On 8/17/2024 12:24 AM, Lawrence D'Oliveiro wrote:
> On Sat, 17 Aug 2024 00:22:20 -0400, 186282@ud0s4.net wrote:
>
>> The M$ lawyers will make SURE we can't all get along ...
>>
>> SO ... just sayin' ... time to get working on the Linux replacement
>> FAST ...
>
> They tried that already, and failed. Threw everything (legal, economic,
> marketing FUD) at it, and Linux survived.
>
> And now, Microsoft is tying its own destiny more and more to the well-
> being of Linux. So it can no longer afford to be predatory as before,
> anyway.

I am looking forward to the day when Windows is just another GUI module
for Linux (like Gnome, KDE etc). We may get there in about 5 years?

Charlie Gibbs <cgibbs@kltpzyxm.invalid> writes:
>
> Linux is doing well in the server world, but the desktop will be a
> much harder sell.

For God's sake, not so loud! Keep it down!

My desktop knew nothing but UNIX for 10 years, then has known nothing but
Linux for 20 years after that.

It would have a mental breakdown if it found out there were other operating
systems out there in the world.

Jack
--
My Wife told me to take the spider out instead of killing him.

Went out. Had a few drinks. Nice guy. He's a web designer.

On 18/08/2024 07:46, Lars Poulsen wrote:

> I am looking forward to the day when Windows is just another GUI module
> for Linux (like Gnome, KDE etc). We may get there in about 5 years?
>

X windows, Wayland, or Classic Windows sir?

Its getting to the stage where emulating all or part of Windows on linux
would actually be quicker than running it native.

I remember an (apociryphal?) take about Gary Kildall, who in a summer
vacation job was tasked with fixing a bug in megabytes of assembler.

He rewrote it in FORTRAN fixed the bug and it ran 5 times faster...

--
“It is dangerous to be right in matters on which the established
authorities are wrong.”

― Voltaire, The Age of Louis XIV

On Sun, 8/18/2024 2:44 AM, Lars Poulsen wrote:
> On 8/16/2024 9:14 PM, 186282@ud0s4.net wrote:
>>    But - without Winders license - it'd probably knock
>>    thirty or forty bucks off the price easy. Why don't
>>    they sell THOSE ?
>
> I bet that MS is still doing what they did decades ago: The box builders get a huge discount - say 75% - on the cost of their Windows licenses, PROVIDED that they put Windows on ALL the boxes they sell.

There is an article about it.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bundling_of_Microsoft_Windows

You can find sellers who don't put Windows on the hard drive.
When I bought an OEM machine at Eurocom (Eurocom branded,
Clevo is the ODM), Windows was not on the hard drive.
As a build to order, there is a tick box on the form for Windows,
and it is boxed Windows, not Royalty OEM Windows. Eurocom
does not put a SLIC in the BIOS, because the Windows used
has a COA sticker.

You can also build your own computer. You'll need a couple
screwdrivers, a small Philips for some of the screws, a
larger Philips for some of the others. An after-market CPU
air cooler, even has a screwdriver in the box (I like those
screwdrivers). Your hard drive, when you get it, has no OS
on it.

Paul

On So 18 Aug 2024 at 05:28, Paul <nospam@needed.invalid> wrote:

> On Sun, 8/18/2024 2:44 AM, Lars Poulsen wrote:
>> On 8/16/2024 9:14 PM, 186282@ud0s4.net wrote:
>>>    But - without Winders license - it'd probably knock
>>>    thirty or forty bucks off the price easy. Why don't
>>>    they sell THOSE ?
>>
>> I bet that MS is still doing what they did decades ago: The box builders
>> get a huge discount - say 75% - on the cost of their Windows licenses,
>> PROVIDED that they put Windows on ALL the boxes they sell.
>
> There is an article about it.
>
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bundling_of_Microsoft_Windows
>
> You can find sellers who don't put Windows on the hard drive.
> When I bought an OEM machine at Eurocom (Eurocom branded,
> Clevo is the ODM), Windows was not on the hard drive.
> As a build to order, there is a tick box on the form for Windows,
> and it is boxed Windows, not Royalty OEM Windows. Eurocom
> does not put a SLIC in the BIOS, because the Windows used
> has a COA sticker.
>
> You can also build your own computer. You'll need a couple
> screwdrivers, a small Philips for some of the screws, a
> larger Philips for some of the others. An after-market CPU
> air cooler, even has a screwdriver in the box (I like those
> screwdrivers). Your hard drive, when you get it, has no OS
> on it.
>
> Paul

I recently bought a new computer from Lenovo, built to order. I could
select to have either Windows, Ubuntu or no OS. It was even a few Euros
cheaper without OS.

'Andreas

--
ceterum censeo redmondinem esse delendam

On Sun, 8/18/2024 4:43 AM, Jack Strangio wrote:
> Charlie Gibbs <cgibbs@kltpzyxm.invalid> writes:
>>
>> Linux is doing well in the server world, but the desktop will be a
>> much harder sell.
>
> For God's sake, not so loud! Keep it down!
>
> My desktop knew nothing but UNIX for 10 years, then has known nothing but
> Linux for 20 years after that.
>
> It would have a mental breakdown if it found out there were other operating
> systems out there in the world.
>
> Jack
>

I can see a plan is coming together here.

Well, we had a plan, but we drunk all the beer,
and now we're passed out on the floor.

Oh well, maybe next year.

*******

A lot of newer computers, no longer come with an optical drive.
Burning an ISO9660 is not a practical option for those.

Utilities for "making" USB stick setups, are fraught with problems.
Even if you gave the average user instructions, with the state of
USB handling, they could hardly be expected to succeed at the
task of making the media for the OS in question. USB setups have
silly requirements like "present a stick with a partition on it",
then the USB tool "formats" the stick and removes the partition in
question. The process then, is "logical and makes so much sense".

If you wanted to provide an easy path for a Win-to-Linux transition,
use a stub.exe to pull down the OS and put it on the disk. That's
how Microsoft does it. And even they don't do a good job (can't
run their MediaCreationTool.exe on WinXP).

On older machines, we can be using our Nvidia binary blobs, and
the years-of-support are limited. My 7900GT (suitable for Optiplex 780
refurb with Core2 Duo processor), Linux media now, the screen freezes
with graphical noise on it, and I can't flip to terminal and do anything
(function keys). A copy of Windows runs that screen fine. How is it
that a Windows can run a screen when a Linux can't ? There used to be
a time, when Linux was proud to outdo Windows on the length of support
for old hardware, but no more. Linux has succumbed to the same
hardware snobbery as every other ecosystem.

Puppy is the only shining example. It uses XVesa for X11 and that
"drives just about anything". Yet, no other distro seems to be
able to take a page from the Puppy play book. Puppy is so good,
it even runs on hardware, where there is hardly any alignment
between drivers and hardware at all! Which is most impressive.
Puppy is able to modprobe older hardware, and do a good job on
drivers, but for newer hardware, not many things have drivers,
and yet it still works.

*******

But I'm still on the floor right now, I'm drunk and passed out. Later.

The current plan, is for Power Users to embrace Linux, which
would be... oh... about 3% of the desktop population.

Google has prepared media, to use their ChromeOS intellectual
properly and install it on Windows hardware. They're a bit prepared.
They've been sipping their beer, and haven't passed out.

https://support.google.com/chromeosflex/answer/11552529?hl=en

Paul

On Sun, 18 Aug 2024 05:28:23 -0400, Paul wrote:

> You can also build your own computer. You'll need a couple screwdrivers,
> a small Philips for some of the screws, a larger Philips for some of the
> others. An after-market CPU air cooler, even has a screwdriver in the
> box (I like those screwdrivers). Your hard drive, when you get it, has
> no OS on it.

You left out the fun part... Which processor? Which mobo out of many
offerings? Which form factor? Which RAM? Which SSD? Which case and power
supply?

I used to do that but the thrill wore off. Now I get a box with Windows on
it and select 'erase everything' on the Linux installation menu. Unless
you have specific needs it's usually cheaper in the long run.

On Sun, 8/18/2024 3:36 PM, rbowman wrote:
> On Sun, 18 Aug 2024 05:28:23 -0400, Paul wrote:
>
>> You can also build your own computer. You'll need a couple screwdrivers,
>> a small Philips for some of the screws, a larger Philips for some of the
>> others. An after-market CPU air cooler, even has a screwdriver in the
>> box (I like those screwdrivers). Your hard drive, when you get it, has
>> no OS on it.
>
> You left out the fun part... Which processor? Which mobo out of many
> offerings? Which form factor? Which RAM? Which SSD? Which case and power
> supply?
>
> I used to do that but the thrill wore off. Now I get a box with Windows on
> it and select 'erase everything' on the Linux installation menu. Unless
> you have specific needs it's usually cheaper in the long run.
>

There's a lot of reading to do.

You can't rush a job like this.

If you have a delivery date to meet, I recommend one month of
lead time. Some people show up with "I need this shizzit in two days".
Well, no you don't.

And I guarantee, you will learn stuff along the way :-)

Nobody gets this stuff right, if they're not constantly
doing builds. Times change. Etc.

I start, by selecting my RAM standard first. A DDR4 motherboard
will be a cheaper build than a DDR5 motherboard. Look at which
processor company is having trouble, select the other company.
If the CPU is 65W, use the cooler in the box. If the CPU is
250W, and the CPU maker says "we recommend water cooling",
you should at least believe them that a "challenge" exists.
For a high power CPU, they don't come with a cooler, and you'll
be shopping for a $100+ solution for it.

If you post a list of parts, you can get some feedback on your
choices. A commenter might say "this choice is a taste issue",
and other items "this choice is a technical issue". Working
with your parts list, is more efficient than writing a book
on the spot.

"this choice is a taste issue"

https://www.cyberpowerpc.com/blog/w/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/rgb_lighting_blog_article-753x1000.jpg

Paul

In comp.os.linux.misc rbowman <bowman@montana.com> wrote:
> On Sun, 18 Aug 2024 05:28:23 -0400, Paul wrote:
>
>> You can also build your own computer. You'll need a couple screwdrivers,
>> a small Philips for some of the screws, a larger Philips for some of the
>> others. An after-market CPU air cooler, even has a screwdriver in the
>> box (I like those screwdrivers). Your hard drive, when you get it, has
>> no OS on it.
>
> You left out the fun part... Which processor? Which mobo out of many
> offerings? Which form factor? Which RAM? Which SSD? Which case and power
> supply?
>
> I used to do that but the thrill wore off. Now I get a box with Windows on
> it and select 'erase everything' on the Linux installation menu. Unless
> you have specific needs it's usually cheaper in the long run.

Sites like pc part picker take the guesswork out of picking parts. And you
can try alternatives depending on what's in stock where you live.

https://au.pcpartpicker.com/

On Mon, 8/19/2024 1:37 AM, Peter Dean wrote:
> In comp.os.linux.misc rbowman <bowman@montana.com> wrote:
>> On Sun, 18 Aug 2024 05:28:23 -0400, Paul wrote:
>>
>>> You can also build your own computer. You'll need a couple screwdrivers,
>>> a small Philips for some of the screws, a larger Philips for some of the
>>> others. An after-market CPU air cooler, even has a screwdriver in the
>>> box (I like those screwdrivers). Your hard drive, when you get it, has
>>> no OS on it.
>>
>> You left out the fun part... Which processor? Which mobo out of many
>> offerings? Which form factor? Which RAM? Which SSD? Which case and power
>> supply?
>>
>> I used to do that but the thrill wore off. Now I get a box with Windows on
>> it and select 'erase everything' on the Linux installation menu. Unless
>> you have specific needs it's usually cheaper in the long run.
>
> Sites like pc part picker take the guesswork out of picking parts. And you
> can try alternatives depending on what's in stock where you live.
>
> https://au.pcpartpicker.com/
>

(Will need a good browser to get through the Cloudflare picket, for pcpartpicker)

On their $560 budget build, the CPU is a 12100F quad core for $85.
(The F means there is no GPU inside, and this is generally a bad idea.
It means handcuffs on always needing a video card in the box at all times.)
An alternative would be buying a 12100 instead, with a GPU inside, and turn
that GPU off most of the time. Any time your video card is out for a cleaning,
the internal GPU can be used. I'm running on internal GPU, even though
the junk room has a perfectly good spare video card.

The video card selected for the budget build, is an RX 6600 for $180
(that's slightly below the junk card price range). I'm not sure
any of those cards are available in town (Best Buy stocks $500-$700 cards,
my real computer store chain is run by a kook so you can never
rely on any stock being in the store or their warehouse).

https://www.techpowerup.com/gpu-specs/radeon-rx-6600.c3696

132 watts
PCI-Express 4.0 x8 interface (normal is x16 lanes)

That's twice as fast as this (slider table at bottom).
AMD used a laptop GPU, a laptop GPU with no video SIP
for decoding hollywood video formats without CPU input.
The wiring is x4, considered to be as shabby as you can
go without being a bottleneck.

https://www.techpowerup.com/gpu-specs/radeon-rx-6400.c3813

53 W maximum
PCI-Express 4.0 x4 (normal is x16 lanes)

This is the graphics in my processor. The RX 6600 is 5.92 times as fast.
The RX 6400 is 2.64 times as fast as the GPU inside my CPU.
A RTX4090 is 23 times as fast as my GPU in the CPU.
My GPU in the CPU is suited to playing The SIMS.

https://www.techpowerup.com/gpu-specs/radeon-graphics-512sp.c3768

The megalist here has video card benchmark data.

https://www.videocardbenchmark.net/GPU_mega_page.html

The single thread CPU bench rates how most software will run (software
that only uses one CPU core). The 12400 does not do that badly.

https://www.cpubenchmark.net/singleThread.html

The multi thread bench rates how well something like 7ZIP .7z compression would run.
The 5950X with double the cores, is included for comparison. The one
below it is a DDR5 RAM CPU. The one at the bottom of the list, gulps power.
If you get a 14900K today, flash up the BIOS to get a new microcode.

https://www.cpubenchmark.net/high_end_cpus.html

AMD Ryzen 7 5700G 24,553 $158.99
AMD Ryzen 9 5950X 45,639 $358.78 Double the cores
AMD Ryzen 9 7950X3D 62,428 $525.03 Double the cores plus a slab of L3 on the side
Intel Core i9-14900K 60,504 $545.81

The three bottom ones need "coolers", any old thing will
do for the first one (even the in-box cooler is good enough).
I don't like using water in computers, but the kids like it.
I guess the gurgle and the whir, is a thing.

The mains power consumption of my (idle) 5700G right now is 24 watts.
Competitive with my laptop power consumption. And that's with
a single browser page open, and my newsreader. Most of that power
is not the CPU itself.

[Picture]

https://i.postimg.cc/JhVTpFyS/5700-G-at-idle.gif

The CPU is fitted with an NH-C14S, but I wasn't exactly
going to leave the C14S in the junk room when I have one,
so the in-box cooler is sitting in the junk room instead.
The C14S never speeds up on this build (six heatpipes, but
only the one fan). If the C14S is needed for some reason,
I just swap coolers.

Paul

On Sun, 18 Aug 2024 20:42:10 -0400, Paul wrote:

> There's a lot of reading to do.
>
> You can't rush a job like this.
>
> If you have a delivery date to meet, I recommend one month of lead time.
> Some people show up with "I need this shizzit in two days".
> Well, no you don't.
>
> And I guarantee, you will learn stuff along the way

That's my experience. A least a month of research before checking boxes at
NewEgg. Then there is the cross your fingers moment when you hit the
power button. It's fun the first few times.

On Mon, 19 Aug 2024 03:18:21 -0400, Paul wrote:

> The video card selected for the budget build, is an RX 6600 for $180
> (that's slightly below the junk card price range). I'm not sure any of
> those cards are available in town (Best Buy stocks $500-$700 cards,
> my real computer store chain is run by a kook so you can never rely on
> any stock being in the store or their warehouse).

I've had that problem. When the video card crapped out I hit the stores in
town looking for a generic board to plug in, nothing special. Everything
was high end.

When I went into BestBuy recently for a USB hub it took a while before a
clerk directed me to a dusty shelf way in the back of the store that had a
plain old 4 port hub.

I understand profit margins and all but they do tend to drive you into
Amazon's waiting arms for generic keyboards, mice, peripherals, and what
not.

On 8/17/24 3:24 AM, Lawrence D'Oliveiro wrote:
> On Sat, 17 Aug 2024 00:22:20 -0400, 186282@ud0s4.net wrote:
>
>> The M$ lawyers will make SURE we can't all get along ...
>>
>> SO ... just sayin' ... time to get working on the Linux replacement
>> FAST ...
>
> They tried that already, and failed. Threw everything (legal, economic,
> marketing FUD) at it, and Linux survived.

But Linux=Linus=Linux ... and he's not so young anymore

So don't be so confident.

M$ also seems to be trying to "contribute" to Linux
in various ways and make sure their code becomes the
foundation for what lots of people use. Then the
lawyers can claim an ownership of Linux - or pull
all their code and collapse a large number of
needed/popular apps.

When it comes to MONEY, expect no end of evils.

> And now, Microsoft is tying its own destiny more and more to the well-
> being of Linux. So it can no longer afford to be predatory as before,
> anyway.

I suspect M$ will eventually do what Apple did - buy
some flavor of BSD and build a look-alike system on
top of it. Won't be easy, but Win is a tangled MESS
of code going back decades - I don't think even "AI"
can understand it.

SOME rumors say M$ has been working on "Win-IX" for a
few years already.

On 8/18/24 5:14 AM, The Natural Philosopher wrote:
> On 18/08/2024 07:46, Lars Poulsen wrote:
>
>> I am looking forward to the day when Windows is just another GUI
>> module for Linux (like Gnome, KDE etc). We may get there in about 5
>> years?
>>
>
> X windows, Wayland, or Classic Windows sir?
>
> Its getting to the stage where emulating all or part of Windows on linux
> would actually be quicker than running it native.
>
> I remember an (apociryphal?) take about Gary Kildall, who in a summer
> vacation job was tasked with fixing a bug in megabytes of assembler.
>
> He rewrote it in FORTRAN fixed the bug and it ran 5 times faster...

Ah, good old FORTRAN ... haven't writ anything
substantial in that ... maybe 30 years now.
However it IS good and CAN do great stuff. IMHO
it's more readable than COBOL even though COBOL
always sold itself on being more readable. Write
a few needed string functions and ......

Before I retired I *did* write a useful little
utility they'd want - in FORTRAN - just to
afflict the New Guys who didn't seem capable
of even six lines of Python :-)

Assembler CAN be faster, but you have to write
good tight assembler. Some micro-controller
experience helps with that. When RAM/storage is
oft measured in BYTES you've gotta do clever work.

On Mon, 19 Aug 2024 23:55:44 -0400, 186282@ud0s4.net wrote:

> Assembler CAN be faster, but you have to write good tight assembler.
> Some micro-controller experience helps with that. When RAM/storage is
> oft measured in BYTES you've gotta do clever work.

I worked on a handheld pH meter that used the 8748 and you knew where
every byte was.

https://www.thomassci.com/nav/cat1/phelectrodes/0

The Ross electrodes were the same but another programmer worked on the ion
concentration meter. We could share some code but there weren't enough
bytes to do both in the same instrument.

The bench models used the Z80 with all the room in the world, or so it
seemed. During the interview for my present job the head of engineering
posed a problem and started off with 'assume unlimited memory'. Whoa,
Dorothy, this ain't the embedded world anymore.'

After 25 years of that and being mostly retired I'm back to messing around
with Pico Ws, Arduino Nano 33s, and so forth. Even those have luxurious
amounts of flash and SRAM.

On Mon, 19 Aug 2024 23:23:31 -0400, 186282@ud0s4.net wrote:

> On 8/17/24 3:24 AM, Lawrence D'Oliveiro wrote:
>>
>> On Sat, 17 Aug 2024 00:22:20 -0400, 186282@ud0s4.net wrote:
>>
>>> The M$ lawyers will make SURE we can't all get along ...
>>>
>>> SO ... just sayin' ... time to get working on the Linux replacement
>>> FAST ...
>>
>> They tried that already, and failed. Threw everything (legal, economic,
>> marketing FUD) at it, and Linux survived.
>
> But Linux=Linus=Linux ... and he's not so young anymore

And Microsoft isn’t quite so strong any more.

On Sun, 18 Aug 2024 05:28:23 -0400, Paul wrote:

> You can find sellers who don't put Windows on the hard drive.

Build-to-order is the easiest way for desktops.

For laptops, there are some “white-box” vendors, like Clevo. For example,
my first System76 laptop, and I think this one as well, are Clevos,
rebadged and with some of their own “secret sauce” put into it.

Jack Strangio <jackstrangio@yahoo.com> wrote at 07:17 this Sunday (GMT):
> candycanearter07 <candycanearter07@candycanearter07.nomail.afraid> writes:
>> Lawrence D'Oliveiro <ldo@nz.invalid> wrote at 22:44 this Wednesday (GMT):
>> > On Wed, 07 Aug 2024 22:30:18 GMT, Charlie Gibbs wrote:
>> >
>> >
>> > Microsoft still thinks that “26 drive letters ought to be enough for
>> > anybody”.
>>
>>
>> Actually, I think that it will start naming drives AA:, AB:, etc.
>
> But will 676 drives really be enough?
>
> Jack

As with anything, it depends on what you need? Tho I'm not sure why
anyone would need 676 drives all plugged in at once.
--
user <candycane> is generated from /dev/urandom

Lawrence D'Oliveiro <ldo@nz.invalid> wrote at 09:07 this Sunday (GMT):
> On Sun, 11 Aug 2024 04:15:09 -0400, Paul wrote:
>
>> There is a mechanism. Mount points.
>>
>> https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-server/storage/disk-management/assign-a-mount-point-folder-path-to-a-drive
>
> Windows Server only?

No, I remember doing that a few times on my Home install years ago. It
wasn't all that great from what I remember.
--
user <candycane> is generated from /dev/urandom