Mandriva Linux 2009.0 Review : A Mixed Bag

Dark Star

'Mandriva Linux 2009.0 Review : A Mixed Bag'

Mandriva is the leading European Linux distributor. It was founded in 1998 under the name Mandrake, producing the Linux Mandrake distribution. The name Mandriva was adopted in 2005, following a merger between Mandrake and Conectiva (a Brazilian Linux distributor) and also a trademark lawsuit in which Mandrake was sued by Hearst Publications, an American company which syndicates a comic strip named Mandrake the Magician. Mandriva Linux earlier known as Mandrake Linux was first released on July 1'st 1998. The first release was based on Red Hat and KDE..

Mandriva has gained huge reputation for delivering easy to use Linux distro with support for many multimedia and proprietary format. Earlier when Mandriva was known as Mandrake, it was the most popular GNU/Linux but some unavoidable circumstances turns the table towards Mandriva and after that Mandriva didn't stood up like it used to.. Mandriva 2009.0 “10th Anniversary Version” will focus more on providing user friendly and usable distro out of the box.. Just like other popular distro, Mandriva thrives on latest and cutting edge technology to provide the best available tools and applications to end users to ease their Desktop Experience..

Mandriva 2009.0 features latest Desktop Environments, tools and application to attract more and more users .. Tagged the most user friendly distro , Mandriva 2009.0 try to live up to the expectations … Mandriva 2009.0 packs in a lot of changes including the inclusion of the latest gun of Open Source community i.e. KDE 4 [KDE 4.1.2 to be specific] . Other software that comes with Mandriva 2009.0 are Gnome 2.24 , LXDE, KDE 3.5.10 in repositories.. Apart from this Mandriva has revamped its Free and Powerpack Installer with new looks and features. Though there hardly any changes to the One Installer..

2009.0 did disappoint on the software front as it includes few pre-released and unstable software. . On the software front you will notice all new release that will try to provide a solid desktop experience if not bad.. Mandriva 2009.0 includes Linux Kernel 2.6.27 rc8, Xorg 7.3, Compiz Fusion 0.78, KDE 4.1.2, Pulse Audio Sound Server, gcc 4.2.3, glibc 2.8.1..

Mandriva 2009.0 One edition featuring KDE 4 focuses on providing more and more KDE 4 applications but since many of the KDE 4 applications are still under development you won't be able to get your hands on them.. Mandriva One 2009.0 includes lots of software like Amarok 1.90 Beta 2 , Open Office 3.0 RC 2 , Firefox 3.0.3, The Gimp 2.4.7.. In addition to these you will be provided with basic K application or the Gnome application that usually Desktop Environment ships with it...

Mandriva doesn't disappoint other audience who are accustomed of using different Desktop Environment. To meet the need to those people Mandriva ships in different DE's like Gnome 2.24.0, LXDE and several other accessible from online repositories ..Mandriva includes value added addons in Gnome edition like addition of Empathy IM client and ability to play TV like BBC and you Tube through Totem Video Player..

Dark Star · #1 (**permalink**) By Dark Star on 31 Oct 08, 11:56 PM

Guys please digg the review here Digg - Mandriva Linux 2009.0 Review : A Mixed Bag

SidhuPunjab · #2 (**permalink**) By SidhuPunjab on 1 Nov 08, 12:36 AM

Digged, Repped

Good review, games taking all HDD space, some1 donate HDD. Will try in VMWare.

morgoth · #3 (**permalink**) By morgoth on 1 Nov 08, 04:40 AM

great work there mate. Repped

Keane 16 · #4 (**permalink**) By Keane 16 on 1 Nov 08, 07:17 AM

How do you activate the Lancelot menu style?

Good review.

Dark Star · #5 (**permalink**) By Dark Star on 1 Nov 08, 08:03 AM

^^First Unlock the Widgets [Right Click Unlock], the Right click on the empty space on the pane and select add widgets , scroll down and double click to add Lancelot Launcher , to adjust the position of Menu Plasmoid Right click the panel Select Panel Settings and Drag it wherever you want..

That will add Lancelot Menu

Rahulrulez · #6 (**permalink**) By Rahulrulez on 1 Nov 08, 08:07 AM

Could Digg, but while logging to Digg a/c I'm getting some error donno what it is..

Very very Nice review.. I am thinking to use Mandriva (Since 4 months

)

As usual Darky's reviews are more than Expert's reviews.. So no doubt AWESOME review..

REPPED..

Dark Star · #7 (**permalink**) By Dark Star on 1 Nov 08, 10:46 AM

Few Edits :

1. Mandriva Add/Remove does allow you to search packages by description , all you need to do is click on magnifying button in the search menu and change the search preference . Though you need a working net connection to do that as software description needs to be downloaded ..

viralbug · #8 (**permalink**) By viralbug on 1 Nov 08, 12:42 PM

great review as usual!

a little of my experience:
installation time seemed faster for me than 2008.1. within 15 mins i was looking at my desktop.
i havent had any problems with my sound files. all of them play perfectly. i did face a problem with my hd video files. normal avi's played well, but my hd files sometimes just didnt play, without any error being displayed. im using totem. when i tried again after restart it played perfectly.
i tried using ark (archiver) once and it couldnt decompress rar files which were divided into parts.

overall i liked 2009, though it does have some irritating bugs. but still, its pretty much usable. kde 4 looks awesome.

Gurpartap Singh · By Gurpartap Singh on 1 Nov 08, 12:47 PM

honestly, i never gave mandriva a try. but your interest in it might make me to

Lots of reps awaiting you buddy!

Dark Star · #10 (**permalink**) By Dark Star on 1 Nov 08, 01:02 PM

Quote:

i tried using ark (archiver) once and it couldnt decompress rar files which were divided into parts.

Install Unrar ! Open Add/Remove type unrar and install it that will do the rar compression/decompression job..

Or open konsole and type

Code:

urpmi unrar

As far as HD video concerned I don't have a capable system to run these.. Instead of using Totem you can use Smplayer , to install restricted codecs go to easy urpmi and add PLF repositories for 2009.0 Easy Urpmi

After that open Konsole and run these commands

Code:

urpmi libdvdcss2
urpmi real-codecs
urpmi win32-codecs

This will install all the essential codecs to run RM and other restricted file..

virus32win · #11 (**permalink**) By virus32win on 1 Nov 08, 01:12 PM

Great Review ......

Dark Star · #12 (**permalink**) By Dark Star on 1 Nov 08, 08:12 PM

Review got published in Distrowatch

DistroWatch.com: Mandriva Linux

PiXeLpUsHeR · #13 (**permalink**) By PiXeLpUsHeR on 1 Nov 08, 08:18 PM

What a well thought out and well written impartial review with deserved reps.

I tried Mandriva once about 8 months or so ago, but was not impressed with it's hardware support, so I am glad to hear that this has improved.

I find it surprising that they did not make a Mandriva One 64 bit version.

Supporting 4GB RAM is a must today, it's a little difficult to believe that this distro was so competitive whilst only being able to read 1GB RAM.

I am not sure that this release would make me want drop my 2 current favorite distro's (DreamLinux and Ubuntu)

Good job Darky... a really nice review..... Thanks

Dark Star · #14 (**permalink**) By Dark Star on 2 Nov 08, 08:23 AM

Yep , thats the bad part Mandriva only support 3 platforms

while other OS like Debian , Gentoo has support for nearly all of them

Comparison of Linux distributions - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

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