Ubuntu

[RichardS]

Originally Posted by graphicgr8s

3 isn't hard. Try five. I've gone as high as ten. But all with a boot manager. I got 4 without it. But not 5

Which boot manager, by the way? I'm using BiNG, but mainly for partition management and cloning.

Richard.

[cupic]

thanks guys for the info as I too love Photoshop and lightroom and will keep using the Live CD till I'm certain I like it enough to maybe have 2 OS on one HDD or have 2 HDD on


cheers

[graphicgr8s]

Originally Posted by RichardS

Which boot manager, by the way? I'm using BiNG, but mainly for partition management and cloning.

Richard.

I did it quite a while ago. One machine has one I downloaded for free. The other has a manager a buddy gave me that he developed. It was a beta I was testing for him. So truth is I don't remember.

[Nanthiel]

Note that Photoshop works on Linux (up to CS2 without problems — at least I haven't encountered any)... but if you need Lightroom, you have to use Windows. =/

[cupic]

Thats good news as I have CS2


cheers

[Nanthiel]

On the Wine website I read somewhere that other Photoshops work as well (CS3 being the most problematic), but you have to give it some sweat. =p
Although it also said that CS2 can have problems. But as I said, I had none.

[Volvo244T]

Originally Posted by Adam

Ubuntu runs great and is actually faster/more stable than windows, but the key downside is that you can't really run photoshop. Thus, I really only use the Ubuntu laptop to browse the web and code.

Originally Posted by Nanthiel

Note that Photoshop works on Linux (up to CS2 without problems — at least I haven't encountered any)... but if you need Lightroom, you have to use Windows. =/

Solution: VirtualBox.

[stevebrot]

Originally Posted by Volvo244T

Solution: VirtualBox.

I was going to suggest virtualization, but have no experience with Open Source options. I have only used VMWare and that ain't cheap! Something like VirtualBox may be a very good option over dual boot.

Steve

[graphicgr8s]

Originally Posted by stevebrot

I was going to suggest virtualization, but have no experience with Open Source options. I have only used VMWare and that ain't cheap! Something like VirtualBox may be a very good option over dual boot.

Steve

But dual boot is fun.

[vinzer]

Originally Posted by graphicgr8s

But dual boot is fun.

True, and I think using virtualization takes a performance hit, since you're essentially running two OSes all at once (feel free to correct me on this one). I guess it's not much a problem for today's ever more powerful machines, but personally, I'd like to keep system resources free as much as possible.

[stevebrot]

Originally Posted by vinzer

True, and I think using virtualization takes a performance hit, since you're essentially running two OSes all at once (feel free to correct me on this one). I guess it's not much a problem for today's ever more powerful machines, but personally, I'd like to keep system resources free as much as possible.

Yes, there is a performance hit. Although resources are shared to a greater or lesser extent (depending on the package), you can't make something from nothing. There is overhead associated with the virtualization. Most of my experience has been with servers with multiple virtual hosts. To keep everything working smoothly, you need lots of memory and a hot processor. There are also potential issues with network resources. If you push the limits a little too hard, things sort of grind to a halt.

I also have worked with running a virtual server using the VMWare Player. The "parasite" machine was running RHEL with Oracle 11i and Oracle Application Server installed. It was all that work laptop (high end Dell running XP Pro) could do to keep up. I thought I was going to melt something!

Steve

[exwintech]

> I'm running 2 dual-boot PCs, older with PCLOS (PCLinuxOS) - and Win2k-SP4, the one I'm on now with PCLOS-2009.2, and XP-Pro-SP3.

XP rarely gets used - it's there because my ISP demands Windows or Mac... I recently put the Software for my Canon SX10 IS on it - just to see what it did - nothing I couldn't do as well or better in Linux.

With my cameras - I have the Canon and a Fuji S2000HD, mainly kept for the 1280 x 720 ISO-compliant MPEG4 / *.mp4-extension video - I just use a card-reader and download to a directory on a Desktop.

For graphics I work between Photoshop 7.01 (runs perfectly, fast, with all functions, in the PCLOS iteration of Wine) - and the latest version of Gimp. Between those I can do anything a very keen friend can do with Photoshop CS3 in XP.

As for Windows Users trying Linux for the first time - they've usually heard of the "Buntys" - Ubuntu (Gnome Environment), Kubuntu (KDE Enviro), Edubuntu, so on. Possibly because Ubuntu-etc is pushed by the South African Canonical Corporation, "Africa's Microsoft"....

There are far easier to install and use Linux Distros - PCLinuxOS, PCLOS, is one of them. It's a lot more "familiar" to Windows Users (I was a double US CompTIA A+ qualified Windows Tech for 11 years) - just imagine the Win2k style Menus, similar Taskbar (Panel, in Linux) - but a much more attractive working environment - running things across 6 or 8 Desktops at a time (up to 20 Desktops if you were THAT busy...) - with hundreds of Applications, Tools, Utilities, Games, etc - and over 10,000 more - which can be multiple-installed at the same time, via the Synaptic Install / Uninstall Untility.

Unlike Windows, with this system, I can open Synaptic, Click to Reload its record of what's in the Repository - Click "Update All" - and it downloads and updates, for the operating system, and every Application and Utility-etc installed in it. My last (Sunday) - full-update took 6 minutes for the downloads, and 4 to install them. Try that with Windows... Linux is vastly faster and easier!

If you do specific high-demand things, audio and video editing, music composing, graphics-rendering, so on - there are System Kernels optimised for different things. Just download and install other Kernels - and you can boot between them - they list on the GRUB Boot Menu below Linux, Windows, etc.

If you want to use Virtual Box - and need USB connections from, say, Windows 2000 running in it - the versions for most Distros in their Repositories don't have USB (they're the "open" versions.) Some Distros, including PCLOS, do have a Distro optimised version with USB on the Virtual Box site. Just download the RPM (now includes the Guest Additions and Full Manual) - and install it with Package Manager. You can then run scanners, printers, external-hard-drives, etc, from Win2k (etc) - in V-Box.

Using Win2k-SP4 in V-Box is far less of a performance-hit than running XP-Pro, and most things (Adobe, Ulead, etc) - you'll need will run in Win2k-SP4.

As for setting-up dual-boot being difficult...? Not with PCLOS. I set this new PC up last month, starting with the XP that came on it. That had a C:-System partion, D: was the burner-drive, and "rest-of-drive" of the 320GB, was E:-drive. All in NTFS5, of course.

So I just did it the easy way - used my old Partition Magic 7, made E:-drive 50GB, and an F:-drive of 30GB, and converted F: to FAT32. Reason - as a Transfer partition between systems. Linux handles Copy, Move, Drag-Drop, so on, between Ext3 (the Linux fully journalling filesystem) - and in Linux, F:-drive just comes up as TRANS /hdc6. Open it and treat as another Linux partition. Over in Windows - anything put into it in Linux, is in F:-drive.

The changed Windows layout was then C:-25GB, E:-50GB, F:-30GB.

Put in the PCLOS LiveCD (can run a PC bypassing hard-drive - or with a failed or absent hard-drive - or rescue-copy - to DVDs or XHD - data from an unbootable Windows install) - in the drive, change BIOS to Boot from CD/DVD - and run the CD up to Linux Desktop.

From there - click on the "Install to Hard-Drive" Wizard - and follow instructions as it works through them. A reasonably bright kid of 12 could follow the Wizard... when finished - the install took 11 minutes on this AMD-3GHz dualcore 6000 with 2GB of DDR2 Corsair) - reboot once, and up to working Desktop.

The default install gives 4 Desktops, I like 6 - a few clicks - 6! Configure Networking / Internet - a few clicks in Control-Centre. Set up Shorewall Firewall - 4 clicks in Control-Centre. Close CC - open Firefox to "check Internet" - yes, okay. Close FF - open Synaptic - and fully update the operating system and every app on it - since the 2009.2 LiveCD was made in June....

And a few minutes later - a fully updated new Linux install (partnered to an XP-Pro install, complete with Transfer Partition) - total time - from Close-XP and reboot to change the BIOS to run from LiveCD - 36 minutes.

If anyone needs a detailed run-through of how to install PCLinuxOS (yes, I did my "Distro Wander", through 9 or 10 other Distros between 2000 and 2005, when I found PCLOS and stayed with it) - dual-boot with Win2k or XP - post back and say so...!

Yes - this is being done from Linux. All of my Internetting is... 9 years, not a Virus, Trojan, Worm, Rootkit, or Hacker.... See Pic.

Regards, Dave.

[ve2vfd]

I just gave PClinuxOS a try and up to now I like what I see a LOT!

Might just have a convert here

Pat

[reeftool]

I have a desktop running Ubuntu. I like it better for most things. I prefer to do my photo editing with Photoshop Elements so I'm keeping my Windows XP machine for a a while. There is a lot of Linux photo software available and it is improving and the day will probably come when I will use some distro of Linux exclusively but not yet. I do just about everything else on my Ubuntu box though. I have never tried a dual boot setup so I can't comment.

[Harvey3]

I also had ubuntu. its also easy to use and faster than other systems too but compatibility to customers was my issue. Most of my clients uses windows or mac.

I'll be checking on their future release hoping they've fixed it then.