According to their website, Xandros 2.0 is now shipping. The site also states that “Users with high-speed connections can purchase and download both the Deluxe and Standard editions of Xandros Desktop 2 at www.xandros.com”, but their download section still states “Xandros Desktop OS is not currently available for download.” Supposedly they will also have a free, 30-day evaluation version available for download.
I’d like to hear what some of you think about this desktop.
If the shipping version has a manual included, anybody know if the downloadable version will include a soft copy ?
I was a 2.0 beta tester and this is simply the best all purpose SOHO or home desktop linux out there. The crossover products make a big difference here, but other things like Xandros Networks and Xandros File Manager are pretty nice too.
Plus, their CD burning applet built into the file manager will blow you away. This is one distro that actually IS worth paying to support.
… if I reinstall StarOffice, the time to trial begins again…
Not sure, but I would say yes. The boxed product comes with the nice 200 pager, and it’s very professionally done. I have an electronic copy (PDF) because they gave them to us testers to read though for any improvements or suggestions.
This company has some really great people in it, and I urge everyone to try this product.
>Plus, their CD burning applet built into the file manager
>will blow you away. This is one distro that actually IS worth
>paying to support.
How is that different from the rightclick k3b option in kde 3.1 and does it burn dvd’s?
I asked the Xandros team that same question but never got a response.
It will be interesting to see when it’s available. As I stated earlier, I was on the beta testing team and we never got to try this….we’re all very curious about this.
“How is that different from the rightclick k3b option in kde 3.1 and does it burn dvd’s?”
Well, you don’t have to worry about having k3b installed and ready to go.
No, it won’t do DVD’s.
However, it can replace K3B for most other basic tasks that home or soho users might do…like burning images, music cds, data cds….
k3b is a great app, but Xandros’ built in buring is easier to understand for new users, and it’s just so darn simple it’s amazing. It can’t replace k3b for everything, but does a lot of the same stuff.
if you are a die hard k3b user you probably won’t care much for it, but this will hit the spot for many, many users out there.
I’ve been using Mandrake for the last few years, because it’s so easy to install and use; Xandros seems to have some appealing features, though. Any thoughts on how it stacks up against Mandrake 9?
i beta tested xandors on various computers i own, i never could get it to work properly on a multi partitioned setup, especially a seperate /usr /home /var and / partition… for some reason, the installer did not like it very much.
i’m not even sure if they fixed that bug yet, so i am goign to hold off on buying this distro.
the file manager was excellent though, i did manage to crash it a few times, and it borked on viewing my windows network shares a few times.
the different beta’s were also very inconsistently working with my wireless card, which is based off of the orinoco chipset, and works just fine with linux.
so as for xandros on my laptop, nope, not for me. i even bought that lifetime lindows subscription, lindows laptop edition sux, didn’t even detect my wireless correctly. i just formatted and installed morphix back on my laptop, which works perfectly, and has a great installer.
hope this helps!
I just purchased the delux download version. It DOES have documentation you can download. You get:
# Xandros Desktop OS V2 Getting Started Guide (1.2MB)
# Xandros Desktop OS V2 User Guide (12MB)
Xandros will soon replace my broken Fedora machine. :+)
Quote:
“The evaluation version is coming, to make sure that the loyal customers who paid for a download get the best possible download rates we arent making it publicly available yet. Once the inital traffic dies down, the evaluation will be posted.”
Posted as the tenth post in response to “Xandros 2 as Donwload Edition (Deluxe?)” in the Xandros Forums on the Off Topic board by Matt Larose, Technical Support Representative for the Xandros Corporation.
I have tried many different distros. Spending my time tweaking was fun at first but I got tired of it. Xandros 1.0 (then 1.1) just does what I want it to without a bunch of messing around. In fact my wife likes it and uses it with no problem.
If your not happy with your current operating system, Xandros is well worth a look. However, if you are happy with your current operating system then just stay with that. Changing operating systems just for the sake of change doesn’t make sense to me. I don’t care about having the latest and greatest, I want stability and something that works, and Xandros delivers (at least 1.0 & 1.1 do). Like they say …… If it aint broke, don’t fix it.
I am buying Xandros 2.0 to support the company, but also because some of the new features appeal to me.
Mike
I guess I just don’t see the point of Xandros/Lindows etc. If your going to be paying money for some proprietary X86 OS that touts being able to “run your window’s apps” why not just stick with Microsoft Windows? XP Home is stable, cheap, and will be supported for many years to come. Not to mention it has all the hardware and software vendors scrambling to support it.
So again what benefit do you get from running Xandros? And don’t say security because XP running Thunderbird and Firebird with Update Notification is just as safe as running Xandros/Lindows.
Its not like your running an Open Source OS like Debian,Fedora, Mandrake, Slackware or Gentoo. It seems to me Linux distros like Xandros or the worst of both worlds. Your not getting the ideological benefits of running Real Open Source Linux. And your still trying to run the same apps that of course work perfectly on Windows.
I just don’t get it. If it were free as in Beer I could see people trying it out, but since your actually paying money why not stick with either Pure Linux or Pure Windows and not some half-breed?
I’m not Trolling btw, I just don’t see any benefit for most people.
I bought a copy of Xandros 1.0 and I thought it was a great product. The only problem that I had was IO performance was dismal and I was not able to find a Xandros supported method to upgrade the kernel. Since it is debian based, I did it on my own and it fixed the problem though. I look forward to trying out v2.0, but in the meantime, I’ve been using Libranet and Libranet rocks.
does rock. i must concur w/bill on this one. sweeeeeet distro.
I request that they post complete changes of any GPL source they have used, such as the Debian core. If not they will be in violation of the GPL and will have a legal fight on their hands…
Never mind they posted the source. It’s in the FAQ, seems to all be there…
“I request that they post complete changes of any GPL source they have used, such as the Debian core. If not they will be in violation of the GPL and will have a legal fight on their hands…”
They don’t have to give you the source unless you purchase their product. Although they can’t stop you from getting the source from someone other than you who purchased their product.
I do belive that Xandros has been good about releasing their source though. I wouldn’t worry about it unless it becomes an issue.
I think capturing Saddam brings closure to this conflict though. Unlike Gulf War 1 where nothing really ever came of it. But I think there is still a LONG way to go before they pack up the troops and bring them back. Might be an American military presence over there until dooms day actually.
Well, personally I have some kind of weird fetish when it comes to Operating Systems. I like to play with any O/S I can get my hands on. I’ve tried almost all of the main Linux distors. (Don’t care about the little fly-by-night distros that pop up and are gone a month later.) I’ve played with FreeBSD, Solaris 9 x86, QNX (long time ago), BeOS, and I recently bought OS/2 warp on eBay for like $5.
And I picked up some old 1GB hard-drives recently so I could check out NetBSD, OpenBSD, and any other O/S that piques my interest.
So I want to check out Xandros if for no other reason that to get a feel for it. Compare it to Mandrake, Fedora, SuSE, etc.. (Fedora is my “main” system right now. Although I’m probably going to switch to Mandrake 9.2. Have had Mandrake setup on my spare machine for the last couple of weeks and I think it’s pretty good for a Desktop system.)
However to directly answer your question, I think the likes of Xandros appeals to people who keep hearing about “this Linux thing” and want to check it out but don’t want to jump into something completely foreign. They want something that’s going to look and act like something that are at least kind of familiar with. Then, if they like what they see and they stick with it, then in time they might check out the more “pure” distros.
So – I think it’s a Good Thing.
See, Working in a Windows environment here at work is all fine and dandy, but the software we make is all ASP web based so its only actual support is Internet Explorer,
Until Xandros came out I couldn’t convince my boss that supporting another browser was worth it. However I have happily been running Xandros 1.1 in a Windows Domain for the last 8 months, re writing code to clear up incompatabilites between it and Mozilla.
I’ve dropped Redhat, SuSE and Mandrake into this group and only Xandros has survivied the “torture” test that my boss throws at me.
Simple…elegant…linux…
[/i]I guess I just don’t see the point of Xandros/Lindows etc. If your going to be paying money for some proprietary X86 OS that touts being able to “run your window’s apps” why not just stick with Microsoft Windows? XP Home is stable, cheap, and will be supported for many years to come. [/i]
several reasons:
-viruses are mainly written for windows, few of them affect Linux
-linux seems to me to run faster on comparable hardware.
-there are applications (for science and research) that I need to use that are not availible on Windows
-I find it easier to develop software under Linux
-I am not beholden to a single company when I run Linux. I can change vendors if something annoys me or the company pisses me off.
-Linux is cheaper and will be supported for many years to come
Simple. Some people are like me. Too lazy to put in the endless work required to keep a system fine tuned, and too ignorant to understand everything anyway.
But I paid Danegeld to Microsoft for 20 years because (for me) there was no feasible alternative. Now I have alternatives.
Barry
I have to say i am mega impressed with Xandros. The desktop, the theme choices.. the menu layout. Xandros 2 is a must have. Wonderful distribution.
Thsi looks to be one of teh best distributions.
I have downloaded, installed and checked out Xandros 2.0.
First impressions:
– They have not really updated the themes, icons, “look and feel” of the OS. Apart from the new “plastik” theme, everything looks quite old and dated.
– Performance and overall responsiveness still seems a bit sluggish compared to other distros on the same box.
– I cannot get several programs to load in 2.0 – when starting them they seem to start loading but then quit (Realplayer, Opera, Evolution)
– DVD playback doesn’t work for me – Xine quits before it can start playing anything.
– Xandros Networks still seems slow and cumbersome. Things I have already installed still appear in the “to install” lists.
Apart from this, things seem to “just work”. However, I have had less trouble and more pleasure using Libranet, Mandrake and Mepis on the same box.
Hi all, have been beta testing Xandros2.0 from beta1. I believe I was picked to test Xandros because I fit the profile of those who would like to migrate from MS to Linux. I am no good on the console but can find my way around with a mouse. This Xandros2.0 is definately worth the money and because we needed to keep some MS programs, in the past, a total break from MS was not possible.
From the very start with Beta 01, I was able to turn off my Windows box and have been running MS Office Professional (I could have easily used Open Office Org 1.1), but MS Office needed to be tested, QuickBooks Pro2002, PhotoShop7 and PhotoShop Elements2.0, A good CD Label making program out of Canada called “ClickNDesign3d”by Veritas and several other MS type programs, along with all the programs included with Xandros.
The CD burning program in XFM (Xandros File Manager) is very good and will satisfy all but the very most particular.
This is a very good Operating System which I consider to be more than a distribution. If you neglect to try it you will be missing a very good thing!
I do not want to debate those who are upset at having to pay for Linux. I wanted an Operating System that could free me and my company from the overbearing tendencies of a company which is making the same mistake as Compaq. All I know is Xandros fills that position and when I think of all the money I have spent with Microsoft, Xandros Linux is an extremely good buy, purchased from a very reputable company. Xandros has never failed to honor their support obligations as have other Linux Distros I have tried.
Thank you for listening, Paul.
Very interesting system Xandros has conjured up. I really do hope to see how the competition will work between it, Lindows, and Lycoris.
I’m sure we all know that Lindows will die a horrible death. After all, who builds a system that doesn’t let users have any personal space/power of their own? That is, when they rid themselves of the /home directory we know we have a problem. It’s very much like Windows, and I think for security purpose a user won’t mind typing in a password every now and then.
Xandros and Lycoris are the only two real competitors here. But as people say, Michael Robertson has a habit of being very loud. Maybe it takes someone to talk out about these other two “home desktop solutions” as well. Distro war or no distro war, Lindows is horrible for a user based system, much like Windows. Lycoris and Xandros are the only systems worth taking a look at for a home user if you ask me.
To each his own though.
In response to the commentquoted below.
>>I guess I just don’t see the point of Xandros/Lindows etc. If your going to be paying money for some proprietary X86 OS that touts being able to “run your window’s apps” why not just stick with Microsoft Windows?<<
Your comment is reasonable, makes common sense, but it implies that things should be polarized on the basis of products–Open Source VS Proprietary.
The only polarization for me is emotional, even irrational: me against MS. But buying a good product from a market place of fair competition is fine with me. If an open source OS is better than Linux for sale, I’d go with that–as long as it’s not MS.
A_C_T_I_V_A_T_I_O_N
I have three computer in my house. You get the idea.
Pollycat,
Have you tried downloading another ISO. I haven’t tried my X2.0 ISO yet, but perhaps you have a corrupted ISO?
I am a betatester aswell..
Lets see…
1. Better than mandrake?
It toasts any RPM distro any day… Its debian with an attitude. And 1.1 is one of the best ranked distros atm… And 2.0 is a whole lot better than 1.1
2. 30 day limit how?
I would presume the 30 days limit is on the xandros tools… If they stop working the machine will stop working i guess… PNP, filemanager …. and so on.
3. Harddisk trouble man.
I’ve used it successfully on several harddisks and partitions. Now biggie… Probably just finger trouble from your side… Ive run from 1.0, 1.1, 2.0 beta 2 through rc 2 with the same success.
4. A little flame to the Why even bother post… Research before you post, first of all its debian just right through it… You pay for a set of software that is on top that makes it work a bilion times better than stock Debian. And they have support… It is the best system I’ve used, and i started with slackware 1.0… So you buy the enhancement package on top of pure opensource.. And you get support
My description of Xandros…
Its a linux distro based on debian without the normal install/config hassle.
Oh it is soo good not having to do /etc hacking like I have done for sooooo long, was fun in the start… But now its just painfull… I want to use my time productively.
The look and feel is very updated… Ok its the same theme but hey how much better it looks..
At my system it flies… but you ned ram to let it fly. I run Evolution at work, Opera at home and so on… Have no problems what so ever… And Xandros Networks works perfectly…
After your descriptions it sounds like a Xandros 1.0 or 1.1 distro…
PS… They aren’t allowed to deliver a distro with DVD playback yet… None of the players out there are really legal you know
But if you look on theirs site forums there is a little article about how to use apt-get to get DVD playback working.
Have fun everyone…
PS. For the GPL Worried people… The Xandros guys actually take pride in posting back their bugfixes and so on into the opensource community so it benefits all linux distros… They have done lots allready.
I beta’d this feature (inadvetantly) and it’s a simple total system shutdown 30 minutes after bootup.
And don’t get any fancy “OMG, but Linux is GPL, we’ll bust that puppy” ideas. Why? So you can *STEAL* their NON-GPL work?
But, basically, it works by digital signatures. No signature (i.e. from a licensed installer), no workee after 30 minutes. The timer is in the XFM, which is very tightly integrated into the desktop. Oh, and XFM is NOT GPL. It’s Xandros own work from the old Caldera file manager, and not based on any GPL code. And it’s quite good, too.
So, you could take Xandros, rip out the non-GPL installer, XFM, all the integrated non-GPL software such as Crossover Office, Flash plugin, Java, Acrobat Reader, and probably a few more, but then, if you’re going to do that, you might as well just install Debian in the first place. Because that’s exactly what’s left over when you remove the Xandros stuff that make it well … Xandros.
So, if you like a nice prepackaged, easy-to-install Linux distro that you can give to your mother or use in your brother-in-law’s business or your own small business, the <$100USD they ask is not at all a bad deal.
And the license is generous – any number of personal-use home computers *and* one commercial use computer. Now, of course you can install and use any of the GPL’d packages on any number of computers any way you like, but you don’t need Xandros to do that anyway.
Hope that clears up some of the interest in that 30-minute timeout on the evaluation product.
Why is that everyone with a half-baked idea always hides behind a fake name? Trolling? Admit it. You are.
To answer your question why use linux instead of Windows? Simple, because we can. Hate to burst your bubble, but using a different browser is not going to make your OS more stable or secure.
There are plenty of users that do not WANT to use MS products any more, but there seems to be one or two apps that one can not find a replacement for in linux. Products like Crossover Office allow these users to switch to linux NOW and still use that app.
Xandros Desktop 2 is the best distro I have ever put on a computer. The built-in CD burning puts Windows XP built-in burning to shame. You can have several different CD projects going at one time and then burn them when you get ready. Creating a project is as simple as dragging and dropping files to the project. Burning is only one link away.
As a die-hard Windows user, I can say that Xandros can make the switch to linux extremely easy for anyone willing to try.
My post was in response to post #14.
Pollycat – posting your opinion about an early beta? LIke ANY distro, Xandros Desktop 2 comes with several themes. If you don’t like the default theme, change it. Why bitch that it is outdated? If you think you can come up with something better, please share.
To answer your question why use linux instead of Windows? Simple, because we can. Hate to burst your bubble, but using a different browser is not going to make your OS more stable or secure.
I beg to differ on that point. A lot of the security probs in Windows have to do with some hole in IE exploiting the underlying OS. As for stability, it depends on the user – if you keep clicking ‘Yes’ to those ActiveX controls, you’re going to get a lot of malware on your machine in a hurry, which is never a good thing.
There are plenty of users that do not WANT to use MS products any more, but there seems to be one or two apps that one can not find a replacement for in linux. Products like Crossover Office allow these users to switch to linux NOW and still use that app.
That remains to be seen. I plan to try the version of Crossover installed with Xandros 2 – if it can even install and run CoolEdit Pro 2.1 even without any of the plugins installed, I’ll be impressed.
Xandros Desktop 2 is the best distro I have ever put on a computer. The built-in CD burning puts Windows XP built-in burning to shame.
That’s what Nero 6 is for, dude
You get what you pay for.
I am also a Xandros Beta tester. I have been waiting for the beta period to end to be able to say Xandros 2.0 is EXCELLENT! Its been really hard to keep my mouth (typing fingers) closed during the beta test period. The folks at Xandros have done an excellent job in creating a distribution that can satisfy both styles of users. Easy enough for Mom with plenty of room for the hardcore Linux fans and the techies who still want their command line apps.
Xandros, once and for all, proves that Linux is indeed READY FOR THE DESKTOP.
Move out of the way Windows, theres a new game in town.
Never do two forums/threads at the same time, blixel. Mistakes like that would happen more often.
“- They have not really updated the themes, icons, “look and feel” of the OS. Apart from the new “plastik” theme, everything looks quite old and dated.”
I don’t think so. Btw. you know that next KDE release will come with the Plastik theme? See how ahead of time Xandros is
“- Performance and overall responsiveness still seems a bit sluggish compared to other distros on the same box.”
Performance at mine was much better than other distros I tried, because hardware-acceleration of my Geforce 4 actually worked.
“- I cannot get several programs to load in 2.0 – when starting them they seem to start loading but then quit (Realplayer, Opera, Evolution)”
Work all fine at mine.
“- DVD playback doesn’t work for me – Xine quits before it can start playing anything.”
Does only not work with some disks.
“- Xandros Networks still seems slow and cumbersome. Things I have already installed still appear in the “to install” lists.”
This seems to be true only for slow connections (56k-isdn).
I have to admit that Xandros 2.0 is not perfect yet, it has some minor inconsitencies and problems which can bug you, but all in all its the best distro available yet and those minor bugs will soon be fixed. Then it will be the perfect distro
The purpose of “even bothering” is to find an OS that is not produced by a convicted monopolist. Everbody knows that monopolies put out bad products and have no motivation to provide quality services. Besides the fact that Windows won’t let you delete you internet browsing history. It is a matter of principle that other OSes get support.
Having said that, I have yet to get an OS to run without major problems. I am still trying to get fedora to run.
I am one of the beta testers for Xandros Desktop Version 2. Although I have not yet used the final product, because I am waiting for it to be shiped to me, I can tell you from RC2 it’s amazing. Even the first beta was amazing.
The look and feel makes both Windows, Mac, & Linux users feel right at home, Xandros has found the happy mediam in this aspect.
The OS it’s self is fast, stable, and up-to-date. Hardware support has been exelent for me, I could not find anything that did not work.
Xandros Networks is the all-in-one package management program you have been waiting for, it does everything from installing RPM’s and DEBS from the Internet, to downloading extra software from the Xandros servers or Debian servers. There is no limit to what is possible to install. If somehthing is available for Linux in one form or an other it will install and work on Xanmdros Desktop 2.0.
Xandros File Manager is just like Explorer in Windows XP, so its just what you need to manage any type of file.
Multimedia support is above par, the only thing that does not work out of the box is holliwood DVD’s, but all you need is to install a file from Xandros Networks to get this working, it’s easy and very quick.
Don’t know what else I can sey, just try it, I think everyone is going to love it. it’s much better then any other Linux I have ever used! (Mandrake, Lycoris, LindowsOS, Ark Linux)
Has Xandros managed to make copy-and-paste work the way Windows and Mac users are used to? Supposedly Sun has done this in their new distro. Anyone know?
I just hilighted your heading, typed control-c, then clicked on the subject line, typed control-v and presto-magic! copy-and-paste worked the way I am used to in Windows. But then again I am only using Lindows, which according to various people in this forum, is based on Xandros. I would assume that the good folks at Xandros had not overlooked this feature 😉
Call me crazy, but I can even play an mp3 song (David Bowie) and a mpeg movie (Sponge Bob) at the same time from my Windows 2003 Advanced Server NTFS partition, without a hiccough!
“I just hilighted your heading, typed control-c, then clicked on the subject line, typed control-v and presto-magic! copy-and-paste worked the way I am used to in Windows.”
Copy-and-paste works that way *inside* some programs. But often fails when you try between programs.
Try your experiment again and paste broswer text into OpenOffice, for example.
i test 1.1 downloadable version. works for me about 90-95% only problem was tv viweeing
Try your experiment again and paste broswer text into OpenOffice, for example.
The preceeding text was copy-and-pasted into OpenOffice, edited, and copy-and-pasted back into the browser in the Lindows Internet Suite. The font is ugly as sin in OpenOffice 1.0.3, but the point is that it does work.
BTW, I only started playing with Lindows today. I just fired up the LindowsCD on my Windows 2003 “Workstation”. I am a lifetime licensee of LindowsOS because I am “defender of choice” #455 for Sweden.