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For sound, I had to activate ALSA by installing alsa-base and alsa-utils, and running the command "alsaconf" as root user. A few clicks later, the C-media card showed up in the Xfce sound mixer. Media playback is handled by Xfmedia, a no-nonsense yet capable player that's so dead simple to use, it's brilliant. Out of the box it supported at least CD, mp3 and XviD. CD play consumed a minuscule 2% of the processor while XviD gobbled near 80% but remained fluid. I tried Realplayer, but for what it offers I feel it's not really worth the bother. Quicktime and Windows media support come by installing w32codecs for Xine. However, this is a legal grey area. (Add the line below to /etc/apt/sources file if you wish.)

deb ftp://ftp.nerim.net/debian-marillat/ testing main

Xfce file manager (xffm) is a love it or hate it kind of app. I found it very approachable and easy to navigate. But it gets a little unruly with larger folders and, again, file association can be a head shaker for new users — you must know the exact name or location of program you wish to invoke. The intergrated SMB browser is slick and all I had to do was install smb-client to make it work. Fstab menu is meaningless to a new user until one expands and discovers drives located there. I suppose Nautilus would be a more friendly file browser, but I found the more I used xffm the more I liked it due to its veiled functionality.

For office work, I installed Abiword and Gnumeric for documents and spreadsheets respectively. Both apps worked surprisingly well on this machine and featured MS compatibility. However, complex content really got the hard drive churning. And I installed ImageMagick, a fantastic little photo viewer/editor that worked great.

Here is a brief summary of things I added to flesh out the operating system above what was provided by Xfce and Debian. The list in no way represents a complete or the best selection of apps, but all worked well on this test machine:

Synaptic for package management; Gaim for messaging; Abiword and Gnumeric of office work; ImageMagick for photos; Thunderbird for email; smb-client for networking, alsa-base/utils for sound, file-roller for compression/archiving; gtkdiskfree to monitor disk space; Flash and Realplayer for internet media; gpdf for PDF files; Firestarter firewall utility; gtkam for cameras; cupssys and gnome-cups-manager for printing; gnome-games and Frozen Bubble for nonsensical amusement.

Now for the bad points ...

Sometimes the lack of physical memory reared its ugly head — opening more than one app at a time sent the hard drive thrashing. This is to be expected with only 64MB. I doubled up to 128MB and the OS came alive. I could open three or four apps without a hint of strain. If you intend to do lots of office work or graphics, more memory seems to be the ticket as the machine never once felt like a 400MHz castaway.

I couldn't easily allow users to halt or reboot the machine especially with the default XDM login manager. Installing GDM gave more control to the user and allowed a nifty timed login.

The Xfce menu is a lifeline for a ex-Windows user, but some apps I installed via Synaptic did not find there way there. This isn't by any means a problem limited to Xfce. But the menu editor is crude and unintuitive. Frankly, I hadn't the patience to learn it.

While completely free, as in beer, the downloads for Xfld advanced desktop and Debian are rather huge and time consuming; no problem for broadband but mostly prohibitive for dial-up users. And sometimes you just want to pop in a CD and have a complete, functional desktop without all the fuss. In other words, I would like to see Ubuntu release an Xfce version on a pressed CD. Xubuntu, anyone?

The total install with all the fluff I added consumed 2.5GB of hard drive space. Bear this in mind if you have limited space.

Xfce needs more intergrated apps, like CD burning, if it wants to be a full fledged environment. And that shouldn't automatically spell bloat. I feel I had to add too much bulk to get features I would consider necessary for a modern graphical operating system.

Printer set-up is less-than complete, graphically, as I had to install extras to work CUPS itself — definitely not as polished as other desktops.

The lack of desktop icons is jarring but not debilitating. I could access the Xfce menu anywhere with a right click. Actually, there are a lot of thoughtful touches throughout the UI for you to discover.

Summary:

Xfce is here in a big way. With the added memory, the computer was very pleasant to use, and I would be happy with it as a spare for the rec room or what not. It has a great look and feel with speed belying the hardware beneath. I found myself intensely liking the environment the more I used it. It's clean without appearing austere and configurable without suffering feature creep. Some features and usability issues need to be worked on in the way they've designed the entire desktop, simple and intuitive, but it does offer a decent base for a roll-your-own desktop. It too appears as stable as other popular desktops, and I hope they continue development with an eye for the many computers that might labour under full Gnome or KDE desktops.

So does Xfce 4.2 it pass the test? Absolutely. I think my clients will be pleased.

About the author
Admittedly, I am a computer addict and have been for several years. Linux merely fuels this vice. When I'm not working, eating or sleeping, I can be found building or repairing computers for friends and family. I like rhubarb and green tea, and have several aunts still alive. I've been known to reside on Canada's east coast.