freezer

I've tried to make it work between us, Ubuntu. I swear I have. Through the work-arounds and the make-do app replacements. Admittedly, some were pretty neat (I never would've discovered DeVeDe without you).

But now... Once I've finally got things configured just like I wanted - all apps I like in place, Wine properly configured, themes set up nicely, I even figured out how to make the taskbar emulate OSX's launcher...

And then you start booting to a minimal command line. And an hour of Googling tells me that A) The problem is widespread and B) No one knows what causes it or how to fix it.

Long story short: Fuck it. I'm done. Maybe a PC that's been built to use Linux will be a bit less... quirky. Maybe someday I'll find out.

But it won't be for a while. My next PC purchase, I'll probably spring for Windows 7. Using a personal computer shouldn't be as much work as you made it.

We meet again...

I'm pretty sure Linux just took revenge on me for my abandonment of it...

After I deleted the Linux partition, I used GParted to re-size my XP partition to the full disk size.

Apparently, my BIOS didn't like that.

Because once I started GRUB (Linux's boot loader) kept looking for the other partition, and locked the system up when it couldnt' find it.

Fine. We'll just pop in the XP disk, run "fixmbr" from the Recovery Console, and move along.

Um... No.

Suddenly, my IDE drive is being checked as the master drive.

Windows was installed on the newer, bigger SATA drive. The older drive has NEVER had an OS on it, BTW.

Mutter, grumble. Fine. Format the XP drive (the stuff I wanted, i moved to the IDE drive anyway.), reinstall XP.

Yet again, no.

Turns out, quick formatting doesn't kill the old Master Boot Record. So now it won't load XP without the install disk inserted, it's STILL seeing my IDE as the C: drive.

So I have to do a full SLOW format of the SATA drive and unplug the IDE drive for the time being. (For some reason, XP will try and ignore the SATA drive in favor of the older, more standard IDE drive.).

Get everything installed...

Only to see the IDE drive is blank.

HAAAAAAAATE.

Fortunately, I still have my old PC handy (only had the current one for a month or so), so I can rescue my files (The only really urgent thing was my RSS feeds, which I THOUGHT I had backed up on Yahoo Briefcase, anyway.).

Just call it Ubuntu's Revenge, I guess.

Well... It was fun while it lasted.

I like Linux. I was getting used to the look and feel. I was SLOWLY finding Linux alternatives to the apps I liked or figuring out how to make them work under Wine (Ktorrent was a particularly nice find.).

But the hardware issues have finally made me throw my hands up in disgusted defeat.

Recently, I used a refill kit on my HP printer cartridges. Apparently I did something wrong, because all my documents were coming out pure red.

This used to happen all the time with my Lexmark, so I figured that I'd just have to switch to greyscale until I have the cash to replace the color cartridge.

That's when I discovered that, apparently, the Linux print server has been ignoring my black cartridge and has been running EVERYTHING through the color cartridge. When I switched the print settings to just the black cartridge, the pages came out blank.

Yeah. Screw this. I have a perfectly good Windows partition. I'm using it.

I'll probably go back to Linux before too long (Probably in time for Kubuntu 7.10). But I'm definitely test driving the Live CDs first, so I can see if the thing will actually recognize my hardware.

Why didn't I switch to the KDE desktop sooner? OMG it's so much more convenient than GNOME. (For one thing, it launches Windows apps without having to right-click for a launch option).

And I spent a couple of hours looking for a wallpaper changer for GNOME (ultimately settling for a downloaded script that I set to run every ten minutes with the crontab command).

KDE has a wallpaper changer built in to it's basic options.

KDE is so much more Windows like and user-friendly... I'm wondering what the hell I was looking at that turned me off to it in the first place.

And if Ubuntu wants to be the choice of Linux n00bs, why the hell is the much more sparse GNOME desktop come as teh default (and there's absolutely no hint that there's even an option for a second interface, let alone how to switch).

Oh, Linux... You enchant and infuriate me all at the same time!

As I remarked previously... Linux appears to be a great OS... Unless you're heavily into videos: viewing them or editing them.

Then... It sucks ass. Unwashed ass.

Current issue: Trying to get the mplayer plugin for Firefox to play video files properly. It works as advertised with streaming audio, but video streams (of the not-flash variety), load up, then die unplayed.

Looking up the issue on various Ubuntu forums suggested reinstalling the mozilla-mplayer plugin.\

I did so.

Now the audio is fubar, and it STILL won't stream video.

And that's in addition to the ongoing struggle with hardware drivers: my print driver refuses to recognize my exact model (It's an HP Desktop 3930. There are specific setting for the 3920 and 40, but not the thirty) and the settings leave MUCH to be desired. (Even Windows most generic drivers would let you set print quality on a per-job basis). And I've just given up trying to find drivers for my Sound Blaster. (I found an SB driver package... Which doesn't contain my particular card and won't install because it lacks a software library it refuses to identify).

I am SERIOUSLY considering scrapping Linux and relegating it to a virtual drive on XP. But for now, I persevere. And curse. A lot.

ETA: Media crisis averted. First workaround: Zap all the media plugins except for the app you want to use. Worked like a charm. Second workaround (the better one): The MediaPlayerConnectivity plug-in, which launches the stream with an external player of the user's choice. Awesome!

The driver thing still sucks ass, though!