VL v Windows 2000 - A newbie view

[Masta]

Wow, where was I when this thread started?
 I hate to go backwards in the thread after all the suggestions have started, but reading over this from the start (since I've just now seen it), I can deeply understand where diggs was coming from @ the very start. This is a superb community, but I did see something that I do not think was a wise approach to someone who comes on frustrated... and you really don't want to know what they're saying to their monitor while they're trying to install for a first time, after they've become used to other distros or OSes .... what I saw was an approach to control control the typical response on how someone should enter their experience.

I can't stress enough how fast that deterred me from another distro community, where it was more like "bow before thy", and if you did anything else but, your post were not only removed, but you were banned --from every part of it. There were a few distros out there and I'm sure many know of what I mean.

Granted that this community is FAR above that!

 Understand that there will be many who come on here typing, frustrated or not we don't know, except through our own word interpretation. An approach to calmly and friendly respond is a good approach.

Myself, I try to read what the person is saying of importance, whether it is negative or positive, is totally not important, but what they're saying in either is.

This thread did turn around and became directional in people suggesting ideas for improvements. This is cool, but that should have started from the get go. In this situation it would have been a great response to ask diggs if he had any suggestions that could have made his experience better. Although in his way, he did tell us 

Just some tips I find useful too keep personal sanity 

Thanks for the suggestions for improvements, I'm sure the developers are reading. Carry on...

[kidd]

Wow RonB!  You wrote a really beautiful post, explaining perfectly lots of the reasons why some of us are here. Could I quote it somewhere else in the internetz?

diggs but, I think he didn't took the best one either.  I mean, lots of people think that community members must answer all kind of questions, and always be nice, and.....

When a new user comes into the forum and posts his/her first post, I look very closely to it, and try to imagine how's he like.  That wasn't a nice introductory post.  There's a lot of info on internet about how to ask questions smartly and kindly in communities.

All in all, at last, we found out what he thought could be improved

[Deach]

I would have to say the forum here is much more "people oriented" than what I was accustomed to.  (thank you).  I remember trying to install vector a while back when I had much less linux knowledge than I do and although I got it to work, it just wasn't for me right then.  With the new gui installer it was more smooth (helped that I knew some of what it was asking)...

It was wonderful that when I rebooted at the end of the install <short> I had a working laptop.  Wireless, audio, video, and a sytem that was pretty much ready to go. 

I often wonder if you took someone with ZERO knowledge of any OS or computer and gave them a machine with a blank hard drive, if this windows vs linux "thing" would turn out differently.  While I doubt this person exists, it would be interesting.  It seems to me today a lot if not the majority of people just go buy a computer with the OS preinstalled, then learning the rest is "as we go" so to speak. 

Well just my .02 worth of thoughts.  Thanks for letting me be here and such a great distro. 

[GrannyGeek]

I often wonder if you took someone with ZERO knowledge of any OS or computer and gave them a machine with a blank hard drive, if this windows vs linux "thing" would turn out differently.  While I doubt this person exists, it would be interesting.  It seems to me today a lot if not the majority of people just go buy a computer with the OS preinstalled, then learning the rest is "as we go" so to speak. 

I sometimes chuckle at how out of touch with most computer users we Linux folks are. VERY FEW Windows users have ever installed an OS. Nearly everyone buys a computer with the OS installed (Windows or Mac). The vast majority of computer users could not install an OS. Sure, essentially you just put in a CD or DVD and theoretically you should come out at the end with a working OS. But along the way you have to make some decisions and most computer users have no idea what to say. Partitioning? They'll turn to jelly right there. What kind of video driver do you want? "What's a driver?" They *might* know the brand of their computer. They are likely to think their operating system is Microsoft Word (I've seen that numerous times in forums).

For Windows computers, most computers do not come with a Windows installation disk. They come with a Restore partition, from which the user is supposed to make a DVD or set of CDs. Making these is extremely easy, but people don't get around to it and if they have something that necessitates reinstalling Windows, they have to call the computer manufacturer and PAY FOR a Restore disk that they could have made for no cost, but didn't.

Note that Restore disks work *only* with the computer they came with. You can't put it on a different computer. If you try, it will fail. So the previous post about finding drivers for all this stuff is irrelevant for most users. All the drivers are included in the Restore disk, which is an exact image of the way the computer came when you bought it. Also, the previous post was incorrect about burning CDs. Windows XP and later included a utility to burn a CD. And Windows Media Player includes support for MP3 and AVI. You do have to install Flash in the browser, but it's much simpler to install it in Internet Explorer than in other browsers because Flash will be installed automatically from Adobe's site, whereas for other browsers you need to download and run a file. Even with a retail Windows disk there are many drivers included, so it's not often the case that you'd be dead in the water until you found the most recent driver for your hardware.

Anyway, nothing is easier than getting a computer with the OS installed, and using the Windows Restore disk puts you right back where you were when you got the computer (minus your data and added programs, of course!).
--GrannyGeek

[Masta]

Yeah exactly.. now all we need is a nice contract with HP and Dell ... 

[GrannyGeek]

I forgot to say that you don't need a Restore disk unless your hard drive fails. If it's still working, you can restore to from-the-factory condition from the Restore partition. Unfortunately, all hard drives will fail eventually--some sooner, some later. Users don't seem to recognize this, though. Losing the only copy of your 90% complete Ph.D dissertation happens more often than you want to think because someone never thought the hard drive would fail, so never copied the dissertation to other media. Even more common is to lose all your photos because you didn't back them up on other media.
--GrannyGeek

[RonB]

That's ok. (though it was one of the longest posts I've seen here  )

Yeah, sometimes I have trouble shutting up. Sorry.

[RonB]

Could I quote it somewhere else in the internetz?

Sure. Not quite sure why you want to -- but I don't see any problem. Thanks for the encouragement.