On Sun, 2 Oct 2005, John Nall wrote:

> sergio masci wrote:
> 
> > > Sorry but you've got this backwards :-)
> 
> Oh well.  Wouldn't be the first time.  :-)
> 
> > > Windows does not go out of its way to be compatible with your
> > > notebook, 
> > the notebook manufacturer goes out of its way to be compatible with
> > windows. They even write their own drivers and utilities when windows
> > comes up short.
> > 
> > 
> Yeah, but there is a logic problem there, isn't there?  Linux can't follow
> that lead?  Why are they ("they" being defined as the different distros) going
> off in all different directions? 
> > There was a web site that gave info of linux friendly notebooks, patches
> > and utilities. I'm not sure if it's still up. When I wanted to run Linux
> > on a notebook I looked at which notebooks were supported before I bought
> > one.
> > 
> > 
> And so you proved my point!  If I want to run Windows on a notebook, I do not
> have to look up which notebooks are supported. 
> John

Sorry I misunderstood. I thought your point was that "linux distros" 
should support all notebooks. To which I was responding that a distro 
producer is link M$ in that neither cares about the notebook and it's the 
notebook manufacturer that plugs the gap on the M$ side.

I think the problem with the majority of distro producers these days is 
that they have dreams of hitting it big like RedHat did. Yes I know Debian 
seems to be an exception but they do seem to take forever to make any 
progress.

BTW I've been using SuSE 7.1 on a Toshiba Tecra 800 for about 4 years now. 
Ok SVGALIB needed a little coaxing to get it to work properly but I'd 
recommend SuSE to anyone (I'm actually using 9.2 on some other machines).

I started using FreeBSD a while ago and I was impressed by how streamlined 
installation (core and packages) was and continues to be. I think the 
FreeBSD people have really got it together.

Regards
Sergio Masci

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