[Gloucs] Fwd: Re: KDE problems.

[Paul]

On Saturday 28 Nov 2009 13:23:09 GEOFF BAGLEY wrote:
> Hi Paul.
> 
> Was the previous KDE (from which you upgraded )  KDE3 ?
> 
> I have never tried Mandriva.  I did however run SüSE way back when it
> was version 6.5. (Poss AD2000 ?)  I changed to Debian when "Woody" came
>  out.  All that time I used KDE.
> 
> When KDE4 landed on my machine I did not have the time or inclination to
>  study it.  I had other priorities.
> 
> Could you please tell me, how would you, as someone who has used both,
>  characterise the differences ?
> 
> I often use the KDE konsole as a CLI, and the "Desktop" as a parking place
>  to keep track of current files.  I don't want it cluttered up with
>  decorative junk.
> 
> Cheers,
> Geoff
> 
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> 


Hi Geoff, I'll do my best, but if you need anything else let me know...if what 
I provide below is a bit too high-level for you.

I have used KDE3. If I recall correctly, I used it extensively on 2008.0 
(PowerPack version), but in the early summer I upgraded to "2009.1 Free" and 
it wasn't long (October) before my OS offered me an upgrade to 2010.0 which I 
took.

Now, because I wasn't on the 2009 version long I can't recall if it used 
version3 or 4 of KDE... looking now at articles on the web, they suggest this 
version was shipped with an early 4 version. I found this version quite clunky 
and slow on my PC. However, since upgrading to 2010, its much slicker - not 
clunky at all.

Anyhow, I've always found KDE on Mandriva to be stable... never had any 
significant stability problems.. I run Mandriva on a (fairly old) Dell 
Dimension 3100 (2.6G CPU with 2GB RAM on a separate 15GB HDD (main HDD drive 
used for XP for Kids).

For me the main key differences/improvements of KDE4 over previous version are:
-->Uses firefox 3.5.5 with the usual plugins (flash10.0r32, Quicktime/Totem, 
WinMedia player to name but a few) I can you i-player and listen-again 
features etc.
-->s/w (patch) upgrade process has been improved too - much slicker.
-->comes with openoffice 3.1 (which includes auto updates)
-->all the previous apps came across too (i.e. Kontact, Ekiga, Google Earth, 
Kopete etc)
-->Many new applications, including the file manager Dolphin, document viewer 
Okular (PDF viewer), and media player Dragon Player were also supplied. All 
work fine.
-->BTW - dragon dvd viewer works out of the box where as previous versions of 
DVD players were a nightmare to get DVDs to play!!
-->If you want to keep your desktop free of clutter... no problem... out the 
box 2010.0 (FREE) KDE4 provides a basic desktop with very few icons + the 
backdrop is quite plain.
--> All versions come with a basic terminal console... current one uses Bash.
--> Because I have a fairly old PC with a basic integral graphics card i stay 
away from the fancy desktop graphics feature (i.e. compiz etc), so can't 
comment on how good they are in KDE4+. However, the basic 'out-of-the-box' 
graphical experience is good.

Overall, I wouldn't say the differences weren't that significant.

For anyone who'd be interested in further information on Mandriva, use the 
link below for an overview etc.:
http://wiki.mandriva.com/en/Mandriva_Linux_2010

One good thing about Mandriva and i'm not aware if other distros provide this, 
but the "One" version allows you to copy the OS onto a bootable CD-R so that 
you can try the distro in a non-impactive way. You may find this useful to 
further evaluate KDE4 or Mandriva.

As a non-techie, it just works... I do all my uni work on it... overall I've 
been really impressed, especially with this latest 'Free' version which 
absolutely, is the best yet.

If you have any specific questions about Mandriva, I'm happy to try and answer 
them.

Hope the above helps..

regards

Paul