[NTLUG:Discuss] Mandrake 7 -- review

[Opinionated]

My only warning about Mandrake is in regards to upgrading a RedHat distro with
Mandrake.  I tried upgrading Redhat 6.0 with a Mandrake 6.1 distro.  It was a
fiasco.....A lot of problems came from the fact that I let RedHat start assigning
my regular User accounts with an UID of 500, whereas Mandrake assigned extra
accounts (such as guest) automatically at the UID=500s Range and started assigning
Regular Users at UID=1000 or above (Same for group assignments).  My normal user
account suddenly became guest with a Mandrake predefined group instead of my
original User/group identity. This confused my system to the point of total system
failure, and I was forced to Reinstall my RedHat 6.0 setup so that I could recover
my files.

Can someone tell me if Mandrake 7.0 also does this?

The lesson I learned is Do Not Upgrade RedHat distros with Mandrake distros.



sunflower1043 at juno.com wrote:

>         Hi to all --
>
>         Maybe you all have read some favorable reviews of Mandrake 7 -- on
> LinuxNewbie or elsewhere -- like I have recently.  I installed it last
> weekend, and have been meaning to post this;  I am pretty impressed with
> it so far, myself.  Of course, proceed at your own risk; for me, looks
> like it will be my distro of choice for the time being.
>
>         On a P II - 266 Mhz, 160 MB RAM, 2 Western Digital drives (4 G + 10 G);
> Sndblstr AWE 64 sound; Diam Stealth 3D3000 video card; TEAC CDROM; Have a
> HP Laserjet 6L; parallel port Iomega ZIP; no DVD, CD-R or RW, tape
> drives, etc.  Whole machine appx. 2 yrs. old; a clone from IMS Computers.
>  Using it as a business desktop, small ofc/home ofc.
>
>         The install routine is really good-looking;  I suppose that sounds a
> little funny.  But, it's  a really attractive blue screen (if you want,
> change to brown/green, grey/white), with a series of "stoplights" down
> the left side, turning green as each step completed;  you can go back up
> and re-do prior steps if you wish.  It doesn't have those grainy looks,
> and lines across screen, like RH 6.1 and SuSE 6.3 graphical installs had
> for me.  Guess it must use a different server in the install, or
> something.
>
>         If you choose the "expert" install, it gives you 5 choices as to
> security level to be installed.  (First time, I chose most strict level
> -- "paranoid" -- and I was unable to get onto machine on reboot, as root
> !!!)
>
>         The package selection, configure users, passwords, seemed nice to me.
> Their disk partitioning procedure is about as easy, attractive,
> simplified and user-friendly/ "dumbed-down" as I've seen it (I've tried
> Corel 1; RH 6.0, 6.1; SuSE 6.1, 6.2, 6.3; Mandrake 6; Caldera 2.3;
> Turbolinux 6; and, of course, DOS FDISK [!] ).
>
>         On reboot and launch, the desktop (can choose KDE, GNOME, others and/or
> all) is pre-configured (at least for GNOME & KDE), with ready-made
> symlinks, on desktop, to your other automounted partitions.  It also uses
> (as with, I suspect, much of the rest of Mandrake distro), the RedHat
> "sndconfig" device, which is the only way (other than Corel Linux) I've
> ever been able, despite much labor and RTFMs, to get a working sound card
> on Linux.  It also configured my printer just fine (I haven't tried the
> ZIP drive, on same port as my printer;  that's also been a chronic
> problem for me on Linux).  I haven't configured/ connected it to Net yet;
> nor thoroughly been thru the whole system yet;  have not yet installed
> StarOfc on it, nor WordPerfect 8.
>
>         This distro (at least on the Linux Central CD, which is where I got it),
> offers a *lot* of the GNOME/ KDE apps.  Also, it does include a really
> recent (I guess), graphically-enhanced version of Linuxconf, which,
> compared to SuSE  YAST, others, is maybe my own favorite tool of that
> type.
>
>         This is the first distro that I've used LILO in the MBR to boot;  all
> other times, I've put LILO on floppy or the Linux partition, booting with
> a boot floppy;  this feels to me like, symbolically, it's another step
> for me in switching over to Linux.
>
>         It seems like a distro that fits the classic app of a machine for your
> mother/father/ sister/brother/kids, or else for an (at least somewhat)
> non-Geek like yours truly, who wants/ appreciates a GUI; still have
> trouble hacking scripts;  pretty easy for me to install, and, at least
> for me, helping me out so far!
>
>         Again, your mileage may vary.  Proceed at your own risk!  Best to all --
> Doug
> ***************************************************
>   Douglas D. Darnold      Principal/ Attorney
>   LAW OFFICES OF DOUGLAS D. DARNOLD <sunflower1043 at juno.com>
>   P. O. Box 12461         Dallas  Texas 75225-0461        Voice: 214-368-0068
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