[OT] Linux distro recommendations for HP Omnibook 900B laptop? [was Re: Comparioson of purpose for PyGUI and AnyGUI ???]

[Richard Hanson]

[I'm not aware of the local customs re [B]CC'ing the poster being
replied to when changing the subject line to start a new thread. I'd
welcome advice if such is desired. So far, I've only replied
in-group.]

Andrea Griffini wrote:

> On Tue, 21 Sep 2004 20:17:26 -0700, Richard Hanson <me at privacy.net>
> wrote:
> 
> >loading-RH9-tomorrow'ly y'rs,
> 
> OT but I can't resist.

Glad you didn't resist!

> Pay attention to what you're doing and please be sure
> you're installing a very current very patched system.
> I installed RH9 on a server (to replace an old machine
> running RH6) and to my great surprise it lasted to the
> wind of the internet about 6 hours before being rooted
> by a romanian idiot.

Thanks very much for the heads-up. 

As it happens, RH9 is the only relatively new distro I have CDs for.
(I'm on dialup, so DL'ing other distros is a bit onerous.) But, thanks
to your "JIT" warning, I shall immediately see about ordering a
different distro on CD from some online outlet and will forestall the
RH9 installation for the interim.

Can you or anyone recommend a better distro for an HP Omnibook 900B
laptop? 

I currently have only a CardBus Xircom combo modem and ethernet card
(RBEM56G-100) for this machine -- do any distros support this card?
Or, can a different combo card be recommended? Perhaps a
recommendation for just a modem card?

Thanks for any advice! 

(Email replies are welcome, if you wish. I apologize for the munged
email address in my sig, but I think spam tastes like crap :-) and am
trying to avoid such. :-/ )

BTW: I'm not running a server (that I know of... -- I *am* still using
Windows... :-) ). I'm looking for a decent Linux (or other Unix) for
personal use -- usenet, email, webbrowsing, and offline
personal-productivity stuff. 

> Is it only the brand name the part I don't like in
> windows ? I would say not. 

I'm getting *so* tired of spending my limited time and energy on just
*rebuilding* Windows machines. (I had to stick with Windows for some
time due to a family reunion book project I was working on -- the apps
I had available at the time were Windows-only, and the other
contributors were also using Windows-only software. Thankfully, that
seven-year project is now finally done -- so I can move on to a "real"
OS. Hardware reliability remains a problem, though.) 

However, I also immensely dislike the ad-hoc and quite baroque Windows
et al GUIs. I think that the HCI problem has not been adequately
addressed on *any* of the popular platforms (to my knowledge). See my
soon-to-be-posted thread titled "[OT] 'Pre-announcement' of
Python-based 'computing appliance' project" for further info about my
work-in-progress.

Thanks again for the warning re RH9!


off-to-CheapBytes'ly y'rs,
Richard Hanson

-- 
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