OT: New Compaq *&^%$#!

Ditto Dell, Sony, and everyone else.

My only option there was an 'eMachine' from BestBuy or CompUSA. One look at the innards is all I needed- they're built out of bottom-of-the-line parts. One of the local computer shops refuses to work on them.

-Carl

On Sat, 20 Dec 2003 18:51:54 GMT, "Bob Swinney" brought forth from the murky depths:

Thanks. I'm actually a curmudgeon but cynicism fit the topic better.

--- - Sarcasm is just one more service we offer. -

The clerks at Walmart think so. So do the mechanics down at the local dealership, and the nurses at your local hospital. Vertical market applications have long used the unix, or Linux, operating system. Most of the users don't know, and don't care, what operating system is installed. They aren't systems developers or computer scientists, so they don't need to concern themselves about OS internals. All they care about are the application programs with which they actually interact.

There are now suites of application programs available for the Linux platform to service nearly any need. Star Office is every bit as capable as Microsoft Office, and is available in a free version for Linux users. To the user, there is virtually no difference in the two application suites. The situation is similar for graphics and engineering applications.

If something is available for Windows, it likely has a Linux equivalent (often freeware with source code, which excites the propellor heads, but needn't concern the appliance user). About the only area where this fails is game programs, which are often very platform specific (though there are games for Linux).

Of course you do have to be wary of hardware like Winmodems and Winprinters, which are very much Windows specific because they've off loaded much of the required processing from the external hardware to a Windows DLL. Some plug and pray hardware may also need a bit of user intervention to install.

But there are nearly always hardware alternatives which don't care which operating system you run. And now, vendors are starting to provide Linux drivers as well as Windows drivers with their hardware, so even specialist items like the DVR video board I'm using will also work under Linux.

Linux is getting better at dealing with plug and pray hardware too. In fact I'd say it is already better than Windows. It doesn't just give up if it can't figure out what to do, it *asks* you for help. Linux can sometimes be an adventure to install on non- standard hardware. But the same can be said of Windows, and there's usually less you can do about it with Windows.

In any case, you'll probably prefer to have the hardware vendor pre-install the operating system, whether it is Windows or Linux (more and more vendors are now offering Linux as an alternative to Windows). So as a user, you really don't have to worry or care about such issues. All you need to do is turn the computer on, start your application, and do whatever it is you want to do with the computer. Same as with an automobile, you don't need to know how to program its powertrain control computer to drive it.

If you've used a TiVo, you've run Linux, since that's the OS underlying the TiVo application. Most TiVo users probably don't know that, and most probably don't care, but it is nice for those of us who *are* "propellor heads", and like to hack our consumer electronics for enhanced functionality.

Gary

I've had both HP and Compaq at work and they both suck. I swapped out the video card in the HP and more than doubled the speed. Just enough wierd parts that it's cheaper to trash it if any hardware fails; I have zero faith in parts availibility a year from now too. I know a few people I would wish them upon, but then Chinese slow death would be too good for those individuals 8o).

Try a visit to

Ugh! Now there's two places I avoid.

Gary

I am on my 2nd e machine. The first one still runs just fine my only problem after 4 years is a noisy fan. Customer support for any questions/problems has been far better than what I recieved for my compaq. I'd buy another e machine, I'd never buy another compaq. If you are a serious gamer or do high end graphics you need something better.

I have SuSe Linux 9.0 pro installed in my high end machine, It has drivers for any printer you can mention, USB support is excellent, CD-RW and DVD included, video support seems to be unlimited. Havent tried windblows emulator, no sense in clobbering a good machine with a bunch of shit. Installation from the SuSe Disks is even more of a "no-brainer" than any version of windblows, and it's stable, far better than any version of windblows. windblows 95, 98, and XP all crashed while running a 500 frame animation, Linux blew through it without a hitch. (PovRay render 4 1/2 hours under Linux, eight hours combined in the other three, no finish on any version of windblows. Crashed after 230 frames, no recovery possible, start again.) SuSe tech support far better than micro$oft, and you don't have to fork over bucks every year before they will tell you anything.

SuSe comes on 7 CD's and one DVD, includes just about any kind of program you want to use, and none of it is stripped versions or has crippled functions, those are the exclusive properties of the incapable OS. Two months with it in the 2.66 Ghz P4-c, and still no crashes. Windblows, on the other hand,,,,

THe SuSe 9.0 I have has a very Mac type interface for those that need it, but still has the commandline options if you want them. Very impressed, windblows XP goes for just $199.99 at the local Best Buy, SuSe goes for $79.98 from the same place. Lots of software available at no cost, or with licenses available at prices far below micro$oft, most downloadable. Much of it in .rpm (self extracting) formats. Going to the command line and typing "man" and the program brings up more information than you can use. They just assume you know something about the OS to begin with. Not much different from switching to dos to run an old program. Best part is not worrying about it crashing.

Our site used to be a Compaq free zone after all the grief we had with their proprietary view of "Industry Standard" hardware and software. Unfortunately, two mergers later, it is now the company standard. I weep for you.

Mark Rand RTFM

Seems to me if you are buying an HP machine you might just as well get one with HPUX. We've run them in the lab for years and years now (along with the HP RTE systems) and prefer the HP stuff to the other brands out there. Although I must admit HPUX and AIX from IBM are very similar operating systems; nevertheless, we prefer the HP hardware to the IBM hardware.

-- wf.

Lennie the Lurker wrote:

I had one e-machine for 24 hours, took it back and bought something I could work with. No way I could upgrade that box to anything except the configuration it was in when I bought it. Won't even look at compaq tho, junk by any other name,,,,,

Well, this is strange. I recently bought a Compaq S4000NX, same thing but with the 2.4 GHz Celeron and less memory, and I couldn't be happier. Of course I went from a 266MMX with Win95 :-) I did go to Microsoft.com and do an online upgrade of Windows XP.

It will suggest about 40 Megs of upgrades, but you get to select what you need. Most of the suggested patches are for networked computers and cases where an attacker has direct access to the keyboard. You probably don't need any of that stuff. I ended up with about 8 Megs of installs and everything went great. Any of the patches can be removed by themself if you want to later (they are listed in add/remove programs).

Go to Control Panel, add/remove programs. Get rid of the BackWeb stuff. It is listed as a RealOne auto update or some such. It takes a long time to uninstall, don't panic. BackWeb runs in the background checking to see if you are online and pops up a box to ask if you want to upgrade stuff.

Download and run Adaware and SpyBot, they check your machine for spy ware. I had 20 or 30 spy programs after a month of Internet use. Update them faithfully. Download Sygate Personal Firewall. Set it to block everything and ask at first, and block any of the auto connect stuff you don't want. Allow Netscape free access, etc.

If you want to upgrade to a P4, the motherboard will accept up to a 2.5 GHz P4 (I have emailed to Compaq's customer service on this, but ask them yourself if you want to).

Dennis

I second the motion for UX. I had one or more UX boxes under my desk (and several BIG servers down in the computer room) for ten years. The biggest problem I had was that the UX boxes required so little sysadm attention that I would forget what to do between problems. Not so with the Sun boxes management inflicted on me. I think there may have been three flavors of UNIX that I haven't worked with, but Solaris required the most babysitting of them all. I never could understand why I saw people wanting to hire "Sun system administrators" until I had to support some of them 8o((.

As to Linux releases Mandrake might be worth a look. I've downloaded a couple of versions and the 9.x versions seem to really install cleanly. The three CD set contains almost any application you can think of, and the price is right.

Done already.

Done already.

Here's what I posted the other day:

I sent a nasty note to Compaq/HP about all the problems with our new machine.

Got a real nice reply with instructions on how and what "services" (that's what Compaq/HP calls them) can be disabled from start up and

I'm still a bit pissed that the machine came configured with software no one will ever use (Wi-Fi support for a machine with no Wi-Fi ports, for example) but if it doesn't f*ck up again, I'll keep it.

For all of you who wrote to tell me to roll my own, I would if I had the time (and might this summer) but I've got two kids that have a ton of homework (my daughter is an AP student taking college courses. In high school.) and needed a computer Right Now.

For all of you wiho posted helpful links and ideas, thanks.