Yannow, this week is just being a bear.

[kyrielle]

For all sorts of reasons, including but not limited to:
1) My desktop computer is dead, for the moment. Dead C drive. Trying to decide whether to buy a new one, or to replace the drive and reinstall the OS. (I do not have a disc, but would have to buy it. They included a copy in a partition on the drive. I do not like that method, but everyone seems to do it. Ugh.) Leaning toward buying a new one. Assuming it isn't still under warranty which we're investigating now. And I really don't want Vista. But I really didn't want XP back when, and I got used to it and had good luck with it, so if I end up with Vista, hopefully the same experience will occur. *dubious*

2) The filling I got put in my front tooth Monday came out today. At least this time I probably shouldn't have to pay for it but this won't be fun. (They're not open tomorrow, and I noticed late tonight, so I'll sort this out Monday.)

Comments

[mdlbear]

Buy a new one. Lenovo, Dell, and Fujitsu all sell machines with XP installed. Vista is the best reason yet to switch to Linux.

Or put together a new machine from parts, and buy a copy of XP to install on it. It'll be more reliable, easier to upgrade, and you'll have the install disk for the next time something goes splat.

[kyrielle]

Yeah, it depends a lot on what is available at the local stores, especially Fry's. I do not want to wait on mail order, particularly. I'd rather not have to juggle hardware and installing XP on my own, though I can if I must. (If I decide to go that route, I'll probably first check to see what besides the primary drive needs replacing on the current computer. I think the power supply would, from how it's behaving, but the rest might be okay - and it's still plenty powerful for my needs, CPU and memory-wise, if that's all it needed.)

It would take more than Vista to drive me to Linux. I've made a couple attempts to go Linux in the past, and I will not make another attempt in the future unless I am very surprised by the progress it makes, or forced into it. That is the only OS that has ever brought me to tears of frustration. It seems to work well for people who get it, but it's a pain in the ass. (And I do have Unix familiarity, but Windows has spoiled me. It's pretty, it's easy, and it does what I want when I want it almost all the time. Linux doesn't, and I don't want a "toy" that takes that much time to get to do anything useful. Plus my main use for the desktop is playing World of Warcraft, and I can't see them with a Linux release, somehow. :)

[mdlbear]

Check the CPU fan, too -- that's usually the first thing to go. Power supply is second.

Linux has improved markedly over the last couple of years; Ubuntu, in particular, has been concentrating on the desktop and "ordinary" users.

Games are the big problem with Linux, of course. It works for me because I was never much of a Mac or Windows user; just copied my Unix config files -- a dozen years ago -- and kept going.

[kyrielle]

That's what I was told about Linux last time I tried it, too. Honestly, if someone in person shows me a Linux box, lets me play around with it, and convinces me it's usable, that is probably the only way I would even consider trying it again. (And given how attached I am to several Windows-only programs, including ones I use on the laptop as well as the desktop, I suspect that still wouldn't cause me to switch.)

Linux developers' (and to some degree users') ideas of what desktop and "ordinary" users who are accustomed to Windows might need seem to have been quite wrong in the past. Given my general dislike of spending money OR time for things to go wrong, it just doesn't make sense to try that again without substantial need.

My Dad would have agreed with you, btw; he loved Linux. But he was also an old-school geek, a physics major who ended up working as a software engineer, and a tinkerer in all ways. And he didn't recommend Linux, even as recently as a few years ago, to users who weren't heavily technical / "geeks". Of course, those were older Linux versions, obviously.

[mdlbear]

Be delighted to, next time we meet. (My next conventions are Baycon, ConChord, OVFF, and Conflikt). An alternative for playing around is to run Ubuntu off the live CD - programs take longer to start, but it doesn't touch your hard drive.

Dual-boot is always an option if there are Windows programs you need.

*sigh* My Dad was an OS2 user; never did persuade him to try Linux. He's the one who got me interested in folk music, science fiction, and computers back in the 1950's. Chemist turned hacker, in his case. He died in 1999.

(added: um... I see you're in Oregon. I'll be in Portland for OSCon July 22-5.)