50 but he recently tried Mandriva 09 (GNOME). The video drivers seemed to work properly, but for some reason videos playing via the internet had some serious lagging/stuttering. I suspect it may have been something to do with it's flash player plugin. Anyway that gave him an excuse to switch back to Mint.

And so Mint FTW!

An interesting thing - on the R50, desktop effects (video hardware acceleration?) worked perfectly on Mint 4, but Mint 5 broke it.... thankfully Mint 6 brought it back (or so it seems).