Comments on: PCLinuxOS 2010 (KDE)

By: Vivekanandhan G

Vivekanandhan G — Sun, 10 Apr 2011 03:58:48 +0000

Please dont try PCLinuxOS. I tried it 3 years back. Still I could not come out of it. Earlier I was a happy distro hopper, trying fedora, ubuntu, mint, vector, mandriva… I was able to successfully change my distro within 3-4 months. But after trying PCLinuxOS, I could not come out as on today. So Please never ever try this one.

By: Vivekanandhan G

Vivekanandhan G — Fri, 28 Jan 2011 14:18:00 +0000

I have used about 6/7 distros as main distro in the past 5 years. As I could not stick to a single distro even if it worked ( Actually I had to kame it work for me) for more than 6 months. Ever since I started using PCLinuxOS, Still I could not change my main distro. This one is very addictive. I am trying other cool distros as additional. But I dont find the comfort of PCLinux in any other distro. It is designed exactly the way I want. I can just use it after fresh install (Just need to install Open Office).
More than its features, I like the forum members and the community. We can make package request (And that is added within few days.), Always there are helping hands in the forum in case somebody needs help.
According to me, this is the best of all distros.

By: Desktop Linux: The Presstitutes Strike Again! | Eye On Linux

Desktop Linux: The Presstitutes Strike Again! | Eye On Linux — Wed, 20 Oct 2010 19:46:43 +0000

[...] Linux Mint PCLinuxOS Peppermint OS One Kubuntu Pinguy OS openSUSE Fedora [...]

By: Brian Masinick

Brian Masinick — Sat, 15 May 2010 04:07:30 +0000

@Rita:

The IPV6 setting is not inherently the fault of distribution vendors, it is the way that networks operate. Here’s the deal: Network address space has been running out on the Internet for some time. Quite a while ago now, IPV6 was invented to resolve that problem. There is no issue with IPV6 at all, except one: VERY FEW, if any, Internet Service Providers (ISPs) have implemented IPV6. What does that mean? Well, if you have IPV6 and the classic IPV4 implemented on your system, the network address searching algorithms will first look for an IPV6 address and if found, use it, otherwise continue to search. This lengthens the time when 6 is searched first, especially since so few IPV6 addresses are out there. Searching IPV4 first would be faster.

It turns out that you can disable IPV6. I think it would be a good idea if it were turned off by default until it becomes prevalent. That would speed up network access. It is not a bug at all, though, simply a convention – one day we’ll see that it is a good one.

By: momentum

momentum — Fri, 07 May 2010 11:01:29 +0000

It is fast as hell om my amd athlon 1600 xp with radeon 9600 pro, much faster than kubuntu for example, so if someone is looking for easy to use distro with kde 4, pclinuxos is great choise.

By: Joshua W. Harris

Joshua W. Harris — Mon, 03 May 2010 08:00:26 +0000

Well I’ve tried out PClinuxOS 2010 KDE….everything is great as long as you dont enable a 3D desktop. I’ve tried numerous configurations of the graphics server and kde settings but got nowhere near the performance of Kubuntu 10.04. Good package management and selection, great theme, and otherwise decent distro ruined (at least for me and many others) due to slow graphics performance. Kubuntu, Suse, Pardus and others get it right. I’d have to recommend one of these over the latest PCLinuxOS.

By: PCLinuxOS 2010 « Jso | Stefano Orlandi, Java Developer and Software Engineer

Mon, 26 Apr 2010 08:21:24 +0000

[...] http://desktoplinuxreviews.com/2010/04/20/pclinuxos-2010-kde [...]

By: tlmck

tlmck — Sun, 25 Apr 2010 12:58:02 +0000

@ Jordan Clarke: I should have mentioned if you do a search for "task" in Synaptic, all of the various desktop environments will show up. Th exception would be fluxbox which is listed simply as fluxbox.

By: Paul Mienuo

Paul Mienuo — Sun, 25 Apr 2010 07:56:18 +0000

Gnome version runs beautifully on my 900A EeePC. Will be on there a long time! Amazing!

By: house cleaning your brain

house cleaning your brain — Sat, 24 Apr 2010 22:48:44 +0000

it would be the Linux distro for me if it were only 64 bit.
But it’s not so I use others. That is just my opinion and of course not necessarily the opinion of others

By: Wil

Wil — Fri, 23 Apr 2010 15:57:17 +0000

@ Rita: I have run 2010 kde minime on 8 separate modernish systems A64 X2 to Core 2) and 2 ancient (P3) machines and a mini ITX celeron 220 board with no problems. I am using IDE to Sata (150-300) devices and mostly Nvidia cards. Why don't you post the specs of your system since most problems I've read have been from esoteric hardware. Firefox has never given me problems even with the IPV6 problems VERY few others have experienced.

By: Jordan Clarke

Jordan Clarke — Fri, 23 Apr 2010 15:43:25 +0000

@ tlmck: :) I'd happily try all of the desktop environments for PCLinuxOS 2010! I'm particularly curious about PCLinuxOS 2010 E17 though (especially after Elive demanded payment for an installation - requesting donations is fine, but demanding payment isn't reasonable, considering distro-hoppers are the most likely people to try it). However, I can only download so much before overdoing the usage limit, slowing the connection and getting into trouble with my (Window$ using) parents! :D And seeing as I've been wanting to try a KDE 4.4 installation for a while now (frustrated glare at openSUSE 11.3 Milestones 1-5), I thought this would be the way to do it. Needless to say, I've had a pretty good experience with it (I'm happily typing this message on it right now in fact), but there have still been a couple of issues. I hope my comments have come across as nothing other than constructive criticisms... :)

By: tlmck

tlmck — Fri, 23 Apr 2010 13:53:09 +0000

@ Jordan Clarke: If you are a Gnome fan, download it from the repositories and then select it at the login screen. It is definitely not "off the rack" Gnome.

By: tlmck

tlmck — Fri, 23 Apr 2010 13:48:17 +0000

@ whichkde: Try http://kde-look.org/

By: tlmck

tlmck — Fri, 23 Apr 2010 13:37:24 +0000

@ Eddie Wilson: As I stated in my post above, there are alternate kernels that essentially make this a 64 bit version. I do agree PCLOS should adopt the 32 and 64 bit version scenario used by most other distros. You can save some download time by getting just the Gnome desktop in Synaptic. The alternate kernels are there as well.

By: nks

nks — Fri, 23 Apr 2010 00:47:07 +0000

One thing I noticed yesterday while testing this (KDE) release is automatic detection and configuration of network printer on windows network, which I think is not possible in most distros. On others distros you will have to first enter/browse your device location and then choose from the list of printer for correct driver. But in PCLOS 2010, I just enabled detection of windows printers and upon clicking next, all the printers on network was listed. Then the next screen suggested the correct printer driver (no list of plethora of drivers to select from). Pretty nice. Also the list of open applications is now shown in taskbar similar to Win7. Preview of open applications is now good (app name used to make it look bad). Horrible battery icon has changed. Many changes (visual as well as functional) are very nice.

By: Jordan Clarke

Jordan Clarke — Thu, 22 Apr 2010 15:51:44 +0000

I’m running PCLinuxOS 2010 as my main laptop OS as of today, and so far it’s been pretty good stability-wise. However, there are a few noteworthy niggles:
Sound isn’t working properly for me. Headphones are fine, but speakers aren’t working. I’m not sure, but I suspect it may have something to do with me having had headphones plugged in during the install…
The device notifier sometimes displays the devices above the “Devices recently plugged in:” message, almost entirely out of the pop-up.
To me, Amarok is awkward! So I downloaded VLC, which works as normal. However, after working with Rhythmbox, I feel disappointed.
I had a little trouble with time zone configuration, but got there eventually… this should be part of the installer (which really should be more like Ubuntu’s).
Having been using GNOME 2.30 (i.e. Ubuntu 10.04 and Fedora 13) for a while now, I’m having a harder time navigating. However, I expect Windows users will feel quite comfortable here. (Oddly, I haven’t forgotten how to use WXP yet…)
All this said, there’s plenty to like:
A breathtaking implementation of KDE, with lost of gorgeous screensavers! :D
Get OpenOffice. I much prefer this idea to having OpenOffice on the LiveCD – it saves LiveCD space; it gets all the apps; and it shows the terminal in action for newbies (not sure why I think that’s good, but nonetheless I like it).
Flash pre-installed. Really, this is something that appeals to newbies too much for any beginners distribution to ignore. Especially if you occasionally like working off LiveCDs and decide to watch YouTube.
Classic Menu! This really is worth it for newcomers, even if the difference is merely a right-click away.
The Control Center is excellent! A simple, attractive layout with sensible options.
It’s PCLinuxOS! Therefore, you’ll become part of perhaps the friendliest and most helpful online Linux community!
It’s more stable than Ubuntu. For example, Ubuntu currently has a bug suggesting kernel panics just one week from the official release! Canonical had better get onto it quick-smart!
Did I mention that PCLinuxOS 2010 is absolutely beautiful? :D

By: Ola

Ola — Thu, 22 Apr 2010 11:30:13 +0000

@ Gnobuddy: Gnobuddy's remarks reflect most of what I feel. I loved PCLOS 2007 and 2009 (based on KDE 3.5) and used them as an alternative desktop on my notebook. When KDE 4 came out, I tried very hard to like it - on PCLOS and every other distro using it. I hated it, so much so that I am hesitant to try out PCLOS 2010, where - under normal circumstances, I would have been one of the first to try out. I will eventually try it out, but the spontaneity with which I took to PCLOS 2007 is not there anymore. A pity!

By: evervigilant

evervigilant — Thu, 22 Apr 2010 07:45:09 +0000

With regard to its similarity to Mandriva, Texstar said in an interview, “PCLinuxOS 2010 was built from the ground up using the packages in our repository… it is similar to Mandriva due to some ported packages and different in that we create our own packages, import packages from other distributions and patches as needed.” [http://www.osnews.com/story/23176/Introducing_PCLinuxOS_2010/]

If PCLinuxOS 2010 is anything like my experience with the previous versions of PCLOS, it will be generally quicker and more stable than Mandriva (and several other well known distros). I haven’t had a chance to try it out thoroughly myself yet, since I’m slow to roll out big changes onto my production machines and only test on spare equipment, but I’m pretty hopeful based on what I’ve seen thus far.

By: whichkde

whichkde — Thu, 22 Apr 2010 05:49:20 +0000

Wanted to know which theme/kicker panel background is used by PCLinuxOS. Can someone knowledgeable help? I love kicker to be this way. the default AIR theme panel is too much non-transparent and also shows some idiotic patterns. I love the way PCLinuxOS kicker panel at the bottom shows. Does anyone how/where to get that kicker theme from or what setting can I do on my existing non-pclinuxos linux?

Thanks.

By: Johan

Johan — Thu, 22 Apr 2010 02:12:06 +0000

davecs, if PCLinuxOS was built from the ground up, why then is the Control Center and drakinstall neary identical to the one on Mandriva ?

By: davecs

davecs — Wed, 21 Apr 2010 23:30:57 +0000

Not having OpenOffice pre-installed means that you can install your native language version rather than the default English(USA). Add Locale enables you to set the general desktop to your area’s language.

Provided you have a fast internet connection, this means you have a truly international distro on a single CD.

As for 64-bit, the advantage (potentially) is speed. However, I think Texstar has succeeded in getting this baby to go faster than many 64-bit distros. I’m glad he and the guys worked out how to build the distro from the ground up instead of using another distro as a base. It probably accounts in part for the speed.

By: Rita

Rita — Wed, 21 Apr 2010 22:22:54 +0000

In response to the earlier poster regarding the “testing” of PCLOS.

After reading a thread on the PCLOS forum regarding others who’ve had similar problems trying to connect to the internet, yes, there is a bug in PCLinux2010. Apparently within Firefox one must disable the IPv6 feature to get access to the internet on PCLinux2010. Whether it is a bug that only affects PCLinux, I don’t know. But with Ubuntu using Firefox 3.63 there is no problem accessing the net. The problem can easily be fixed if one knows how to disable IPv6 within Firefox – but that’s just it. How many beginners to Linux will know how to do that ?

My advice to the developers at PCLinux would be to accept this as constructive help and get the problem fixed as soon as possible. Once it’s fixed and people can access the net “out of the box”, then PCLinuxOS will become a better distro for beginners.

By: Rufus Polson

Rufus Polson — Wed, 21 Apr 2010 17:36:30 +0000

It really is a lot like Mandriva, isn’t it? Seems like most of the positive features (e.g. menu layout, control centre) are basically derived from its Mandriva roots. Which is fine because Mandriva’s a good distro . . . the key distinction I guess is that PCLinuxOS uses apt and Synaptic with its RPMs rather than urpmi and Mandriva’s tool. There was a time when that was probably an advantage, but I’m not sure it makes much difference now.

By: Eric

Eric — Wed, 21 Apr 2010 17:01:48 +0000

The website says that PCLOS comes with parental controls. But when I tried running it live, I found that I had to download it separately.