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getting a new pc; selecting virus software

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posted 13 years ago

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KullConquered wrote:
Paul I listened to your podcast. It made me want to throw up a little.

Like you, I have trouble knowing where to start.

Interesting read... In the end this is one area where a lot of people want what they want. I always buy entry level and run Linux.... but then I have a family to feed. I do computers as a hobby, not as a job. If I was doing software development for a living, I would probably want something faster.... just for compiling.

You have some archaic ideas about Windows and Ubuntu. First of all the "driver search" thing is nearly entirely over. Windows has generic enough drivers to run nearly

Windows did much to end it when they started specifying what kind of hardware they would support. Manufactures started making "standard" hardware for windows... Linux got the benefit of being able to use standard drivers.... and less r&d.

I am not going to claim I can legitimize all of FireFox's CPU usage, but I think you are missing a lot on how software can operate.

Far as I can tell, flash was the problem. I found cpu load showed no change from 6 tabs to 20, but did depending on the tab viewed (see my post above for more) Animated gifs (like the smilies all in a row when editing this message) use a bit more. Once flash is being used, it uses CPU cycles if it is on the open tab or not. I guess firefox can't tell flash when it is not being seen. Paul says he mostly is looking at a lot of messages on this forum which all have the youtube window at the top. The flash doesn't use much resources for these, but some and times 120 could be a lot. They also take up memory. I don't know if he was hitting the swap wall or not.... but windows uses a file for swap which therefore may be non-contiguous and requires more disk access than a partition type of swap.... both are slow though. If flash is always active, it would be trying to keep it's bits out of swap, meaning the other parts of firefox would have to go there. In my opinion, it would be worth figuring this out if that much firefox use was my daily computing (I tend to read the forums the same way, just a lot less of them... I frequently open another tab to look up something while typing a message, so I understand Paul's method of operating). More memory may have made a difference, but in any case, knowing what was going on would give a better indication of how close a new computer was to being "not enough" in a short time.... or way more than needed. Still if you have the money....

In the end Paul is successful in running this forum because of the way he is and works. I couldn't do it even though I may have been able to fix this particular problem with less fuss.

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posted 13 years ago

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Paul would benefit by raising settings in FireFox or any browser for max connections and requests. Again the problem becomes in available bus room. It is not about paging to disk, but the fact that even though small, there is only so many requests that can actively be transfered at one time.

In general due to the speed of our machines these days, to anyone else, these things seem unnoticeable.

If you switch between IE and FireFox you will notice lag times between tabs and windows increase in IE. That has always been a problem with it for me. It gets confused. FireFox rarely, and I mean rarely, has had that issue for me.

I do not even do computers as a hobby. When I was a gamer I took that portion more seriously. Now it is 100% practical application for what I do day to day. It is like my bicycle, I just want it to work as well as I can expect.

Paul you should do this, it will only take you a minute or two and benefit you greatly if you use FireFox still. You have to accept your needs are unique and so you made a purchase on one. If you have trouble with this let me know I will do it for you.

http://www.ubuntugeek.com/speed-up-firefox-web-browser.html

if you are using Chrome try this Paul.

http://downloadsquad.switched.com/2011/03/03/speed-up-google-chrome-by-enabling-hardware-acceleration-and-pre/

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posted 13 years ago

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I just downloaded Chrome (Chromium on Ubuntu) to try hardware acceleration. Hot ma-ma-jama is it fast now. I mean DAMN.

paul wheaton

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posted 13 years ago

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LasVegasLee wrote:
Thanks, Paul, for the photo of Steve. Certainly my fascination with orbiting brain lasers and gorgeous fembots with a penchant for evil has fueled my love of Linux. How could it not?

For those who want to know more about Steve, the Linux supervillian, check this out -

I saw the one on youtube - but the video came up wonky for me. Kinda skippy / stuttery. So I make a link to the original:

http://www.ubergeek.tv/article.php?pid=54

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posted 13 years ago

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Computers are definitely one of those areas where we're prone to "churn".

It's important to have a clear idea of what you're going to use them for, and not get sucked into buying a more powerful machine that you really need.

My current computer has a mini-itx motherboard with an Atom processor. It's not the speediest machine in the world, but it only draws about ten watts maximum. When I first got it I ran FreeBSD on it, but I've since switched to Debian Linux. Total cost: less than $500.

I use it for browsing the web, reading email, and doing some light programming. I also use it to serve up my collection of mp4 videos (from permies, of course!) to my television, via a device called a Roku and some inexpensive software for it called roksbox. I haven't had any problems with its performance, but then I'm not a gamer or an animator like my oldest son.

It's a desktop machine, not a laptop, because I'm a stay-at-home-and-tend-to-my-garden type and therefore don't have much need for a more mobile device.

paul wheaton

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posted 12 years ago

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Wow. Ten watts. Wow!

I want to report on the laptop I have now. I work on it all day long nearly every day. I have really put it through the paces and ... the best thing ... no crapware. none. Zero. The only thing that ever pops up is stuff that I have set up to do that.

That "no crapware" feeling is really awesome.

On another note: one time, at about five or six weeks into ownership, I tried to put the laptop into hibernate. After a long time, the computer rebooted and lost my state. So I emailed tech support and got this snarky response about how it must be some sort of software I had installed. This is exactly the sort of response I expect from a second class outfit. This goes back to my idea of a first class outfit and their response: "Out of 437,216 computers in use, this is the third time we have had this report. We have several paths we can pursue at this time: 1) we do nothing and hope it goes away; 2) we replace your computer at no charge to you; 2B) we replace your computer and the new computer has linux; 3) we have a technician work with you to try to see if we can get it to do it again and figure out what may be causing the problem - if we determine that it was third party software, we would expect you to cover the support expense; 4) you send your computer to us and we try to duplicate the problem and fix it."

As for speed, if I go two weeks without rebooting and have a 50 firefox windows open (and gobs of other apps) some things will slow down or start to get skippy. But a reboot always seems to fix this. And rebooting once every two weeks seems reasonable.

In general, the computer appears to keep up with me. Which was not the case with the mac or the hp.

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Location: Eastern Colorado, USA

posted 12 years ago

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I have used some variant or other of Linux, exclusively, for the past 8 years; Fedora Linux for the last 5.

I have so completely forgotten what computer problems are that I have difficulty trying to tech-support my Windows user friends. MFC, DLL, VB6, and ASP are nearly forgotten acronyms. "Virus" is nearly gone from my vocabulary.

Two years ago, I finally gave up on trying to solve my father's computer problems, and installed Linux on his machine. I had already gotten him used to Firefox and Thunderbird, so it was an easy transition. Since then, no tech support calls. He's 80. Yeah. 80 years old. Loves the penguin now. If a man whose first car was a Model A Ford can use it, you can too.

Talked to my friend who owns an IT support company. Asked, why don't you convert your customers to Linux? Said he'd be out of work and broke if he did. This, by the way, is the real reason Microsoft brags that their techs make more money than UNIX techs. Duh. You don't get paid to fix that which ain't broken.

Etc, on and on.

Just sayin'.

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posted 12 years ago

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Re Linux:

They say that very few people are able to go on eating sausage once they've seen how it's made. I used to work at Microsoft, and will never use any of their products again if I can avoid it.

Re power:

Paul, perhaps I should clarify my claim to have a 10watt machine. That's the power used by the CPU/motherboard. The hard drive and other peripherals increase the total.

Especially the monitor. I've switched to an LCD display, which is much less of a power hog than the old CRT's. But all by itself it draws as much or more power than the rest of my Atom-based machine. So I'm always careful to turn it off when I'm not using it.

Still, it's a darned sight less expensive to run than my old desktop machines. Besides the fact that they were connected to CRT's, they had 250W power supplies ... and needed them.

paul wheaton

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posted 12 years ago

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Had another hibernate failure.

Also found out that as I was interviewing alexia allen, I tried to have my laptop on to look at the questions people had for her. No internet. No CD/DVD stuff. Just viewing what was already on the screen. The battery died after an hour and a half. I was expecting a six hour battery life.

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Len Ovens

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posted 12 years ago

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Corky wrote:

Especially the monitor. I've switched to an LCD display, which is much less of a power hog than the old CRT's. But all by itself it draws as much or more power than the rest of my Atom-based machine. So I'm always careful to turn it off when I'm not using it.

In my case, the server is monitor (and keyboard) less. Remote logins do anything I need. I do have a terminal plugged into the serial port but haven't turned that on in weeks. It depends on the use of the machine.

paul wheaton

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posted 12 years ago

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Have now had about seven hibernate failures. Lots and lots of work lost.

And now some sort of virus got in (something claiming to be virus software said it was dealing with viruses - not anything I've given permission to run, so I immediately ran ESET which THEN found it and got rid of it) - so I guess running ESET all the time isn't quite flawless either. My stuff is no longer working right. I'm backing everything up and will re-install the o/s.

More on evaluating this laptop: when I get a lot of firefox windows open, all of the video stuff craps out. To do video editing, I have to close all firefox windows. But I could do that with a much cheaper laptop. If I try to watch something on youtube, sometimes the choppyness is so annoying, that I close all of my firefox windows and then fire up one chrome window and then go to youtube.

So I thought I was paying extra to get a really good laptop. Now I just feel like a really stupid sucker.

Based on the information I have at this moment, I think I would have stuck with the HP I picked up for $999 at costco., only I would have installed a fresh copy of windows (not what came with the laptop). That way there would have been no crapware. As for ESET: I dunno, I suppose I'm in better shape. I'm still doing the same thing I did with the free stuff from microsoft's free stuff: copy everything and re-install the os.

In the last six months has linux gotten any better?

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paul wheaton

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posted 12 years ago

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I reinstalled windows, and then installed "linux mint". I have now been using mint for about two days.

First note: mint installs about four times faster than windows. And most of that was where mint seemed to figure out all of my bits and bobs and didn't need me to load drivers for stuff seperately.

Apparently, this version of linux is, as of a couple of weeks ago, the most popular linux. So it is the #3 operatiing system in the world.

Perks:

1) no anti-virus software needed. Apparently, the default security is plenty good. I know there is a lot more to say about this, but in a nutshell, people generally don't load anti-virus software on linux.

2) free. All of everything is from volunteers. They get pleasure in knowing that people are using their stuff.

3) I am not feeding the microsoft engine.

4) I am not feeding apple either.

I'm slowly installing all the apps I use regularly. I suspect there will be some that don't run on linux. But there are two windows-ish emulator-ish things that apparently should work / might work that I might try.

There have been a couple of minor bumps in the road, but I just noticed that there were some 230 upgrades the linux wants to install. So I am now doing that. Maybe the bumps will go away.

One thing I've noticed is that mint uses WAY less memory than windows or mac. Like half. Maybe even less than half. And everything, so far, has been really snappy: the computer waits for me rather than me waiting for the computer.

I'm actually rather hopeful/excited about mint. Which surprises me. Hopeful/excited about an operating system?

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Daniel Worth

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posted 12 years ago

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Paul,

I've been a full time Linux user for 6+ years and I've done everything from video editing to professional printing to full album production on Linux. Our household had 3 desktops and 4 laptops all happily running Linux. If you need any help on using it just let me know.

See my project at http://500yearfarm.com

Len Ovens

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posted 12 years ago

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paul wheaton wrote:
Apparently, this version of linux is, as of a couple of weeks ago, the most popular linux. So it is the #3 operatiing system in the world.

Yeah, I think a lot of people left Ubuntu in the last to versions with the Unity desktop. On the other hand Unity might be a really good first time user desktop when they get it just right. It is easy to use... gives only a few options that are easy to find and is full screen centric.... I hate it, but it would work for most people.

Perks:

1) no anti-virus software needed. Apparently, the default security is plenty good. I know there is a lot more to say about this, but in a nutshell, people generally don't load anti-virus software on linux.

2) free. All of everything is from volunteers. They get pleasure in knowing that people are using their stuff.

3) I am not feeding the microsoft engine.

4) I am not feeding apple either.

3 and 4 are what got me started in 1993 or so... well, I had a Sinclare (spelling?), then an STe ("Jackintosh"?), I got into PCs for BBS stuff, DRDOS for single line and then the free OS2 for two lines... all before that... I started working with Linux because OS2 did not have the networking software I needed to get into Inet stuff and they wanted more money than I could afford for the drivers etc.

number 1 was the reason my wife went Linux on her old computer... with her new one she wanted to stay windows... that lasted a week before she asked if I would install Linux for her.

One thing I've noticed is that mint uses WAY less memory than windows or mac. Like half. Maybe even less than half. And everything, so far, has been really snappy: the computer waits for me rather than me waiting for the computer.

I'm actually rather hopeful/excited about mint. Which surprises me. Hopeful/excited about an operating system?

Well, you get what you pay for. ?!? Whatever. We seem to be a rather long way off from using multi-processor systems worth beans (linux included). It is not enough to just have an OS that deals with them, the software has to work with them well too. Firefox is not meant for the heavy use you give it and so just uses a single processor... even software written for more than one processor ends up single if used the wrong way. (read up on jackd2 if you really want to know more) Threads help and each new process can use another processor. But no matter how many windows of firefox you run it is all one process pretty much.

Computers are not prema-anything though... so what do you expect?

paul wheaton

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posted 12 years ago

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Well, today I tried to install "mikogo" and the linux version would not run. I then tried a similar program and it wouldn't run either.

And then I thought I would try to run netflix. And that wouldn't run.

I have some more apps to install, and I'm a little worried.

Is there some sort of windows emulator where I can run something that would make netflix work?

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John Polk

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posted 12 years ago

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It used to be that many programs did not work under Linux, and many hardware mfgs didn't bother writing drivers for Linux. Linux has gained so many new users that that problem is vanishing.

When I put together my new desktop, I'll probably go 'dual boot'. I haven't used Linux for many years, and am curious how it has matured.

paul wheaton

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posted 12 years ago

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I've used linux as a workstation on many previous projects. I've also used solaris and some unix boxes. And all of my current server stuff is all linux (although I do quite little with the command line stuff).

I used to be able to scrape by with c shell, k shell, etc. And later scraped by with bash. Around 1989 I was using interactive unix and was pretty good at sed and awk. I did c programming and then a mountain of c++ using cfront.

I've used KDE and gnome on linux in the past.

I've tried to install linux at home about five times and each time I gave it up as too much hassle.

When using it in a work capacity, i was always glad that the real linux power users were in the building and were paid to help at the drop of a hat.

The first time I ever installed linux, I had a guy working in the next cube that was a linux nut. He told me that if I installed it, he would give me all the help i needed so that it would be easier than using NT. He helped for a bout 15 minutes and then got sick of helping me and told me I was on my own.

I have since then learned that if you want to drive away a linux person, all you have to do is ask for help.

BBS: I ran galacticomm for a while. And some stuff that ran on VMS. And at one point I made a DOS terminal emulator that became very popular.

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Richard Kutscher

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posted 12 years ago

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paul wheaton wrote:Is there some sort of windows emulator where I can run something that would make netflix work?

Have you tried installing Wine? It is supposed to be a pretty good windows emulator, not 100%, but think most people say 90% of winblows programs are compatible with it. Have had limited success myself, mainly due to my older hardware (8 years old or so).

Try using "yum install wine", or whatever the package manager is in your distrobution. That should search through and install what you need.

Am using the Fedora 15 install and don't really use much software on it, am mainly playing around a little. Will play more after my move in couple months.

Raven Sutherland

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posted 12 years ago

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................don't forget to take breaks Paul.....

if your able to quiet the chattering monkeys in your brain for a Spell....

Listen to the Wind blowing thru the trees....

for ..... they have a message....

Dave Bennett

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posted 12 years ago

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I think that Microsoft is best described as an "Anti-Operating System" but then I am a UNIX lover so Linux is the way to go in my opinion. When these old G4 Macs finally give up the ghost my next and probably last system will run Linus also. I can't afford a new Mac so I will build a new system from this huge collection of serviceable parts I have acquired over the years. It is my opinion that most virus writers target windoze because it is the most common OS so they can attack big companies more easily and if they screw up other systems...... they rationalize it as an....... "oh well sorry I wasn't going after you." Not an acceptable answer to the problem but I suspect using Linux there won't be virus problems. No Bill Gates to attack and no big corporate systems either.

"When there is no life in the soil it is just dirt."
"MagicDave"

Steve Nolan

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posted 12 years ago

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Hi everyone!

I was an MCSE but I have used Linux for the last 10 years, and Mint for the last 3 years (I did use Ubuntu until then).

I find that WINE can run most windows programs, but I still have Oracle VMWare with XP on the old 'puter just in case. It has been a LONG time since I had any problems running windows progs on my computer. I just don't need them with linux Mint.

I have a dual boot with win7 on my backup, just so I can boot it to remember how to fix the (MANY) problems my windows friends run into.

I met Richard Stallman a few years back and was not swayed to his view that command line is the only way to compute, but I don't have his mathematical brain. Still, I am glad i use linux, and open source wherever feasible. Always check www.osalt.com before ya buy software.

Cheers,

Steve

Len Ovens

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posted 12 years ago

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paul wheaton wrote:Well, today I tried to install "mikogo" and the linux version would not run. I then tried a similar program and it wouldn't run either.

And then I thought I would try to run netflix. And that wouldn't run.

I have some more apps to install, and I'm a little worried.

Is there some sort of windows emulator where I can run something that would make netflix work?

The linux mikogo is beta. not sure why it wouldn't work though. Wine is the biggest windows/linux interface around, but there are some commercial variants that do at least some things better the name cross something crossware? comes to mind.

It can be that way.. Not sure about netflix, but minitube has got to be the best youtube viewer I have seen yet... Just downloaded it this weekend. Nice clean full screen video.

BBS: I ran galacticomm for a while. And some stuff that ran on VMS. And at one point I made a DOS terminal emulator that became very popular.

I ran Maximus on both the drdos and os2 machines. A friend of mine ran two lines on a win3 machine (dating myself?)... when the second line was active the first dropped to half speed... He had a timer that power bumped it once a day to keep it running when he was away. I switched him to OS2 and those problems went away. When I went to Linux I redid the BBS with a few home made utilities for menus and such with bash as glue. I would just use dialog now, slower but less work and easy to maintain. I had a custom version of login to handle new users etc. It also passed callerid and some other info. The nice thing about BBS was that there were no anonymous people (well I am sure there were some) I only let people on my system I knew.

paul wheaton

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posted 12 years ago

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I dodged mikogo by using google docs. For what I needed to do that day, google docs worked better anyway.

I have several podcast opportunities that I have put off because I don't have a way to record skype. In windows I had a program called "pamela" that I paid for. I could call somebody with skype, visit with them a little and then say "let's start" and hit record. When I'm done, I stop recording and then visit a bit more before ending the call.

I could arrange an 800 number conference call service that records, but that records the whole conversation. So I would have to edit it. That adds more work. A lot more work. Work I don't want. It would be easier to pop back over to windows and fire up pamela. Of course, I don't have my notes over there ... and then my life starts to become this dual boot hassle.

Any suggestions on recording a phone/voip conversation on linux?

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paul wheaton

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wine is now installed. I thought I would fire it up and there would be a window of windoze - but I couldn't figure it out.

The other day somebody suggested I watch something because they thought it was permaculture-ish. So I popped over to netflix, found it in instant view and .... it won't play. So then I thought I would fire up wine, run firefox in wine and watch it. Nope. I researched it and .... apparently there are no solutions.

I can look at stuff on hulu and youtube okay. And I watched this movie on another service (but I had to pay). So then I thought maybe I'll ditch netflix and go with something linux compatible. I spent about five minutes trying to find alternatives and let it go.

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Raven Sutherland

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you need to utilize the Permie power (on the Board)

of saying ........ what your looking for......

someone else may already know of it....

Len Ovens

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paul wheaton wrote:I dodged mikogo by using google docs. For what I needed to do that day, google docs worked better anyway.

Any suggestions on recording a phone/voip conversation on linux?

Anything that works with the jackd audio back end would work. The jackd website lists:

VOIP

Asterisk: is the world’s leading open source telephony engine and tool kit. Offering flexibility unheard of in the world of proprietary communications, Asterisk empowers developers and integrators to create advanced communication solutions...for free.
I Hear U: is a Voice over IP (VoIP) application that creates an audio stream between two computers easily and with the minimal network traffic.

Internet DJ Console is an Internet radio app for making a live radio show or podcast.

I do not know if any of these will help you.... Once the output goes through jack you can split the audio to go both to the sound card as well as a recorder (lots of recorders do jack).

Outside of jack everything these days goes through alsa. There is apparently an alsa device called "tee" which can feed two things at the same time. http://www.volkerschatz.com/noise/alsa.html shows it used to listen to audio at the same time as writing it to a file. i have never used it and don't have the time to figure it out these days... I do audio, but anyone doing semi or pro audio uses jack (low latency and all that).

John Polk

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I recently read (on the M$ Newsletter) that M$ had "acquired" Skype VOIP. Stands to reason...they want to be king of everything digital.

EDITED to add the word "Skype"...they bought the big guns!

Len Ovens

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John Polk wrote:I recently read (on the M$ Newsletter) that M$ had "acquired" VOIP. Stands to reason...they want to be king of everything digital.

Bought VOIP? or bought a particular brand of VOIP? It is pretty hard to buy something that has all kinds of free stuff for. There is Gphone and skype and I could see them buying one of them... but not both. (and probably not gphone)

John Polk

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I edited my post...they bought Skype. I never thought it would happen, but 'big money' doesn't talk, they scream.

paul wheaton

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Len,

Out of all of those things, which one do you suggest I try first?

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paul wheaton

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posted 12 years ago

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So here are the three things that I have not been able to solve yet with linux mint:

1) watching netflix instant view

2) recording skype calls

3) sometimes when I suspend, I cannot get my wireless internet stuff to work until I do a full reboot.

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posted 12 years ago

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Linux Mint is the highest distribution of Linux it has over taken over Ubuntu's #1 spot I use it on all my machines and some old computers that are 15 yrs of 10 yrs I use Jolicloud. Mint has been # 1 for me for years

Len Ovens

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posted 12 years ago

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paul wheaton wrote:So here are the three things that I have not been able to solve yet with linux mint:

1) watching netflix instant view

I will not be able to help you there... I don't do netflix.

2) recording skype calls

hmm, I haven't reinstalled skype because I don't use it... no body I want to talk to was ever available when I was... but I think it uses pulse audio as a back end. Please check. If you open the pulse audio control, under multi-media... while you are using skype (may need to be connected to another user) it should show you which applications are feeding it sound. If you see skype in there, then there is a jack backend for pulse.

3) sometimes when I suspend, I cannot get my wireless internet stuff to work until I do a full reboot.

That seems to be a hardware dependent problem. My wifes netbook has no problems with it... I always shutdown instead of suspending. The apps I use seem to be very good at remembering where they were last time I used them. I can understand how with your use that could be a problem though.

Fred Morgan

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posted 12 years ago

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paul wheaton wrote:So here are the three things that I have not been able to solve yet with linux mint:

1) watching netflix instant view

2) recording skype calls

3) sometimes when I suspend, I cannot get my wireless internet stuff to work until I do a full reboot.

One thing you might not be aware of Paul, but when you record someone, make sure you let them know you are doing it. It is very illegal to record a phone call without telling the person. I suggest you record the warning when you first start.

Recording is actually easy, just tap into your wire going to your stereo output (i.e. headset) with a Y, and send it back into a port that is a mic, input or something like that. Radio Shack usually has these Y junctions in stock.

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Brian Gallimore

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posted 12 years ago

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paul wheaton wrote:So here are the three things that I have not been able to solve yet with linux mint:

2) recording skype calls

3) sometimes when I suspend, I cannot get my wireless internet stuff to work until I do a full reboot.

2) I just tried this out and it half-worked: (using Linux Mint 12)
-installed free program skype-call-recorder from http://atdot.ch/scr/download/ (it didn't install an icon for me, so I ran the program from a terminal window by typing 'skype-call-recorder')
-had to also install version 9.8 of libssl (open Synaptic Package Manager, search for libssl, check box, click install)
-the receiving audio records fine, but my audio records choppy. It might work fine on your machine and is probably worth trying. I'll play with it a bit to see if I can figure it out.
-learned about the skype-call-recorder from https://help.ubuntu.com/community/SkypeRecordingHowto

note: a 'y-cable' probably won't be a good solution as suggested in a previous post. The microphone and headphone are two separate signals that need to be mixed to be recorded. Besides, why would you take audio that is already in the computer and try to feed it back in the computer again?

3) I had the same problem with Mint (older version, 7 I think) on my Asus netbook. I looked into it and learned there was a fix that involved re-configuring the wireless driver, but I never spent the time needed to fix it.

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Corky Hatfield wrote:Re Linux:Corky year ago I worked in a shop and worked with as I call the Microscam products LOL I have been using Linux Mint and wont change I have been teaching people to use it I am not to fond of Mint 12 11 is fabulous.

They say that very few people are able to go on eating sausage once they've seen how it's made. I used to work at Microsoft, and will never use any of their products again if I can avoid it.

Re power:

Paul, perhaps I should clarify my claim to have a 10watt machine. That's the power used by the CPU/motherboard. The hard drive and other peripherals increase the total.

Especially the monitor. I've switched to an LCD display, which is much less of a power hog than the old CRT's. But all by itself it draws as much or more power than the rest of my Atom-based machine. So I'm always careful to turn it off when I'm not using it.

Still, it's a darned sight less expensive to run than my old desktop machines. Besides the fact that they were connected to CRT's, they had 250W power supplies ... and needed them.

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paul wheaton wrote:I reinstalled windows, and then installed "linux mint". I have now been using mint for about two days. Paul you will find HP printers work flawlessly with Mint. 2 years now using Mint I share it and teach what I can to get people off the Microscam train. You do not need anti Virus however CLam ANti Virus in in the Symapatic package. Tons of free stuff there!! Windows is resource hog and Virus and malware magnet. Linux is just what you Smart phones are based on Android is a Linux Kernel same as Linux!

First note: mint installs about four times faster than windows. And most of that was where mint seemed to figure out all of my bits and bobs and didn't need me to load drivers for stuff seperately.

Apparently, this version of linux is, as of a couple of weeks ago, the most popular linux. So it is the #3 operatiing system in the world.

Perks:

1) no anti-virus software needed. Apparently, the default security is plenty good. I know there is a lot more to say about this, but in a nutshell, people generally don't load anti-virus software on linux.

2) free. All of everything is from volunteers. They get pleasure in knowing that people are using their stuff.

3) I am not feeding the microsoft engine.

4) I am not feeding apple either.

I'm slowly installing all the apps I use regularly. I suspect there will be some that don't run on linux. But there are two windows-ish emulator-ish things that apparently should work / might work that I might try.

There have been a couple of minor bumps in the road, but I just noticed that there were some 230 upgrades the linux wants to install. So I am now doing that. Maybe the bumps will go away.

One thing I've noticed is that mint uses WAY less memory than windows or mac. Like half. Maybe even less than half. And everything, so far, has been really snappy: the computer waits for me rather than me waiting for the computer.

I'm actually rather hopeful/excited about mint. Which surprises me. Hopeful/excited about an operating system?

Luke Baker

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posted 12 years ago

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paul wheaton wrote:So here are the three things that I have not been able to solve yet with linux mint:

1) watching netflix instant view

I don't think this is possible without running Windows or Mac OS in a virtual machine or dual-booting. While I don't consider this a great option, there are lots of devices (blu-ray players, media players, game systems) available that can play Netflix content that are generally hooked up to a TV, but I imagine they could be rigged to hook up to a computer monitor of some sort.

2) recording skype calls

I think some have already suggested some Skype specific options, but here's a link with some instructions on how to record things using PulseAudio (the sound server that runs in Linux and can give you control of all things audio).

https://www.linux.com/learn/tutorials/367395-weekend-project-record-from-skype-calls-and-other-apps-on-linux

paul wheaton

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Fred Morgan wrote:

paul wheaton wrote:

One thing you might not be aware of Paul, but when you record someone, make sure you let them know you are doing it. It is very illegal to record a phone call without telling the person. I suggest you record the warning when you first start.

So far, everybody knows I am recording a podcast. So that's covered.

there used to be a call recorder you could buy for a blackberry - but then it got banned. Probably for this reason.

I think there is a recorder for skype because recording skype is NOT recording a "phone" call. Just a guess.

I recently heard something where a person CAN record a phone call if at least one person participating in the call is aware that it is recorded. Interesting.

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paul wheaton

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Brian: oof. That is exactly the sort of level of power-user-ness that I want to avoid.

Somebody on reddit sent me a link to something and I started to get the same feeling: gonna hafta get all techy about things I don't wanna get all techy about.

3) I had the same problem with Mint (older version, 7 I think) on my Asus netbook. I looked into it and learned there was a fix that involved re-configuring the wireless driver, but I never spent the time needed to fix it.

Yeah .... I figured. I keep hoping one of the skillions of updates will fix this. So eventually, the problem will sort of just go away.

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