This is a 30 day evaluation version of the Xandros Desktop OS Business Edition. It is fully functional for 30 days and includes a PDF of the abridged User Guide.
Xandros Business Edition 2.0: 30-Day Trial
About The Author
Eugenia Loli
Ex-programmer, ex-editor in chief at OSNews.com, now a visual artist/filmmaker.
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…but I wonder if someone will try to “develop” a “work-around” for this 30-day limit, like the ones we’ve seen circulating on the net for whistlers, longhorns, etc!
Not that I em encouraging someone to do it, but I am curious if it is possible, and how complicated it is (compared to MS protection schemes) to bypass Linux protection schemes like this one (I believe it’s the first time I hear of something like this on linux).
Just plain curiosity…
What a lame ass idea.
A trial version of an operating system where 95% of the software included are either opensource or free software.
Whats next?
Crippling Samba’s webservice, so that only the DELUXE editon can handle that…?
I’m not too much keen to follow proposals on April 1st…maybe the next days if the offer still exists… 😉
ha ha me too. but even if it is true then its very bad for linux development
What is it with you guys and gratis software.
Free is not equal to gratis software!
The GPL (not that it is an athority on morale) states that you only have to give the source to people who you distribute (E.G sells) your software to.
So you can _sell_ your open source software, and say that people may not copy it.
But you have to give the source with.
This serves two purposes: You can make a distribution and take money for it.
As an consumer I _know_ that I can give the source to another distributor, and they can make compatible software.
The main goal of the GPL is to have interoperable software, and a software system that is focused on development instead of a system where it is possible to stall development.
It is nearly impossible to make an Open Source product, and stall development at the same time.
If you wan’t gratis software for everybody, you must either make a distribution out of the not gratis softwaredistribution (by bying one copy, and get the source.), then you must make your own distribution, and sell it for free.
It is really that simple.
Xandros also got non-Free software, but that is not the main reason to _buy_ the product (the main reason imho, is polish).
Uhm, Xandros uniqueness is the addition 5% of the software, plus the way they blend in the software, configure it, debug it, and integrate it that gives them the right to charge for it, and give a time-limited trial. Find that hard to accept? Download your favourite free distro and use that 95% of the software you love so much.
Hm, it is no April fool’s joke. At least I am downloading a 632 MB iso now.
Can’t rule out it is porn, though.
What I am interested in is that how do they enforce the 30 dya limit ? Since linux is extremely hackable, they cant be using a system service which can be remove by the root user. Or do they lock out the root account using some unguessable password, and also lock lilo/grub so that you cant use “linux single” ?
This is what i am afraid of, linux getting better and better, and then also growing more and more commercial. I see it happening around linux and am not pleased. Luckely we still have some good chioce of free resources. Lets keep it that way!
Why is it a lame idea to sell a product.
People have to pay the rent.
Geez … if you want a free Linux distro, download FedoraCore, Mandrake, Gentoo, Debian, Slackware, or any number of other products ….
how childish
I sent in a xandros review which they never posted here.
I used Xandros for a few days and came to the following conclusion. Its much like Lindows but a bit more professional and unless you plan on doing very little with it then dont even bother.
They have some very nice features but this is not a flexible os and the support is almost non existent.
I’m planning to move to Slackware instead.
GNU/Linux is and always will be free in BOTH meanings of the word. Certain linux distos going heavily commercial is great! It means more software, support, and respect for all of Linux, including the gratis distros, of which their will always be many.
There is no company that can buy the linux kernel, and there is no company that can buy the GNU software that we wrap around the kernal to make an OS. The companies can add their own stuff to make it even simpler, prettier, and more powerful, but GNU/Linux itself cannot be made non-gratis, because it already is gratis, and irreversably so.
Rejoice in the commercialization! It will bring great prosperity to all linux users!
I have tried to follow the download link.
I am “an existing customer”, even if I never bought anything, because they have my email address.
When I try to check out I get Xandros Standard Edition added to my shopping cart, for a price of $39 and I can’t see a way how it can be removed.
What is your experience?
Paying for windowze is OK, , , But for Linux NO…
Help develop Linux buy paying a little…
I wonder if the people who wrote these comment are Microsoft people… it sure sounds like…
What I am saying is that xandros is so easy/stable/and works out of the box with thousands of software debain based… wher e the computer market is built out of 15% who Like computers and the rest need them for producing and working, and dont give a damn about Linux or Microsoft, , , ,
So I think your forgeting the 85% who need the Linux to work with out playing arround with …
and the news is :
” Not everyone is a freebsd running fluxbox at home or work”
gotit?
Look, Xandros is an excellant product. To ask why you would pay for free software is ignorant as much of Xandros is proprietary. I have been able to painlessly migrate my wife, mother, brother, father in-law, and several friends to Linux because of Xandros. I could see trying to convince them to learn Gentoo in order to experience the benefits of Linux. It is because of corporate efforts such as this that Linux will come into use by the average user. I prefer Debian, but there is an appeal to being able to get a computer up and running in 10 minutes with everything configured. I know several geeks that have migrated to Xandros because of this. In my opinion Xandros is the single best “commercial” Linux, and definitely the slickest Linux out there. I look forward to the next version. Remember if you pirate commercial distros you really hurt someone. This is a very small development team not a faceless corporate giant like Microsoft. These guys have definitely earned their due.
If you use it within its own confines yes its ok. Its good for newbies. But try and do anything outside of that like installing vmware and forget it doesnt work at all. And trying to get tech support is like talking to a brick wall.
Xandros does a few things ver well though. The XFM is nice to a certain degree and the interface theming is also very nice.
Its definitely a distro worth checking out though.
If they made a “developers” edition which included gnome was optimized for performance and made their xandros networks useable then it might be a really really good linux distro.
Oh also if they added real support.
Overall though one of the better distros around for what it does.
I am of the opposite opinion, to me Lindows looks more “professional”, or, I’d rather say, much more polished.
Whilst I have never used Xandros for any lenght of time, and therefore I can’t really comment, I wouldn’t say that in the case of Lindows “there is very little you can do with it”
The opposite maybe is true: you can watch DVDs with a variety of players (and no, of course you don’t need to buy their paid one), play games, use P2P (virtually all of them), develop…
Only minus: at the moment they use Kde 3.0, but it shouldn’t be too long before version 5 is out, with all the bleeding edge software.
I’ve never actually used lindows myself I’ve just read some reviews. I guess what I was referring to with the comparison was that Lindows markets itself as kind of a “newbie” version of linux. A linux even you “mother” or “wife” or whatnot could use.
What really turned me off though was the support. As someone mentioned before xandros is a small company. This is fine but with small companies sometimes comes small support.
I went into their forums and looked around to see if I could find answers to some questions I had and frankly I wasnt impressed.
I dont know maybe Lindows suffers from this as well. And I know nothing about Lycoris.
What is nice about xandros is its ease of installation in fact I have ended up having to install it on a windows partition and was really concerned because I have no idea how I would do it myself as far as memory spaces and telling the system where on the drive to install. But xandros did it easily.
So it certain things quite nicely. And other things pitifully. Which can be said aboout almost all oses.
A bit suprised about the negitive reactions to this news. For a long time now, the great complaint about Xandros was that nobody wanted to pay for something that you haven’t even had a chance to try. So Xandros is saying: “okay, go ahead and try it first” but everybody is still complaining.
Lindows is a competant product, but I hate the name and it has that name plastered over every living inch of that operating system. The menus have built in ads for their paid click n run service. You can’t just buy Lindows you need a subscription. I would rather pay once. As for support in Xandros I only requested email support once and it was timely, but I usually don’t require support as I am a competant Linux user and developer. You can develop software and do all the geek things with Xandros if you apt-get the tools you need. Apache and PHP come preconfigured together so that hassle is gone. I have even compiled the 2.6 kernel for it, but it took a lot of trial and error. I do love the cd burner and the cd auto-mount and auto-umount ability.It has the best Samba I’ve ever seen. My wife uses crossover for MS Office, but I just use OO. As I said earlier I use Debian, but I have Xandros on a laptop and it rocks. How about a Xandros Server edition with Xandros-easy configuration tools?
You’re right actually. On their forums people complained about this and its nice and about time they did this. Im just speaking as someone whos used it and from the perspective of someone who considers themelves at an intermediate level with linux systems.
But as I said its definitely a distro worth looking at and some people really really do like it.
UT2004 works with Xandros flawlessy. The FPS is high and the load times are half the windows load times. For that I thank God, Linus Torvalds, Xandros, and Hans Reiser.
You can buy Lindows once, at the moment, with the “choice” option. You pay $100 once and you are a member of C&R for life.
I jumped at it 😉
I don’t need much support myself, but the one you get from Lindows would seem first class. You only need to visit their forums and you’ll be astonished by the knowledge of a large section of the users.
Another small (very small in fact, only 2 developers) company is Libranet, but the support is beyond imagination: they would even write a driver specifically for you.
Why is it that some in the Linux community want everything for FREE!!! Xandros is a FOR PROFIT company…. Do you understand that? If you like the trial then buy it, help them out. After all, look at Mandrake, they have had and still do have financial problems. WHY?? Because there are a bunch of CHEAP ASS users out there. Let’s face it Open Source or not, the world revolves around MONEY.
Just my two cents : )
I have downloaded and tested this now, and to my supprise it was no April fool. It worked as it should, and is the very latest Business Edition.
I used Libranet for a while, but found that the support was nonexistant. Jon and Tal apparently never read their forums. They almost never post to them either. I became disgusted with their ignoring the users requests and questions. I also have an issue with people allowed to engage in open harrassment on their forum without warning or censure. The only software they write is the Xadminmenu which usually only runs the standard Debian tools for configuration. Compared to Xandros, which has a wealth of innovative additions Libranet is poor. They actually contribute only about 300kb of code, and they expect to be paid for the whole system. As far as writing drivers they only use the Debian ones that are included with Sarge. I believe in supporting small developers, but they need to develop something first.
I was just about to ask what peoples experiences with it are.
My personal opinion is that Xandros has a windows 98 feel to it. I used windows 98 for a while as my sole system. It worked and had a nice look and feel. But if you tried to do anything outside of its comfort zone then it became very unstable. Thats not to fault windows 98 in a sense as it wasnt designed for certain things.
So xandros has many nice features one of which i commented on above. It was without a doubt the fastest install. It also has a very nice useable interface and definitely doesnt try and overwhelm the user.
Xandros big claim to fame is the xandros file manager which i think is built on the konquerer core. What they did was try and emulate explore in many ways. And I have to say xfm is a very nice piece of software and does quite alot out of the box. But when I tried to customize it in certain ways I found I couldnt.
As far as their support and forums for newbies its ok I guess. Im not sure how many support people they have but I think its one or two. I saw one in the support rooms and he answered some questions. But when people asked anything above some very simply questions they often got admonished beyond belief and treated in very poor ways.
And when I made comments regarding all these facts I was pretty much ignored and then blacklisted.
SO I came to the conclusion that xandros is in the realm of lindows but apparently alot better. And this is fine as not everybody can compile a kernel and use something as advanced as gentoo.
I guess I also learned that i require a more “advanced” and flexible version. I have also found that i prefer gnome to kde. SO my plan is to give slackware debian mepis and arklinux tries and maybe if i get myself drunk enough i will try gentoo. I cant compile a kernel to save my life so it should be interesting.
Different people seem to have different opinions about Libranet support.
True, Jon and Tal don’t intervene very often in the forums, but they have replied some help posts from me, and people say that support gets very good when you email them.
As to what they have contributed in code, allow me to partly disagree: whilst it is true that Adminmenu could have more tools, the installer is one of the best I have ever tried, IMHO, and contrary to many other Debian based distro, you’ll have a very stable, fully Debian compatible OS.
My 2 cents, anyway.
Does libranet come with gnome? Or is it a kde only distro?
Thanks.
comes with Gnome and KDE. Alexander, as far as Libranet being Debian compatable, with the advent of their “safe update” feature they have lost a lot of compatability. After safe update the system becomes unstable and the package manager becomes broken quite easily. This is due to their “creative” use of apt-pinning to make the system impossible to upgrade via dist-upgrade. It sets up a configuration which causes LOTS of issues should you apt-get upgrade. Dependence problems run rampant at that point.They are apparently trying to give the illusion of having a Lindows style archive using the Debian archive in order to enforce the buying of a new version to get the high demand upgrades. I’ve experimented with various installs which has led me to think that version 3 will contain none of the freedom afforded by their previous systems since safe update configuration will come preinstalled. I abandoned it as having no real future because both Xandros and Lindows are set up this way, but at least you get something in the tradeoff.
I won’t pay for Linux.
If no one pays for linux or linux based services there will be no more linux. This elitism has cost the open source community dearly already.
One good thing about Linux is that it’s impossible to put into place a timebomb that can’t very easily be removed. Even Windows timebombs which are very complex and hard to find have been removed. GG Xandros.
I can’t foresee what will happen with Libranet 3, but with 2.8 and 2.8.1 you can simply refuse the safe update, that is what I have done.
My opinion is that even if the safe update comes as a default in future versions, changing the apt configuration and restoring full Debian compatibility should always be possible.
It is true for Lindows, it should be true for Libranet.
Of course in the case of Lindows it doesn’t make a lot of sense, because by using apt you break C&R, which is the main reason for using Lindows.
Libranet 2.8.1 comes with a wide choice of desktop environments/window managers.
My suggestion would be downloading 2.7 for free and upgrading it either to Sid or testing, whatever you feel more comfortable with.
Of course installing anything you want with apt is a trivial matter.
Cybernout,
I see your worry, but if I understand opensource correctly and the modularity of LINUX (and I’m not at all sure I have my head wrapped around these issues – I think I might have once read the GPL, but it’s hazy at best), the beauty of what’s going on is that though the OS may become commercial, it will never close up in a way nor to an extent that prevents a competitor from easily and quickly putting out a pretty comparable product: And, if you have the know how, you can always grab the kernel, the desktop, and the software you want, and “roll your own”. What commercialization of LINUX means is that around a given core product infrastructure there is equal-playing-field competition – if you want to make dollars selling LINUX, you need to convince people that you offer more than the other guy. And because LINUX distros are so cheaply and easily put together (as opposed to making a BeOS or a Windows – from scratch, in-house), there remains a strong likelihood of non-commerical competitors (e.g., Fedora).
If I understand matter right, the commercialization of LINUX is set up to do just what the market is supposed to (create competition forcing the production of better products) while not preventing home-spun efforts (provided sufficient interest exists).
And, as I see matters, things are working out for consumers: LINUX continues to close the gap on Windows and OSX in usability (but, alas, not me beloved BeOS – she broke my heart), offers its own distinct set of plusses and minuses, sells for less, and convinces you to update with new features and improvement (obsolesence as a good thing!) rather than threatening you with discontinued support* (obsolesence as a bad thing!).
(*I take it the issue here is: Since the source of the core components of the product is open, you can get some third party to maintain your obsolescent systems or learn to maintain it yourself – you’re not dependent upon the provider you brought it from, whereas a third party maintaining, for example, Windows has as much access to the core code as Microsoft deems it in its own interest to grant. OR have I read too many biased on-line rants?)
So, are these the kinds of things you’re worried about? Am I making sense? (I’m trying to learn how this opensource world operates by seeing who tells me what I’ve got wrong.)
Very good post!
As to Beos, what about Zeta? Whilst it is still not quite ready, it doesn’t seem too bad to me…
Sorry, little typo in your name 🙂
Alexander,
Thanks for the positive feedback on my post! (I was beginning to think people didn’t do that in such religious discussions as computer OSes!)
I’m most anxious about Zeta – I read things that both worry and encourage me all the time. I’ve got my fingers crossed and some money put aside for the final release (hopefully the first of many). BeOS really fit how I wanted to interface with my computing needs; it’s worth some reasonable amount of money to let yellowTab show me what they’re made of. I think they’ve got a shot at establishing a niche for themselves if they stay focussed, know their customer base, and deliver. I just wish they’d give some indication of when they’d like to have a final release hit the bricks.
Anyway, I’m rooting for them (and, for that matter, LINUX, Windows, Mac, and everything else that offers computer users’ functionality with all its various costs and benefits).
its installed and works everything, hehh.. i first put it on a pentium 13~ mhz, with 64 ram, and it works, a little slow, but all recognized, a little heavy on gui installation but runs and works … 40 minutes latter instaslled on my laptop, , , it installed in 20 minutes, now up and running everything is great..
Thank you, you brought me a stable, and light, and fast Linux Xandros business edition, its a killer.. very good job, only single experts can build such a distro..
see you latter …
Thanks.
Zeta RC2 seems reasonably functional to me.
Of course you’ll know that if you buy RC2, then you can have the final for about 10 Euros 🙂
When you purchase Xandros you receive 2 or 3 months of Email support…the Xandros forum is for Users to try and help out other users, it is an unofficial forum, and the fact that Xandros support keeps an eye on the forum and sometimes post replies is a credit to Xandros.
If you are a small Company offering a product such as a linux desktop distro, there is nothing wrong with charging for your work, who pays the rent on the building? Who pays for your staff to work full time developing and supporting your product?…Who pays for advertising, distribution costs?
Linux kernel is free and should always be, but if you want a Linux desktop operating system, then you should be prepared to pay to support it.
The effects of open source/Linux adoption on the software market and the way we use our computers you mentioned are very good ones indeed. The opening up of standards, applications, etc., will slowly bring software and hardware choice and interoperability back to the levels they were at in the ’80s(multiple hardware platforms for which existed software products for each, for example). Hopefully the open source movement will reverse the stranglehold ms has over this market. I can only hope the beast is broken before they really get into the hardware business,(CPUs, mainboards, BIOSes, etc…) because we will really will be screwed then.
Anyway, I am gonna download Xandros tonight and see if it will fit my needs for a tweak-free, “just works” desktop. I use Mandrake 9.2, have 10 C.E. installed, and I am always messing around with partitions, installing/compiling/trying new software, and just tweaking and tinkering. I need a way for my and esp. my wife to be able to always use the compter without it being in the middle of one of my “projects.”
Off to download….
will Xandros really stop working after 30 days or is it just like many other trial software that will start annoy the user with popups about buying the sofware etc, but you can still continue to use it, although with bitchin’ popups every now and then.
Btw, you people that havent yet tried Xandros…I can highly recommend it. You will probably not be disappointed if youŕe looking for a clean, stable (so far), and user-friendly linux distrubution with lot of quality applications pre-installed and ready to run. For you that want to share an internet connection with your LAN, there is an application called Firestarter that you can download from Xandros Networks, which is primarily a Firewall but also includes NAT translation which is basically the same thing as ICS seen in Windows XP/2000.
so whats the deal with people not liking Xandros making money from their efforts? I mean, in the end its up to you,the customer, to choose if you want to pay for it. Its not like anyone is holding a gun to your head. Then its perfect with a trial edition for you to try out and maybe then buy it.
like Hughesjr says, there are plenty of FREE linux dists.
Install, set the date to one month ahead, reboot, and the trial addition will give you a message that say: “The thirty day trial period has expired. The system will be shut down in 30 minutes and all unsaved date will be lost.”
Put the date back to the correct date, reboot, and the trial continues as normal.
In other words, they’re serious about stopping the trial after 30 days. You can always create another partition to keep your data on and reinstall the system every 30 days (big hassle), or just fork out the money and buy it.