Would you pay more money and go the Extra Mile or is it pain in the neck?

Would you pay more money and go the Extra Mile or is it pain in the neck?

Posted on March 19, 2011 

Would you pay more money and go the Exrtra Mile or is it pain in the neck?

There is so much hype about Windows 7 and on my daughter’s request I went and bought a Windows 7 Starter Pack but kept on delaying opening of the pack to install it since the netbook I bought her already had Windows XP.

She has a working knowledge of Linux with  the desktop she had and I bought the netbook stating that if it started giving problems she has to go back to Linux for her work.

Something simple like Lubuntu or Meego or something advanced like Sabayon, PClinux or Mepis or even Debian.

Then I wanted to repartition (re-size) the hard disk but the XP installed did not allow me to repartition unless I delete the operating system with it.

Since I have paid for the operating system, I realized it is not a wise thing to do since if she wants there are enough computers at home to try Linux including her desktop.
Then everything went into cold storage and she was down with some illness and Windows 7 was completely forgotten.
Today as part of my full reformatting exercise, I deleted all my partition and booted this Windows 7 Starter Pack to see what it has.
It immediately recognized the 20 GiB ntfs partition  (I made as an extra storage facility), the hard disk had and it started giving me instruction that it can be installed in one computer only and the blah blah.
I pulled out the Internet wire fearing it is going to note my laptop machine number and the details and it’s identity and then allowed it to install.
Mind you this was the computer I bought in Singapore after a big fight with the vendor stating that I did not want windows installed in it and I only want the machine and I know what to do with it.

Then I booted Linux while waiting in lounge of the Changi Airport with Linux DVD I downloaded in Singapore (in one of my relative’s residence in Singapore).

After installing it goes up several times rebooting and this is the time it gives all your details to the Microsoft head quarters to subsequently send warning after warnings to lure you to buy all the extra utilities.
Finally it booted up and this one lets you have a password facility and the system has nothing at all to work with.
I told my daughter how stupid was to buy it and booted up and showed her the latest 10th anniversary Knoppix 6.4 live with compiz graphic and Pingus game in it and amazingly beautiful graphics.
It has enlightenment effects and LibreOffice and over 6000 t0 10,000 packages in it’s DVD.
Who is stupid Microsoft or little Me I will let you decide it.
Mind you I installed Knoppix and Sabayon KDE while typing this bloggy blog and tested PCLinuxfullmonty has 64 bits capability also, in between watching the last stages of the Sri-Lanka New Zealand cricket match too.
I must tell you Win 7 took a longer time to install and restarted several times.
Sabayon has a media center called XBMC and it is something windows users will never have the luxury of using.
PCLinuxfullmonty has blender and with these three distributions in my laptop I have amazing rich collection of graphic utilities.
I did not have to pay a red cent but had to spend some time downloading the 3 DVDs with K-Torrent.
Only limitation was the slow download speed of Sri-Lankan Telecom.