What's the best alternative to Windows 8?

Message

darrelljon · #1 Post by **darrelljon** » Fri 27 Sep 2013, 12:17

I've posted about Windows 8 before here http://murga-linux.com/puppy/viewtopic.php?t=87647
Just got a new laptop that came with Windows 8 and after a few hours of frustrating use, I am looking for an heavyweight 64 bit alternative.

darrelljon · #2 Post by **darrelljon** » Fri 27 Sep 2013, 22:08

Just discovered you can't move the user profile to another partition let alone another disk. There are ways involving regedit but no official or supported method. Thanks Windows 8. What a POS.

Smithy · #3 Post by **Smithy** » Fri 27 Sep 2013, 23:15

Fatdog 64 and Lighthouse 64 are the ones in Puppyland. There may be others.

I think they start off light but can become heavyweight. Depends what you want to do I guess. Hope this helps you a bit.

rokytnji · #4 Post by **rokytnji** » Fri 27 Sep 2013, 23:47

After struggling still with installing Windows XP drivers (I have the OEM driver cd for XP) on my eeepc 900 so I can sell it monday.

Anything is better than Windows. On my 64bit computers. I am partial to AntiX
64bit 13.1 so I voted other.

Macpup 550 is going on the replacement netbook I bought to replace the eeepc instead of Windows (washes face and hands).

But, I don't game, CAD, or use Skype and could care less if Adobe Flash Player
dies and HTML 5 takes over also.

Ted Dog · #5 Post by **Ted Dog** » Fri 27 Sep 2013, 23:55

Fatdog64-621 with the right HD drivers for video card can be more useful out of the box than windows 8 after a week of tweaking,
Fatdog64 will even boot with the crazy EFI 'lockdown' Microsoft attempts, just be-sure to turn off hibernation in Win8 or newer linux drivers will refuse to mount win8 active partions due to a VERY nasty method win8 uses to fastboot. To avoid disk corruption, best to not dual boot, just use a different HD
My Win8 had a oversized harddrive, but I found if you shrink the image first, then direct copy onto a smaller harddrive, windows 8 does not throw a fit like past versions. It now wisely has your 'product' key embedded in firmware at manufacturer. I reduced my win8 active portion to 11G, and after perfecting the backup/restore (at 8G moved to bluray storage) so I fit Win8 into a 60G HD. It complains but for what little use I have for it, works OK.

Colonel Panic · #6 Post by **Colonel Panic** » Sat 28 Sep 2013, 16:40

I'm not familiar with the recent 64-bit Puppies but Fatdog was good when I last used it (version 511).

Apart from Puppy, if I had to choose just one 64-bit distro for my machine my choice would probably be one of the RPM-based distros - either CentOS (or one of the spinoffs like Stella) or SUSE, and given the need to choose I'd go for CentOS or possibly one of the other RedHat clones and derivatives such as Scientific Linux. The RedHat derivatives are like Windows NT - a bit retro and perhaps boring but rock stable and they get the job done.

Other people may have been luckier with Mageia than I was - the last time I tried to install it on my machine (a beta version btw) I trashed the MBR and couldn't boot my computer at all.

Terryphi · #7 Post by **Terryphi** » Sun 29 Sep 2013, 05:01

Linux Mint is the best alternative to everything - but Puppy is fun to play with.

koulaxizis · #8 Post by **koulaxizis** » Sun 29 Sep 2013, 08:40

Terryphi wrote:Linux Mint is the best alternative to everything - but Puppy is fun to play with.

I totally agree!

Colonel Panic · #9 Post by **Colonel Panic** » Sun 29 Sep 2013, 11:41

Terryphi wrote:Linux Mint is the best alternative to everything - but Puppy is fun to play with.

I'm not going to argue - Mint or CentOS it is then

grump · #10 Post by **grump** » Mon 30 Sep 2013, 00:17

darrelljon wrote:Just discovered you can't move the user profile to another partition let alone another disk. ....

Right-click on 'My Documents', then 'properties', then 'location' and type in where you want the files to reside. It can be another partition (I always have a 'data' partition) or another disk. Repeat for 'My Music', 'My Pictures' etc.

As for the missing start button - try one of the many replacements available. Mine is "Classic Shell".

As for the hidden shutdown, make a new shortcut on the desktop and write a short command like 'shutdown -s -f -t 03' as the command. Put it in the lower right corner of the screen.

I don't have a M$ account and the machine runs very well.

I don't like the metro theme or the lack of small games like solitare (you sort of need the M$ account to download from the M$ Store), but that's no big deal. However, my wife mainly uses the Win8 machine, while I mainly use Puppy (Precise 5.7.1 atm) on this laptop.

Puppy is more high maintenance than Win8 in my experience, in that I have to do more internet searching for solutions to small problems than I do for the other machine.

darrelljon · #11 Post by **darrelljon** » Mon 30 Sep 2013, 11:44

Ended up using the following tutorial though not officially supported
http://www.eightforums.com/tutorials/42 ... -disk.html
works perfectly.
Moving My Documents is not sufficient

linuxbear · #12 Post by **linuxbear** » Mon 30 Sep 2013, 18:46

Colonel Panic wrote:- but Puppy is fun to play with.

I'm not going to argue - Mint or CentOS it is then

I disagree, Bodhi Linux will outrun Mint or Cent. It runs faster and boots faster on my machines

Colonel Panic · #13 Post by **Colonel Panic** » Tue 01 Oct 2013, 13:03

linuxbear wrote:
Colonel Panic wrote:- but Puppy is fun to play with.

I'm not going to argue - Mint or CentOS it is then
I disagree, Bodhi Linux will outrun Mint or Cent. It runs faster and boots faster on my machines

If speed is the main criterion, I agree - Vector, ArchBang and CrunchBang would also be faster than those two, and probably a few others too. However, I'd imagine that if someone could run Windows 8 on their machine, speed wouldn't be a problem when running either CentOS or Mint on the same one.

linuxbear · #14 Post by **linuxbear** » Tue 01 Oct 2013, 18:57

I use Win 7 to connect to machines at work, so my laptop is capable of that. I run Ubuntu/E17 about 80% of the time because Enlightenment (or Bodhi Linux) is very fast. Anything but Unity. I also like Cinnamon for speed, but E17 is a lot faster.

bark_bark_bark · #15 Post by **bark_bark_bark** » Tue 01 Oct 2013, 22:31

Slackware is a good option.

darry1966 · #16 Post by **darry1966** » Tue 01 Oct 2013, 23:05

Hi guys,

How about Linux Lite. Also has anybody watched Spatry's Cup Of Linux on Youtube.

Ted Dog · #17 Post by **Ted Dog** » Wed 02 Oct 2013, 04:20

Well if JB will release FatDog64-630 already.... It would be the fastest 64bit distro EVER

!!,

He has a new mode for running programs that is about 10x faster then possible in current version, I asked if it would be the default boot mode so the jaws would drop from day one, but he ain't ready to drop that big of a change on the linux world.

So look for a command line setting for that mode...

nooby · #18 Post by **nooby** » Wed 02 Oct 2013, 06:26

JB should be short for use name JamesBond then

wow sounds interesting indeed especially considering
they solved the UEFI thing? So encourage him to share
his dev thoughts on what to expect.

nooby · #19 Post by **nooby** » Wed 02 Oct 2013, 06:28

My naive alternative is to keep all my Win XP
and Win Vista and Win 7 machines and put a frugal
install of Puppy on them.
that is my version of " What's the best alternative to Windows 8?"

To never buy a machine that has win 8 on it unless given for free?

infromthepound · #20 Post by **infromthepound** » Wed 02 Oct 2013, 10:34

Anything.

(old)Puppy Linux Discussion Forum

(old)Puppy Linux Discussion Forum

What's the best alternative to Windows 8?

What is the best Windows 8 alternative?

What's the best alternative to Windows 8?

Linux Lite