Monday, November 30, 2020

Changed Chromebook to the Acer Chromebook 715

 On Sunday, November 22, 2020 I ordered an Acer Chromebook 715 after months of reviewing various Chromebook models, prices, and reviews.

The model I ordered was the

Acer Chromebook 715, Intel Core i3-8130U, 15.6" Full-HD 1080p screen, 4GB DDR4, 128GB eMMC - CB715-1W-35ZK


At the time I ordered, the sale price was $349.  The lowest price I've seen was briefly $329 and the current price now has risen to $479.99, the highest price I've seen for this model since my research began.

In the reviews at https://chromeunboxed.com/reviews/ this system has received positive reviews as a good system, and at the lower prices one of the best values in the $300-500 price range.


Monday, September 28, 2020

Two MX Linux 19.2 versions and two antiX 19.2.1 versions

 I currently have MX Linux 19.2 installed in two instances, one with the default Xfce desktop environment, and the more recent instance with the KDE desktop environment.

I also have two instances of antiX 19.2.1 installed, a "Base" version customized with my preferred software, and a similar version with a different job schedule init service called "runit".

All of these systems easily install and run reliably, and are "well-maintained".  The runit antiX distribution was a "proof of concept", yet I've never experienced difficulties with it.


Thursday, August 27, 2020

MX Linux 19.2 KDE

 I downloaded MX Linux 19.2 in the recently released KDE edition.  I have not been using KDE very much in recent years and I wanted to see how the MX Linux implementation compares, both to other editions of MX Linux and to KDE implementations in other distributions.

I have used KDE with PCLinuxOS; many years ago I used PCLinuxOS predominantly with KDE.  More recently I used PCLinuxOS with Xfce and it was fine.

Comparing any edition of PCLinuxOS with any edition of MX Linux is interesting because both distributions do a good job and meet the needs of their users.  No matter which edition is used, MX Linux boots up faster and runs somewhat more efficiently.  Past research to determine the reason behind this observation and to separate opinion and bias from experiences and feelings, I found that MX Linux, among desktop distributions, loads fewer daemon and other background processes, contributing to slightly better performance that can be both visualized and quantified.  The necessary tools to run a simple desktop are always present in MX Linux and this is evident in the new KDE edition too.  It's comparable to the old MEPIS, which always featured a well engineered desktop using functional, efficient software.  The only differences are due to a decade of software changes; otherwise it's still the same usable behavior in a modern conservative configuration.


Friday, July 31, 2020

Running EasyPC 2.3.3 - Debian Buster Version

more version
Linux version 5.4.51 (root@EASYPC27427) (gcc version 8.3.0 (Debian 8.3.0-6)) #1 SMP Sun Jul 12 21:43:54 +08 2020


#One or more words that identify this distribution:
DISTRO_NAME='Easy Buster64'
#version number of this distribution:
DISTRO_VERSION=2.3.3
#The distro whose binary packages were used to build this distribution:
DISTRO_BINARY_COMPAT='debian'

Thursday, June 11, 2020

About "runit" with antiX

Since the "old" SystemV Init subsystem, sysVinit, was mostly given up in the Red Hat, Ubuntu, Arch, and Debian spaces, there were a few distributions that "held out".

It's hard to believe that it has been close to a decade that those controversial changes were first made.  To be honest with you, when I've run them on various distributions, I haven't had any real "problems" with them, at least from a technical point of view.  I've never had to dig deeply into the bowels of the technical details to resolve any issue, and that's a good thing, because the binary nature of the systemd replacement has been: 1. It's "binary", so everything it does also comes with a tool to manage it.  2. SystemD is WAY more than just an init process, and I think that was the other thing that upset so many people, though it has subsequently been adopted in quite a few places and the noise everywhere, EXCEPT in the distributions that DID NOT adopt it has abated quite a bit.

What's runit then?  Well, runit is another effort to replace the old UNIX System V approach that has been around almost since the beginning, not just of the nineties Linux era, but before that in the seventies and eighties with the original UNIX systems, many of which continue to exist in back end server rooms with legacy hardware and software.

Runit is a fairly minimal init process handler, so that makes systemD haters happy, but it does not do very much. It's fast, though, so if you really want a process initializer that ONLY does process initiation, it definitely does that.  It doesn't completely handle all aspects of initialization (other than starting processes, so if you have any complaints, it'll be with "missing features" but NOT with a lack of speed.  AntiX 19 with runit is as fast or faster than the usual lean, mean, light and nimble system, and if you don't expect much from an init process and you really do want it to only initialize and fork additional processes, runit is perfect for JUST that.  Don't expect much with log files or fancy handling when changing run levels, it is not very special and has only the most basic (though  sufficient) capabilities in this regard.  antiX runit on the whole is great for a system that is simple in the basic sense and fast.

Monday, February 10, 2020

antiX-19-runit_x64-base

I am running this system live from a fairly fast 64 GB USB 3.0 Seagate drive.

System:
  Host: antiX Kernel: 5.5.0-antix.1-amd64-smp x86_64 bits: 64 compiler: gcc
  v: 8.3.0 Desktop: IceWM 1.6.3+git20191202
  Distro: antiX-19-runit_x64-base Marielle Franco 9 December 2019
  base: Debian GNU/Linux 10 (buster)
Machine:
  Type: Laptop System: Dell product: Inspiron 5558 v: 01 serial:
  Mobo: Dell model: 086DKN v: A00 serial: UEFI: Dell v: A04
  date: 08/06/2015 


It seems to boot faster and generally run as well or better than using a hard drive with this "fast" USB 3.0 drive.

AntiX is a fairly fast system to begin with and it's built to run well on a variety of media.