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Author Topic: Tech: Operating systems  (Read 9049 times)

IceAngie

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Operating systems
« on: May 16, 2013, 05:26:01 pm »
I want to change my netbook software to something that actually works and is not super slow on it. I currently have Windows 7 Starter and Hyperspace (both came with the computer), but I'm thinking about formatting it and installing something like Linux.

Do you have any recomendations about Linux or other OS (in that case, which version do you recommend?)?
I've been told to install Linux without deleting the other OSs, what do you think about that? (I, personally, don't like that idea, but I don't really know anything about computers, so...)

Thanks!
« Last Edit: May 07, 2019, 05:47:59 pm by RandallS »
Angeles/IceAngie/Selegna.

RandallS

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Re: Operating systems
« Reply #1 on: May 16, 2013, 07:13:37 pm »
Quote from: IceAngie;108829
I want to change my netbook software to something that actually works and is not super slow on it. I currently have Windows 7 Starter and Hyperspace (both came with the computer), but I'm thinking about formatting it and installing something like Linux.

Do you have any recomendations about Linux or other OS (in that case, which version do you recommend?)?

In order to know how slow/fast something would be on your netbook, I'd need to know what CPU it has, how much memory, etc. If it is a stock unit, if you could just point me to its tech specs on a web site (probably at the manufacturer's site), that will probably tell me what i need to know.

Hyperspace, BTW, is a limited form of Linux -- which should be pretty fast.
Randall
RetroRoleplaying [Blog]: Microlite74/75/78/81, BX Advanced, and Other Old School Tabletop RPGs
Microlite20: Lots of Rules Lite Tabletop RPGs -- Many Free

IceAngie

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Re: Operating systems
« Reply #2 on: May 16, 2013, 07:53:47 pm »
Quote from: RandallS;108853
In order to know how slow/fast something would be on your netbook, I'd need to know what CPU it has, how much memory, etc. If it is a stock unit, if you could just point me to its tech specs on a web site (probably at the manufacturer's site), that will probably tell me what i need to know.


Thanks Randall. It's a Samsung NP-N210. Here is a link. If you need any other info, just let me know, and I'll post it here.

Quote from: RandallS;108853
Hyperspace, BTW, is a limited form of Linux -- which should be pretty fast.

 
It starts fast, but the tasks take ages. It doesn't work very well either. :/
Angeles/IceAngie/Selegna.

RandallS

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Re: Operating systems
« Reply #3 on: May 16, 2013, 08:46:16 pm »
Quote from: IceAngie;108860
It starts fast, but the tasks take ages. It doesn't work very well either. :/

With an Atom N450 and only 1 gig of RAM, it's never going to be a speed demon -- which is par for the course with netbooks or low-end laptops (like our "spare PC" laptop).

You best bet would probably be trying to run Puppy Linux from a USB drive (so you can try it without reformatting). Puppy Linux will load just about everything into your RAM so (once it boots) it will run everything as fast as your CPU will allow.  Unfortunately, your Netbook does not have a CD/DVD burner, so you'll have to get Puppy on a computer that does, burn the .iso file to a CD/DVD, reboot from the CD/DVD, and then you can install Puppy to a USB drive that you can use on your Netbook.

The reason I say to do this and try it before formatting is that I would think Hyperspace should load itself into RAM and run from there, but you say it still runs slow. This means that either it does not load into RAM (in which case Puppy will run faster) or it is still slow even loading into RAM (in which case, Puppy may not be much improvement speed-wise) -- so it's best to try this without reformatting.

Puppy Linux can be found here: http://puppylinux.org/main/Overview%20and%20Getting%20Started.htm

One other thing to consider, how much crapware (useless software installed by the manufacturer) is always running when you boot into Windows? Crapware you don't use (but always runs) can really slow a system down -- even a high end system can be noticeably slowed by this "shovelware" and netbooks can be brought to their knees.
Randall
RetroRoleplaying [Blog]: Microlite74/75/78/81, BX Advanced, and Other Old School Tabletop RPGs
Microlite20: Lots of Rules Lite Tabletop RPGs -- Many Free

RandallS

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Re: Operating systems
« Reply #4 on: May 16, 2013, 09:02:24 pm »
Quote from: RandallS;108870
Puppy Linux can be found here: http://puppylinux.org/main/Overview%20and%20Getting%20Started.htm


I forgot to mention, for your system, I'd use the older WaryPuppy version which should run faster on a low memory/weak CPU system. This version runs well on a old Pentium II, so it should run well on an Atom.
Randall
RetroRoleplaying [Blog]: Microlite74/75/78/81, BX Advanced, and Other Old School Tabletop RPGs
Microlite20: Lots of Rules Lite Tabletop RPGs -- Many Free

IceAngie

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Re: Operating systems
« Reply #5 on: May 16, 2013, 10:00:55 pm »
Quote from: RandallS;108870
With an Atom N450 and only 1 gig of RAM, it's never going to be a speed demon -- which is par for the course with netbooks or low-end laptops (like our "spare PC" laptop).

You best bet would probably be trying to run Puppy Linux from a USB drive (so you can try it without reformatting). Puppy Linux will load just about everything into your RAM so (once it boots) it will run everything as fast as your CPU will allow.  Unfortunately, your Netbook does not have a CD/DVD burner, so you'll have to get Puppy on a computer that does, burn the .iso file to a CD/DVD, reboot from the CD/DVD, and then you can install Puppy to a USB drive that you can use on your Netbook.

The reason I say to do this and try it before formatting is that I would think Hyperspace should load itself into RAM and run from there, but you say it still runs slow. This means that either it does not load into RAM (in which case Puppy will run faster) or it is still slow even loading into RAM (in which case, Puppy may not be much improvement speed-wise) -- so it's best to try this without reformatting.

Puppy Linux can be found here: http://puppylinux.org/main/Overview%20and%20Getting%20Started.htm

One other thing to consider, how much crapware (useless software installed by the manufacturer) is always running when you boot into Windows? Crapware you don't use (but always runs) can really slow a system down -- even a high end system can be noticeably slowed by this "shovelware" and netbooks can be brought to their knees.

 
Thanks a lot, Randall. I have an external DVD burner, so that shouldn't be a problem.

I have no idea how to see what kind of useless software my computer is running. I have to say, however, that when I bought it, it wasn't so slow, but I think the auto-updates of windows may have something to do with its speed right now. I didn't install any software except Open Office (because microsoft things don't let me use the code they gave me when I bought the computer) and a couple emulators for DOS games and console games (gameboy and sega). Oh! And Ccleaner.
Angeles/IceAngie/Selegna.

RandallS

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Re: Operating systems
« Reply #6 on: May 17, 2013, 07:54:23 am »
Quote from: IceAngie;108884
I didn't install any software except Open Office (because microsoft things don't let me use the code they gave me when I bought the computer) and a couple emulators for DOS games and console games (gameboy and sega). Oh! And Ccleaner.

I'd remove OpenOffice and replace it with LibreOffice. It's a newer and more rapidly updated fork of the OpenOffice project. When Sun sold the open source OpenOffice to Oracle, most of the the development community left and started LibreOffice.  It's cleaned up, at least slightly faster on most systems and better supported -- and still open source freeware and  upward compatible with OpenOffice. You might also consider using FreeOffice as a replacement office. It's free (but not open source) and runs much faster on some machines.
Randall
RetroRoleplaying [Blog]: Microlite74/75/78/81, BX Advanced, and Other Old School Tabletop RPGs
Microlite20: Lots of Rules Lite Tabletop RPGs -- Many Free

Sarah

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Re: Operating systems
« Reply #7 on: May 17, 2013, 07:56:31 am »
Quote from: RandallS;108907
I'd remove OpenOffice and replace it with LibreOffice. It's a newer and more rapidly updated fork of the OpenOffice project. When Sun sold the open source OpenOffice to Oracle, most of the the development community left and started LibreOffice.  It's cleaned up, at least slightly faster on most systems and better supported -- and still open source freeware and  upward compatible with OpenOffice. You might also consider using FreeOffice as a replacement office. It's free (but not open source) and runs much faster on some machines.

 
What are the differences between free and open source?
Knowing when to use a shovel is what being a witch is all about. Nanny Ogg, Witches Abroad

RandallS

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Re: Operating systems
« Reply #8 on: May 17, 2013, 08:06:56 am »
Quote from: maybeimawitch;108908
What are the differences between free and open source?

Free software is simply software that is given away free. Open source software is software where the code is available for reuse (and the software is usually given away free). Having the source code available means that if those developing it abandon it or take in in a direction people don't like, other developers can start a new project continung it or taking it in a different direction.
Randall
RetroRoleplaying [Blog]: Microlite74/75/78/81, BX Advanced, and Other Old School Tabletop RPGs
Microlite20: Lots of Rules Lite Tabletop RPGs -- Many Free

Sarah

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Re: Operating systems
« Reply #9 on: May 17, 2013, 08:08:25 am »
Quote from: RandallS;108911
Free software is simply software that is given away free. Open source software is software where the code is available for reuse (and the software is usually given away free). Having the source code available means that if those developing it abandon it or take in in a direction people don't like, other developers can start a new project continung it or taking it in a different direction.

 
okay, thanks, that makes sense. I thought they were both the same thing
Knowing when to use a shovel is what being a witch is all about. Nanny Ogg, Witches Abroad

IceAngie

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Re: Operating systems
« Reply #10 on: May 17, 2013, 01:18:55 pm »
Quote from: RandallS;108907
I'd remove OpenOffice and replace it with LibreOffice. It's a newer and more rapidly updated fork of the OpenOffice project. When Sun sold the open source OpenOffice to Oracle, most of the the development community left and started LibreOffice.  It's cleaned up, at least slightly faster on most systems and better supported -- and still open source freeware and  upward compatible with OpenOffice. You might also consider using FreeOffice as a replacement office. It's free (but not open source) and runs much faster on some machines.

 
Thanks again, Randall. I'll try both of them and see which one is better for me.
Angeles/IceAngie/Selegna.

Rhyshadow

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Re: Operating systems
« Reply #11 on: May 17, 2013, 06:06:42 pm »
Quote from: IceAngie;108884
Thanks a lot, Randall. I have an external DVD burner, so that shouldn't be a problem.

I have no idea how to see what kind of useless software my computer is running. I have to say, however, that when I bought it, it wasn't so slow, but I think the auto-updates of windows may have something to do with its speed right now. I didn't install any software except Open Office (because microsoft things don't let me use the code they gave me when I bought the computer) and a couple emulators for DOS games and console games (gameboy and sega). Oh! And Ccleaner.

One thing I have on my Netbook (N2600 Atom with 1gb) is Glary Utilities. I do system cleans, registry cleans and disk reorgs regularly. I'd suggest looking into that utility - it does quite a bit that Windows doesn't and makes other system utility tasks much easier.

I may change to Libre as I'm running Open-Office now, my main use for my computer is writing for which I have Scrivener, a specialized word-processor/idea manager for writers.
« Last Edit: May 17, 2013, 06:07:32 pm by Rhyshadow »

RandallS

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Re: Operating systems
« Reply #12 on: May 17, 2013, 06:22:48 pm »
Quote from: Rhyshadow;108951
I may change to Libre as I'm running Open-Office now, my main use for my computer is writing for which I have Scrivener, a specialized word-processor/idea manager for writers.

I'm trying Scrivener now -- for writing RPG rules. So far, so good, but I'm not sure it's worth the price when I have a perfectly good copy of Word 2010 on the system.
Randall
RetroRoleplaying [Blog]: Microlite74/75/78/81, BX Advanced, and Other Old School Tabletop RPGs
Microlite20: Lots of Rules Lite Tabletop RPGs -- Many Free

IceAngie

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Re: Operating systems
« Reply #13 on: May 17, 2013, 06:23:37 pm »
Quote from: Rhyshadow;108951
One thing I have on my Netbook (N2600 Atom with 1gb) is Glary Utilities. I do system cleans, registry cleans and disk reorgs regularly. I'd suggest looking into that utility - it does quite a bit that Windows doesn't and makes other system utility tasks much easier.

 
Thanks! What's the difference between Glary Utilities and Ccleaner?
Angeles/IceAngie/Selegna.

RandallS

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Re: Operating systems
« Reply #14 on: May 17, 2013, 06:41:41 pm »
Quote from: IceAngie;108954
Thanks! What's the difference between Glary Utilities and Ccleaner?

Unless you know what you are doing, I'd stick with Ccleaner as it lacks many of the options that Glary Utilities have -- options which can really mess up your computer if you don't understand them and misuse them.
Randall
RetroRoleplaying [Blog]: Microlite74/75/78/81, BX Advanced, and Other Old School Tabletop RPGs
Microlite20: Lots of Rules Lite Tabletop RPGs -- Many Free

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