Comments on IT Lure: Distro Hoppin`: antiX MEPIS 8.2

just read the review, would like to say Antix was ...

2010-09-16T13:09:07.849+03:00

just read the review, would like to say Antix was the only distro that would run on an old 64mb pc straight off, that was after trying puppy,tinyme dsl etc

handy distro to have around

Have been using Puppy Linux for some years now, bu...

2010-02-24T18:51:41.014+02:00

Have been using Puppy Linux for some years now, but am unhappy with the security issue of running online as root.

OTOH, I like the speed of running entirely in RAM. SLAX can run in 1 GB of RAM, how about Antix?

SLAX can read and write UDF formated DVDs, including DVD-RAM disks. Can Antix?

Am confused by conflicting reviews/comments on Antix re:

HDD install - one reviewer says it kicks you back if you try to install to the whole disk, you say it goes ahead and wipes the disk.

system requirements : I thought I saw 233Mhz cpu as minimum, but user above is talking about running on an AMD Duron @ 100Mhz - is that a typo or what?

I guess my greatest anxiety about any small distro is continuity. Puppy has been going through a succession crisis for more than a year now, and there doesn't seem to be any resolution in sight.

What are the prospects of continued development/bug fixes for distros like SLAX and AntiX if their originators bow out?

Got AntiX running on a old Sony Vaio with a 128 st...

2010-01-15T16:37:09.683+02:00

Got AntiX running on a old Sony Vaio with a 128 stick of ram, an eight gig drive, and a AMD Duron @ 100MHZ. I AM AMAZED!!!

regarding old (?) machines, mine is a PIII@650MHz ...

2009-07-30T02:13:59.020+03:00

regarding old (?) machines, mine is a PIII@650MHz with 106MB RAM free (16MB shared with video) with a 10GB hd...
wireless card fully operational (LinkSys USB WUSB54G ver4) from the very 1st moment... as for the OS, yes you're right, I'm using antix 8.2.
Thanks for your review about this light distro

Pentium 4 @ 2.4 Ghz, 2 GB of RAM (DDR1), 80 GB HDD...

2009-07-29T08:58:05.015+03:00

Pentium 4 @ 2.4 Ghz, 2 GB of RAM (DDR1), 80 GB HDD and the lousy NVIDIA GeForce FX5500. :)

It's certainly not an old machine, but also it's certainly not recent. :)

You mentioned this distro is well suited for old P...

2009-07-29T03:58:22.735+03:00

You mentioned this distro is well suited for old PCs so, for my own curiosity what were the specs of the test machine you used for the review (CPU, Memory, HDD)?

Thanks for all the comments! anticapitalista, Ano...

2009-07-27T08:56:48.563+03:00

Thanks for all the comments!

anticapitalista, Anonymous... indeed, the F3 solution worked perfectly. So, Anonymous #2, you should try the same. :)

"How did you set-up your partitions during the istall process?"

From the MEPIS Installation I ran GParted to create two partitions: ext3 and swap. I then went back to the installation, chose "Custom Install on Selected Partitions", selected the corresponding partitions for root and swap (if you have a separate home partition, select it too) and that's pretty much it. :)

I like Antix 8.2 enough to install it to my netboo...

2009-07-27T08:19:49.266+03:00

I like Antix 8.2 enough to install it to my netbook hard drive as my third OS after Ubuntu Netbook Remix and CrunchBang. Two issues, though, might force me to dump this lovely distro unless I find the solutions:

1) My rtl8187se card isn't being detected (I'll see if I can use ethernet cable to download the driver)

2) Function keys are not working properly

I would urge the Antix developers to provide better hardware support for netbooks (the most popular ones, anyway). I also think that Antix should start using kernel 2,6,30 and support the ext4 file system.

I just installed AntiX from the live CD and I noti...

2009-07-27T07:18:29.423+03:00

I just installed AntiX from the live CD and I noticed on the live CD menu, that if you choose [F3]-Video mode, you will find the 1440x900 resolution. When I selected this resolution and then went ahead with the instalation, 1440x900 was installed on the hard drive. I hope this helps.

Hi! Great review! I've encountered similar re...

2009-07-27T05:06:17.799+03:00

Hi! Great review!

I've encountered similar resolution problems and did the hardware set-up in the control center but my settings are not saved. I am sure I did something wrong.

How did you set-up your partitions during the istall process?

Thank you!

Hi thanks for the positive review. Just one point...

2009-07-27T01:30:17.753+03:00

Hi thanks for the positive review.

Just one point on the screen resolution.

When using the livecd, at boot menu screen, you could hit F3 and choose the screen resolution of your monitor and this *should* carry over to install. You can use the livecd with F3 selected and copy over the /etc/X11/xorg.conf as well.

Hope you have fun with the 'lean and mean' antiX!

I'm using AntiX from the LiveCD. My first impr...

2009-07-27T00:24:46.086+03:00

I'm using AntiX from the LiveCD. My first impressions are positive, much like your review.

The Wi-Fi didn't work with wicd, but with the "Configure network interfaces" button in the (really awesome) control center started up a terminal application that was easy as pie to get things running. Aside from that, this is the best low-profile Debian installation anyone is going to get!

The arrow keys don't work on my laptop, and I had the same driver/resolution issue that you had (good to hear it's fixed with nVidia drivers), but hey, with a distro this good, I'm not complaining. Whether or not I wipe Ubuntu is the next question, but everything is running so well I can't really think of a reason not to.

Good review!

Comment from rokytnji (thanks!), who couldn't ...

2009-07-26T22:39:23.472+03:00

Comment from rokytnji (thanks!), who couldn't get past the word verification, because of a bug in the template. I have decided to remove this step as I moderate the comments anyway. So here's the comment:

Enjoyed reading your review. I am a bit of a distro hopper/slut myself. I like AntiX because it is more flexible than Puppy or other Minimal Desktop distros. For those that prefer/like click-able icons on their desktop. Go to Desktop>Alternatives>Rox Pinboard On-Off and turn on Rox Pinboard.

Icons can be dragged and dropped, made launchable by right clicking said icon and setting a run action. You can open /usr/bin and drag and drop what app you would wish to launch. You can then drag and drop what you would wish to set the icon to look like/appearance by dragging and dropping a png. Renaming icon is also possible in the window. Happy Trails, rokytnji