Saturday, August 25, 2012

Manjaro 0.8 XFCE Review: Pretty good new distro

Linux world is getting exciting every day. Almost every week, very good new distros are being launched, not only from the established names but from all quarters. So, we had Ubuntu upgrading 12.04 LTS to 12.04.1 LTS with Ubuntu cloud integrated apart from other incremental additions. I came across in distrowatch, the launch of Manjaro XFCE. It comes from the lead Chakra Linux developer Philip Muller and that actually raised my expectations. I really like Chakra and I guess after using Manjaro, I am impressed with it.


From Manjaro 0.8 XFCE
From Manjaro 0.8 XFCE
It is based on Archlinux and the ISO is pretty light (664 MB). I booted it up live as well as installed in my 8 GB HDD. It's unique USP is bumblebee/bbswitch which can help you switch between Intel/Nvidia graphics card and auto-detection of Nvidia card. Unfortunately it couldn't work on my Nvidia GEFORCE GT 630M. In fact none of the Linux distros I used is able to detect it and it's drivers are not yet present in the Linux repo. So, no issues with it.

The desktop is clean and dark and green looks stylish with a conky with system information running on the header. Application-wise quite rich, as given in the table below, except no office present here. At least Abiword, Gnumeric could have been given with the default ISO. Also to make it more usable you'll be required to download applications like Skype, VLC, bit-torrent client, etc. Else adobe flash, free and non-free multimedia codecs, latest GIMP, and other common apps are present and works well.

From Manjaro 0.8 XFCE
Settings can be accessed through a single settings manager as well as separate settings controls given, which is good. The distro overall is really fast and runs well within 150-160 MB RAM with only task manager running. Linux kernel is the 3rd generation one and XFCE desktop is 4.10, the latest.
From Manjaro 0.8 XFCE

The repository is very rich, derived primarily from Archlinux repo and Manjaro apps added to it. I searched and installed skype 4.0, abiword, and other applications without much effort from the repository.

From Manjaro 0.8 XFCE
From Manjaro 0.8 XFCE
From Manjaro 0.8 XFCE
I installed it in my HDD and experienced Linux users won't find it difficult to install. Steps are pretty simple, prepare HDD and then select your bootable partition, select a swap and then install. It is definitely easier than installing Archlinux but still a Linux Mint or a Ubuntu is easier for a newbie where you just select the destination drive and click next.


Overall, I feel this is a pretty good XFCE distro based on Archlinux. Look and feel is good, speedy and responsive, has a very rich application repository, you can have KDE as an alternative desktop as well. I am not sure how long 0.8 release is supported, whether has rolling release, etc. at this point in time. I am looking forward to their future releases.



Evaluation Parameters Manjaro 0.8 XFCE
Computer on which tested Asus K55VM
Processor 3rd generation core i7
RAM allocated 8 GB
Release Date 20-Aug-12
ISO Size 664 MB
Live boot option Yes
Booting time (live boot) 30 sec
Questions asked during Live boot Language, to boot with graphic drivers or not
Ease of installation Experienced Linux users won't find it difficult but for newbies may take some time. Normally takes about 10-15 min.
Installation time 15 min
Booting time (installed to HDD) 10 sec
Desktop Manager(s) XFCE 4.10
Chosen Desktop Manager XFCE 4.10
Linux Kernel version 3.4.9-1-Manjaro
File Manager Thunar 1.4.0
CPU Usage (with system monitor) 0-8%
RAM Usage (with system monitor) 150-160 MB
Applications
Office None
Multimedia Parole 0.2.0.6, Xfburn 0.4.3
Internet Firefox 14.0.1, Pidgin 2.10.6, Thunderbird 14, Avahi SSH & VNC server browsers
Graphics GIMP 2.8, Viewnior
Accessories Bulk rename, Gedit, 7z, Archive manager
System tools Add/Remove Software, Software update, task manager, Gparted, Bulk rename, Avahi zeroconf browser
Others bumblebee/bbswitch (to be downloaded from repository) helps in switching between Nvidia/Intel graphic drivers
Flash support inbuilt Adobe flash 11
Restricted codecs inbuilt gstreamer good, bad, very bad, ugly, fluendo, ffmpeg, etc. Good enough for most of the media types
Java Not available
Repository Arch Linux repository through Add/Remove Software
How easy or difficult to install an app? Very easy through Software center
Richness of repository Manjaro plus Arch Linux repository is very rich
Parent OS Arch Linux
Upgradeable Not sure. This is the first release, I guess, so it will be supported for sometime.
Internet connection Picked up wifi easily and easy to configure Wired connection
Sound Poulsbo driver already present, faced no issue with sound
Shutdown time 15 sec
Supported till First release and hence to be supported for sometime.

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Tuesday, August 21, 2012

Snowlinux 3 Crystal XFCE Review: Good but could have been better

On 19th Aug 2012, Lars Torben Kremer announced the release of Snowlinux 3 Crystal XFCE, based on Debian Squeeze. The distro is supported till Feb 2014. Given my good experience with Snowlinux Gnome and XFCE being one of my favorite desktop environment for its low resource consumption, I was quick to download the 656 MB ISO from Snowlinux site. I downloaded the 64-bit version.
From Snowlinux 3 Crystal XFCE

I did a live-boot and then installation to an 8 GB partition that I specifically created to try out latest Linux distros. My observations are summarized in the table below:



Evaluation Parameters Snowlinux 3 Crystal XFCE
Computer on which tested Asus K55VM
Processor 3rd generation core i7
RAM allocated 8 GB
Release Date 19-Aug-12
ISO Size 656 MB
Live boot option Yes
Booting time (live boot) 18 sec
Questions asked during Live boot None
Ease of installation Fairly simple, with Snowlinux automatically picking up the Location, time zone, etc. For keyboard, force select USA. Entire thing takes about 15 minutes.
Installation time 15 min
Booting time (installed to HDD) 10 sec
Desktop Manager(s) XFCE 4.8.0
Chosen Desktop Manager XFCE 4.8.0
Linux Kernel version 3.2.0-0.bpo.2-amd64
File Manager Thunar 1.2.2
CPU Usage (with system monitor) 0-8%
RAM Usage (with system monitor) 150-160 MB
Applications
Office None
Multimedia Rhythmbox 0.12.8, Brasero 2.30.3, Gnome Sound Recorder 2.30.0, XFburn 0.4.3
Internet Firefox 14.0.1, Empathy 2.30.3 chat, Icedove mail/news, Thunderbird 14, bittorrent client
Graphics Ristretto, Shotwell
Accessories Bulk rename, Mousepad, Notes
System tools Gparted, Firewall, Software center, Synaptic package manager, Update manager, Task Manager
Others
Flash support inbuilt Adobe flash 11
Restricted codecs inbuilt gstreamer good, bad, very bad, ugly, fluendo, ffmpeg, etc. Good enough for most of the media types
Java Not available
Repository Debian repository through Software center and/or synaptic package manager
How easy or difficult to install an app? Very easy through synaptic and Software center
Richness of repository Shares debian repository and is very rich
Parent OS Debian 6 Squeeze (Stable)
Upgradeable Not sure.
Internet connection Picked up wifi easily and easy to configure Wired connection
Sound Poulsbo driver already present, faced no issue with sound
Shutdown time Due to some problem with killing all processes, had to force shutdown quite a few times
Supported till Feb'2014


Somehow, I have a mixed feeling about the XFCE version of Snowlinux. The Linux kernel is 3, which is good, it boots up really fast, is considerably lighter (64-bit OS running with only 150-160 MB RAM is no joke!), very fast and has all the restricted and non-restricted multimedia codecs and Adobe Flash support is excellent. But, the XFCE desktop environment is not the most updated one - now we have Linux distros with XFCE 4.10.

From Snowlinux 3 Crystal XFCE
Application-wise, Office is really weak and you have to download either OpenOffice (from the Software center) or LibreOffice from LibreOffice site. It means 170-200 MB additional download. Plus, the multimedia section, too, is not very strong either - there is no video player! So, a VLC or Gnome Media player is a must. However, good that all the codecs are provided to play most of the common file formats. Almost paradoxical that no video player is provided in the ISO though all codecs are provided!

From Snowlinux 3 Crystal XFCE

Internet section is good with the latest Firefox and Thunderbird along with Empathy. I wonder why Icedove and Thunderbird both are present - both of them do the same thing! The developers could have provided IRC chat instead!

From Snowlinux 3 Crystal XFCE

Graphics is good enough if you are not into serious photo editing. I miss GIMP 2.8 here! 

However, you can download all the required apps like VLC, Chromium, Pidgin, Wine, PlayonLinux, virtualbox, etc. from the Software repository. Given it's the Debian squeeze repo, you won't have Skype (Ubuntu repo has it). But, you can download the .deb files from Skype site. Similarly you can add Chrome from Google Chrome site.


From Snowlinux 3 Crystal XFCE
Overall, I am ok with having a lighter ISO which fits a CD (a rarity today!), and the user requiring to download some applications from Software center or internet, though I feel the developers could have optimized the software they are providing out-of-the-box. The Gnome version is really complete in that sense. The XFCE desktop environment also requires to be updated to the latest version (released in Apr'2012). All in all, definitely a good distro but my expectation was more.

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Saturday, August 18, 2012

SolusOS 1.2 Review: Now Mint has got serious competition

I guess SolusOS is to Debian what Linux Mint is to Ubuntu. Plus, the lead developer of SolusOS contributes a lot to Linux Mint. All these information actually hyped up my expectations of SolusOS before I began my testing with Solus. And that commonality shows, those who are familiar with Linux Mint, will feel at home in SolusOS. Only difference may be that Solus is still using Gnome 2 whereas Mint has moved to Mate and Cinnamon.


From SolusOS 1.2
Once the release note came in Distrowatch, I downloaded the 32-bit ISO from the solusos site. I guess it is great work from the developers that they limited the ISO to only 1 GB even after including almost all the desirable apps. Additionally, the installation process doesn't require any additional download apart from what is in the DVD - highly commendable!

The details of my evaluation are given below:


Evaluation Parameters SolusOS 1.2 32-bit
Computer on which tested Asus K55VM
Processor 3rd generation core i7
RAM allocated 4 GB
Release Date 17-Aug-12
ISO Size 1 GB
Live boot option Yes
Booting time (live boot) 45 sec
Questions asked during Live boot None
Ease of installation Fairly simple, with Solus automatically picking up the Location, time zone, etc. For keyboard, force select USA. Entire thing takes about 20 minutes.
Installation time 30 minutes, to be conservative
Booting time (installed to HDD) 15 sec
Desktop Manager(s) Gnome 2.30.2
Chosen Desktop Manager Gnome 2.30.2
Linux Kernel version 3.3.6-solusos
File Manager Nautilus 2.31.1
CPU Usage (with system monitor) 0-4%
RAM Usage (with system monitor) 150-160 MB
Applications
Office LibreOffice 3.6.0.4
Multimedia Gnome Mplayer 1.0.4, Totem Movie Player 2.30.2, VLC 2.0.1, Rhythmbox 0.12.8, Openshot video editor 1.4.2, Minitube 1.8, Cheese 2.30.1
Internet Firefox 14.0.1, Pidgin chat, Dropbox, bittorrent client, Xchat IRC
Graphics GNU paint, gThumb
Accessories Calculator, Archive manager, gedit, terminal, root terminal
System tools Deja dup to backup, config editor
Others Wine, PlayonLinux
Flash support inbuilt Adobe flash 11
Restricted codecs inbuilt gstreamer good, bad, very bad, ugly, etc. Good enough for most of the media types
Java sun-java-6
Repository Debian repository through Add remove software and/or synaptic package manager
How easy or difficult to install an app? Very easy through synaptic and Add remove software
Richness of repository Shares debian repository and is very rich
Parent OS Debian stable
Upgradeable Yes, rolling update
Internet connection Picked up wifi easily and easy to configure Wired connection
Sound Poulsbo driver already present, faced no issue with sound
Shutdown time 5 sec

I tested it two ways - on live-boot as well as installation. Just like Linux Mint, Solus works out-of-the-box! All the free and non-free multimedia codecs are present and straight away you can plugin your favorite movie and watch or listen to your favorite songs.


From SolusOS 1.2
From applications point of view, except for the graphics section where I miss GIMP 2.8, rest of the application sections are quite rich, especially the multimedia section. It almost seems like overabundance in the multimedia section. For example, Solus has Gnome, Totem and VLC for video playback and I tested all 3, all of them works! But why three? Wouldn't only VLC been enough? 
From SolusOS 1.2
From SolusOS 1.2
From SolusOS 1.2

Apps are all of latest version - I haven't used Minitube earlier and really liked it. You can play youtube videos or channels directly in Minitube. Once you give a search category, Minitube will automatically load and play all videos in that category without any manual intervention.

From SolusOS 1.2
Overall, the desktop looks great and feels very good to use. Solus installation is actually easier than installing Debian squeeze. I could install it at one go within 20 minutes without any hassles. Gnome 2 desktop over Linux kernel 3 means a very fast and responsive desktop. With only task manager running, it uses only 150-160 of RAM which is pretty low.

Once installed, it could pick up the LAN connection and/or Wifi pretty fast. I didn't face any problem with sound or graphics, etc. post installation. From novice point of view as well, desktop is easy to use, programs are very to locate. Additional apps can be downloaded from repository via add/delete software or synaptic package manager. I downloaded, installed and used skype 4.0 successfully without any hassles (ok, with usual hassle in skype of configuring camera and mic!).
From SolusOS 1.2

So, what appears to me in nutshell, that Linux Mint now has serious competition. I found SolusOS a very refined Linux distribution which will definitely find a lot of takers even from the Linux Mint admirers. The OS works out-of-the-box without any hassles (rarity in the Linux world). Definitely Solus is the distro to watch out for and is recommended for a try out. I bet you'll like it. Given the close similarity between Linux Mint Maya and SolusOS 1.2, expect a comparative review between the two distros sometime pretty soon.

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Wednesday, August 15, 2012

Crunchbang 11 20120806 Review: Minimalistic but highly functional

If you need a cutting edge Linux OS but you have a very very low resource computer, what would you do? You download Crunchbang and your computer will start performing blazing fast and amazingly stable. Now Crunchbang 11 Waldorf is in the testing stage, based on Debian Wheezy (it's also testing till date). I guess once Wheezy is released as a stable distribution, we will have the Crunchbang stable as well.

The 800 MB ISO I downloaded from Crunchbang site, is a testing version and hence, may not be ideal to use for your regular production work. However, I bet once you use it, you'll end up using it regularly. In my use, I didn't note any significant bug or anything not working. Of course, it is in virtualbox.

From Crunchbang 11 20120806
Live boot is quick and fast. It will ask you whether you want a live boot or install it. The desktop is pure minimalistic - no menu no icons - nothing. Right click and you get everything! There is a conky on the right upper corner to tell you the system stats and short cuts.

From Crunchbang 11 20120806
Applications
Crunchbang is in a different genre of minimalistic distros. It is minimalistic but complete and the 800 MB ISO is packed with almost all the essential apps, except may be VLC. Abiword, Gnumeric and Google docs are there for Office work, along with a link to download LibreOffice suite. Iceweasel is the default browser (which I never liked) with out-of-the box flash support along with links to download your favorite browser like Chromium, Firefox, etc. GIMP is to manage your image editing needs and it is the latest version (2.8). Multimedia section is weak with only Gnome media player but you can download VLC, Rhythmbox, Banshee, etc. from the debian repository.
From Crunchbang 11 20120806
From Crunchbang 11 20120806
From Crunchbang 11 20120806
From Crunchbang 11 20120806
From Crunchbang 11 20120806
From Crunchbang 11 20120806
From Crunchbang 11 20120806
From Crunchbang 11 20120806
From Crunchbang 11 20120806
The distro is all black and white. Even Google is kind of black colored in Crunchbang! If you love black, you'll surely have fun with Crunchbang.

From Crunchbang 11 20120806
Minimalistic is stylish as well - look what happened when I changed the wallpaper!

From Crunchbang 11 20120806
The Synaptic package manager can be used to add/delete applications and it sources apps from the Debian testing repository.
From Crunchbang 11 20120806
CPU and RAM Usage
Crunchbang uses the nimble Openbox window manager and is extremely light on resources. With only conky running, it uses about 100 MB RAM and 4-5% of CPU!


Overall
I am eagerly waiting for the final release. Crunchbang 11 would definitely be lighter than any other debian derivative and extremely functional, as well. I am really fond of the minimalistic look that Crunchbang has along with the stability of Debian. Specially those who think Gnome 3 and Unity are ruining the essence of a lightweight, low resource consuming but functional Linux OS, Crunchbang is a must try for them. If you like it, you'll get addicted to it.

More screenshots of Crunchbang 11 is in my Picasa album.



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ROSA 2012 Marathon LXDE Review: Refined, good looking and LTS distro with LXDE

In my last post, I reviewed ROSA 2012 Marathon Gnome version. There I mentioned about very good feedback on the LXDE version and finally yesterday I managed to download and use it. ROSA LXDE is based on Mandriva and has Linux kernel 3.0.28 LTS.

I download the 830 MB ISO from the download mirror. It is considerably heavier than the other LXDE distros I have used like Peppermint or Lubuntu.

From ROSA 2012 Marathon LXDE
The live boot up was with usual questions on language, location, keyboard, etc. as ROSA supports quite a few European languages including English.

From ROSA 2012 Marathon LXDE
From ROSA 2012 Marathon LXDE
From ROSA 2012 Marathon LXDE
From ROSA 2012 Marathon LXDE
From ROSA 2012 Marathon LXDE
From ROSA 2012 Marathon LXDE
From ROSA 2012 Marathon LXDE
The default login is root with no password. Once you put it, it will take you to a red screen and finally the desktop.
From ROSA 2012 Marathon LXDE

Applications
ROSA LXDE has some good apps in the distro by default. As the developers cite, this distro is kept keeping in mind long term support and hence, the apps may not be cutting edge. Firefox 10 ESR is there with flash support; pidgin messenger, LibreOffice calc and writer, VLC media player, etc. are other notable apps present. Only query I have is, why the developers didn't include complete LibreOffice suite? It would have made the package more complete. But, on overall, good collection of apps - some good apps missing are GIMP, Shotwell, bit-torrent client, etc.

From ROSA 2012 Marathon LXDE
From ROSA 2012 Marathon LXDE
From ROSA 2012 Marathon LXDE
From ROSA 2012 Marathon LXDE
From ROSA 2012 Marathon LXDE
You can download more applications from the repository.
From ROSA 2012 Marathon LXDE
From ROSA 2012 Marathon LXDE
Default file manager is PCManFM 0.9.10 and looks really artistic! I haven't seen many LXDE distros with similar polishing.
From ROSA 2012 Marathon LXDE
Another great feature is the LXDE control center - it acts like a control panel in windows and is one stop shop for all configuration requirements in your OS. Of course, separate configuration entries are also present like other LXDE distros.

From ROSA 2012 Marathon LXDE
CPU and RAM Usage
As expected, RAM usage is lower, 122 MB with only task manager running and CPU usage is 1-10%. Performance is comparable to Peppermint 3 or Lubuntu.
From ROSA 2012 Marathon LXDE
Overall
I really liked the LXDE version of ROSA 2012 Marathon, more than the Gnome version. It looks really refined and has good application choices, complete enough for an average user. Only thing, the developers should have provided, is a complete LibreOffice suite along with GIMP. Anyway, users can download them from the repository. Further, the control center simplifies a lot of things for the general users. And given it's lower RAM and CPU usage, it is a good choice if you have a low resource computer. Plus, the long term support for 5 years will ensure that you don't need to install a new OS every year. If you were using Ubuntu 10.04 LTS and now unable to upgrade to Ubuntu 12.04 LTS due to lower specs of your system, you can try out ROSA LXDE! There is no other LTS distro with LXDE right now!

You can see more screenshots in my Picasa album.

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