According to the reviews I've read, 7 is suppose to run on less
resources than Vista, although I only have about 2 months experience
with Vista before I took it off my machine, and no experience with 7.
I have an old lap top at home running Ubuntu 9.10. It's a 2.2g Celeron
with 512m RAM. It appears to me to be the processor that keeps me modest
with my processes. When I look at my system monitor, even with a few
apps up, I'm usually right around 250m RAM, but my CPU shoots up to 100%
every few seconds.
I was running XP on this machine before until I installed Ubuntu about 4
months ago, and Ubuntu is much more usable, as long as I keep things
modest with a word processor and 1 or 2 instances of Firefox running.
I also tried using WINE and I did not have much luck with it.
-----Original Message-----
From: David Ernst [mailto:david.ernst@davidernst.net]
Sent: Thursday, November 05, 2009 3:58 PM
To: Bloomington LINUX Users Group
Subject: Re: [BLUG] [OT] Software for Ivy Tech students
Wow, interesting. I've got an oldish machine that had ~770M RAM in
it, and I got very poor performance running Windows Vista. I added
another 1G stick of RAM, and now it runs great.
Could it possibly be that Windows 7 makes more efficient use of memory
than Windows Vista?? It defies all precedent, there must be some
other explanation.
David
On Thu, Nov 05, 2009 at 03:50:08PM -0500, Kirk Gleason wrote:
>I am running a windows 7 machines with 512MB of ram that performs like
>a champ. I don't do a ton with it, but it performs like a champ when I
>need it too.
>
>On 11/5/09, Steven Black <blacks@indiana.edu> wrote:
>> 512M of RAM is just enough RAM to be in the middle of swapping-hell
in
>> Windows Vista *or* Windows 7. Neither OS will be usable on the
machine.
>> And I mean, literally, she would be better off sticking to machines
in
>> computer labs/libraries/etc than trying to use it.
>>
>> The laptop-license of Windows XP that came with the system became
>> invalid with the destruction of the install media. The license on the
>> bottom was only ever valid with both the physical hardware as well as
>> with the original install media. (This is usually a physical
partition.)
>>
>> You are running in to the same reason that it is impossible for
Goodwill
>> and the Salvation Army to resell modern computers. They can't insure
>> it has a legal version of Windows so when they can not reject them at
>> delivery time, they have to throw away the CPU. This is the same
>> reason pawn shops require the original media -- they've been sued by
>> Microsoft for selling illegal versions of Windows when it did not
>> include the original media.
>>
>> Your best bet is to find someone selling Windows XP online. Some
>> retaillers may still have it. (Unlikely -- and costly -- as it may
be.)
>>
>> Ideally, you want to just install Linux and Wine. Unlike a VM, Wine
does
>> not require a license to a Windows OS.
>>
>> My recommendation: Install Linux exclusively. Tell her about Wine and
>> how it might work, but remind her that the big reason a person needs
a
>> laptop is usually for writing papers, and that Linux will work just
as
>> well for that. Then install Wine and try to get the software she
needs
>> to run on it.
>>
>> If Linux and Wine won't work for her at all, then she'll have to pay
>> real money to get a real laptop. There's just no getting around it.
>>
>> Cheers,
>> Steven
>>
>> On Thu, Nov 05, 2009 at 11:50:37AM -0500, Mark Warner wrote:
>>> It's a 2.0GHz Celeron with 512MB RAM. I got it off of FreeCycle with
a
>>> totally trashed OS and no install media, of course. I was hoping to
put
>>> a more legit version of XP on it, rather than the IU volume licensed
OS
>>> that we all know is available.
>>>
>>> My understanding is that she is going into the medical technology
>>> (transcription, coding, etc.) program. I can only assume she'll be
>>> working in a Win environment. In these types of situations, what I
like
>>> to do is offer a dual boot Lin/Win setup, and encourage the user to
>>> spend as much time as possible in the Lin environment.
>>>
>>> My personal playtoy laptop is a Dell C600 700MHz/512MB/20G machine,
that
>>> has a "just in case" load of XP (never has been needed), a default
of
>>> MEPIS 8, and a partition that I use to install and play around with
new
>>> stuff. That last currently has a load of Karmic. Yes, it runs well,
but
>>> it doesn't have the "snap" that the MEPIS install does.
>>>
>>>
>>> Mark Krenz wrote:
>>> > If its not going to have enough horsepower to run a VM on top of
the
>>> > OS, then its probably not enough to run Vista or Win7 then. Right?
>>> >
>>> > I recently install Ubuntu on an old Dell 600 series laptop and
was
>>> > rather surprised by how fast it was and all the stuff I could run
>>> > normally. It may seem risky to try to get them to try using a
different
>>> > OS, but we took that risk in the 90s a lot and got through it. 10
years
>>> > later its much safer to do and you're much more likely to be
successful
>>> > in converting a user.
>>> >
>>> > I think one thing that the Linux advocates forgot to do is to
teach a
>>> > new generation of Linux advocates how to promote Linux. An OS
can't
>>> > promote itself, it needs users to do that.
>>> >
>>> >
>>> > On Thu, Nov 05, 2009 at 02:34:22PM GMT, Mark Warner
>>> > [markwarner1954@att.net] said the following:
>>> >> Of course. Except for the facts that
>>> >>
>>> >> 1) the machine I'm cobbling together isn't going to have much
>>> >> horsepower, at least not enough to run a VM with decent
performance
>>> >>
>>> >> 2) you still need an OS and software for the VM. We all know the
IU
>>> >> stuff is easily obtained, but I was hoping to be more legit.
>>> >>
>>> >>
>>> >> Mark Krenz wrote:
>>> >>> As if it has to be said.
>>> >>>
>>> >>> Sounds like a great opportunity to spring Ubuntu and Wine or
>>> >>> Virtualbox on them.
>>> >>>
>>> >>>
>>> >>> On Wed, Nov 04, 2009 at 09:55:16PM GMT, Mark Warner
>>> >>> [markwarner1954@att.net] said the following:
>>> >>>> I have been asked to rebuild a computer for a new Ivy Tech
student,
>>> >>>> and
>>> >>>> was wondering if they have access to Microsoft operating
systems and
>>> >>>> software similar to the arrangement that IU students, faculty,
and
>>> >>>> staff
>>> >>>> enjoy. The student didn't know herself.
>>> >>
>>
>> _______________________________________________
>> BLUG mailing list
>> BLUG@linuxfan.com
>> http://mailman.cs.indiana.edu/mailman/listinfo/blug
>>
>
>--
>Sent from my mobile device
>
>Kirk Gleason
>_______________________________________________
>BLUG mailing list
>BLUG@linuxfan.com
>http://mailman.cs.indiana.edu/mailman/listinfo/blug
_______________________________________________
BLUG mailing list
BLUG@linuxfan.com
http://mailman.cs.indiana.edu/mailman/listinfo/blug
_______________________________________________
BLUG mailing list
BLUG@linuxfan.com
http://mailman.cs.indiana.edu/mailman/listinfo/blug
