Tuesday, January 15, 2008

Vista sucks

Good GOD does it suck.

I have to use it for school, because the addle-minded monkeys that run the computer labs apparently lack the sense that the good lord gave a jar of mayonnaise.

Give me XP, or ME, or (shudder) a Mac any day of the week.

Update: Maybe it's time for another round of "John uses Ubuntu, and likes it (mostly.)"

A few weeks ago I discovered that the copy of Windows that shipped with my Laptop doesn't allow me to rip CDs to MP3 at a reasonable bitrate - less than 128! So I booted up the trusty linux box, installed GRIP, and after spending an evening noodling with the settings (which is just another form of play for computer geeks) got it set up to do what I wanted.

I've also been tooling around with avidemux for video editing, but so far I haven't made the switch from using mostly Windows on my laptop to using Linux on my desktop. Partly this is because I've got the Windows install set up pretty much like I want it, and partly because when I've got a laptop that runs silent and efficiently, I can't bear to turn on the big clunky desktop.

Oddly, I've found that instead of using Linux for the usual stuff I do on Windows -- the kind of thing Linux has been capable of doing for years, the kind of stuff partisans say proves Linux is ready for the mainstream -- I'm using Linux for the exceptional stuff that Windows either won't let me do or wants to charge me to do. This, to me, shows that Linux is much more than ready for prime time, but that's just me.

I have some gripes about things not working right, but they're pretty minor and I suspect I could fix them if I could find the time to delve deeper in to Ubuntu forums.

Eventually, I think I'll work up the courage to install Ubuntu on the laptop too, and see how that works.

9 comments:

Adam said...

Dude, ME?

...harsh

Mike said...

yeah, I'm with Adam...at least throw Ubuntu up there...its pretty good and with Open Office, you don't need MS anymore...

That guy said...

Dude, I love my Mac. If you only knew the power of the dark side...

Anonymous said...

John,

It may not just be a tech decision. The licensing agreement with MS may not allow them to downgrade to XP.

This is shit I run into all the time as ad admin. MS licensing agreements are designed with one intent. To screw you over and to make your existence as miserable as possible.

lance said...

++Mike. Linux blows MS's offerings out of the water.
Catelli, try Linux in the server room. I converted our company a few years ago and we aren't ever going back. It just works.

Cheers,
lance

Anonymous said...

Lance, I wish I could. Too many applications we support are only available on MS.

About the only thing I could covert in the back end are the file servers. Its not enough to even make it worth it.

Anonymous said...

You rip at less than 128?!?!?

I won't go lower than 256, but I believe I can hear the difference.

On windows, try CDEx. Will let you rip at any rate.

I tried Ubuntu on my laptop. Works great, mostly. One thing I could not get to work was DVD playback. Could only get sound, but no video showed.

Which I've found ironically is the strength of Windows (and probably MAC). Damn near any media format is playable on Windows, where on Linux not so true.

That guy said...

Yeah, any media's playable on Mac, even .wmv files (although, why would you want them?)

john said...

Catelli: the problems was WMP would only rip CDs at less than 128kbps, but I prefer 256 or higher myself.