So the Fedora project is moving along slowly.

The first surprise was this morning. When I filled the cat's bowl there
was nothing on the deck. I went about my usual morning stuff. The UPS guy
or whoever did the delivery must have been in stealth mode because the
next thing I know I get an email from Amazon with a photo of a package
sitting next to the cat bowl. I stuck my head out and sure enough it was
the Crucial SSD.

I suppose this covers their ass against porch bandits but it's a little
creepy. I've never had a PB problem; in this neighborhood they would be
considered action targets.

When I got back from the gym two 8GB sticks of RAM were in the mailbox. I
pulled the 4s, put in the 8s, and fired up Suse. free reported 16 GB as
expected, all was good.

I thought I'd run memtest overnight to exercise the new additions.
Supposedly memtest64+ on Linux writes a GRUB record so it will start on
reboot. Maybe it does but Suse 13.2 is so old I think they blew away the
repositories.

Next step, fire up the Win 11 laptop, go to the memtest site, and download
the goodies to create a USB stick. There is supposedly a tool to do the
creation and an img file. Check the bios on the Dell and move USB up in
the boot order. No luck.

Read the fine print on the MemTest site. 'The latest, greatest only works
with UEFI, you need an older version. Try that, no joy. It puts a lot of
crap on the USB that doesn't look right.

Have and inspiration I can use the Win 7 on the Dell. Getting it to boot
and recognize the keyboard takes some fiddling. I don't trust the MemTest
tool so I figure I'll try rufus. The first download of the current release
sniffs around and says 'Windows 7? You better get a real old version.' So
I did so.

Screw around some more slapping down crap that wants to be updated since
the Win 7 option hasn't run in years. rufus farts, strains, and say it can
access the D: drive. Try a few of the fixes with no joy.

Back to the Win 11 laptop and get rufus from the Windows store. Format the
thumbdrive to get it into a more or less virgin state, and write the older
iso to the drive.

Go back to the Dell, stick it in a port, restart from Windows, and, praise
the Gods, memtest is chugging away.

This, of course, has absolutely nothing to do with the Fedora install.
I'll use their tool to make a bootable USB tomorrow, unplug the HDD, put
the SSD in, and give it a try. I'm still waiting for the 2.5 to 3.5 bay
blivet but that's no big deal.

Goddam, this is almost like old times.

On Wednesday, January 31, 2024 at 12:37:38 AM UTC-5, rbowman wrote:
>
> I thought I'd run memtest overnight to exercise the new additions.
> Supposedly memtest64+ ...
> [snip foolish contortions]
>

You want to run memtest+? Then just get SystemRescue:

https://www.system-rescue.org/

Of course, it's all Linux and it includes memtest+. Use "dd" to write to bootable
USB. No problem.

rbowman wrote:

>I thought I'd run memtest overnight to exercise the new additions.

Why? I've never bothered running "stress tests" on my hardware.

--
"I think I'll just use the computer to get things done and let
pinheads like you dick around with the OS and half-baked apps."-
Lying Lloyd Parsons

On 2024-01-31 8:24 a.m., chrisv wrote:
> rbowman wrote:
>
>> I thought I'd run memtest overnight to exercise the new additions.
>
> Why? I've never bothered running "stress tests" on my hardware.

Same here, but people do them to detect problems with the CPU or the RAM
so that they can avoid any kind of freezes or blue screens at the most
inconvenient times.

--
RabidPedagog
Catholic paleoconservative
Linux Mint patron

On Wed, 31 Jan 2024 07:24:06 -0600, chrisv wrote:

> rbowman wrote:
>
>>I thought I'd run memtest overnight to exercise the new additions.
>
> Why? I've never bothered running "stress tests" on my hardware.

Well, that's you.

On Wed, 31 Jan 2024 08:43:02 -0500, RabidPedagog wrote:

> On 2024-01-31 8:24 a.m., chrisv wrote:
>> rbowman wrote:
>>
>>> I thought I'd run memtest overnight to exercise the new additions.
>>
>> Why? I've never bothered running "stress tests" on my hardware.
>
> Same here, but people do them to detect problems with the CPU or the RAM
> so that they can avoid any kind of freezes or blue screens at the most
> inconvenient times.

I want to be sure the system is stable prior to the Fedora installation.
Yes, it probably is not necessary but I once did an installation that
would lock up in a few hours do to faulty RAM. Once burned, twice shy. It
ran overnight with 0 errors so I am confident there will be no problems
introduced by the new RAM.

On 2024-01-31 11:09 a.m., rbowman wrote:
> On Wed, 31 Jan 2024 08:43:02 -0500, RabidPedagog wrote:
>
>> On 2024-01-31 8:24 a.m., chrisv wrote:
>>> rbowman wrote:
>>>
>>>> I thought I'd run memtest overnight to exercise the new additions.
>>>
>>> Why? I've never bothered running "stress tests" on my hardware.
>>
>> Same here, but people do them to detect problems with the CPU or the RAM
>> so that they can avoid any kind of freezes or blue screens at the most
>> inconvenient times.
>
> I want to be sure the system is stable prior to the Fedora installation.
> Yes, it probably is not necessary but I once did an installation that
> would lock up in a few hours do to faulty RAM. Once burned, twice shy. It
> ran overnight with 0 errors so I am confident there will be no problems
> introduced by the new RAM.

The best part is that Linux comes with excellent software to stress test
the hardware. If it doesn't by default, installing such a thing is
trivial. I know some manufacturers bundle it with their hardware on the
Windows side, but I've bought computers in the past which had no way
with which to test the hardware.

--
RabidPedagog
Catholic paleoconservative
Linux Mint patron

On 1/31/2024 12:37 AM, rbowman wrote:

> I thought I'd run memtest overnight to exercise the new additions.

https://www.techpowerup.com/download/techpowerup-memtest64/

No rebooting or burn to device required. I guess it blocks and doesn't
test memory already in use.

It does 4 tests per loop:
Stuck Address
Random Data
Move Data
Bitpattern

Memtest86+ (open source) runs 10 tests per loop:
https://memtest.org/readme#individual-test-descriptions

Memtest86 (closed source) runs 13 tests per pass
https://www.memtest86.com/tech_individual-test-descr.html

On Wed, 31 Jan 2024 15:34:15 -0500, DFS wrote:

> No rebooting or burn to device required. I guess it blocks and doesn't
> test memory already in use.

That's the problem if you run from an OS. It may have worked but I had
problems with some other applications I tried. The machine in question had
two choices, Windows 7 or SUSE 13.2.

Anyway Fedora is happily running on the new SSD and installing 926
updates :)

fwiw, the handy dandy Fedora bootable USB was a bust. It failed in the
attempt but it did download the KDE spin iso. At one point it said it
couldn't write to the device, not surprising since the device not longer
existed. Windows would not longer even recognize the stick. I mounted it
on my Linux box and saw it had created three partitions before it died. I
formatted the whole mess to vfat.

Since the iso was already on the Win 11, i plugged it back it. It was
recognized and rufus happily got the job done. Since my work Linux box is
a Dell of the same vintage as my Dell at home I tested it and was happy to
see the live Fedora come up on reboot.

I'm starting to think some of the 'make a bootable' apps assume UEFI.

On 2024-01-31 21:26, rbowman wrote:
> On Wed, 31 Jan 2024 15:34:15 -0500, DFS wrote:
>
>> No rebooting or burn to device required. I guess it blocks and doesn't
>> test memory already in use.
>
> That's the problem if you run from an OS. It may have worked but I had
> problems with some other applications I tried. The machine in question had
> two choices, Windows 7 or SUSE 13.2.
>
> Anyway Fedora is happily running on the new SSD and installing 926
> updates :)
>
> fwiw, the handy dandy Fedora bootable USB was a bust. It failed in the
> attempt but it did download the KDE spin iso. At one point it said it
> couldn't write to the device, not surprising since the device not longer
> existed. Windows would not longer even recognize the stick. I mounted it
> on my Linux box and saw it had created three partitions before it died. I
> formatted the whole mess to vfat.
>
> Since the iso was already on the Win 11, i plugged it back it. It was
> recognized and rufus happily got the job done. Since my work Linux box is
> a Dell of the same vintage as my Dell at home I tested it and was happy to
> see the live Fedora come up on reboot.
>
> I'm starting to think some of the 'make a bootable' apps assume UEFI.

No, I can tell you for a fact that even when following the instructions
to the letter, some of the ISOs burned to USB don't actually boot. It
might be the hardware itself blocking it for some reason, but I can't
help but notice that Ubuntu usually works (though it might need a safe
graphics selection), Mint always works and Pop! OS also always works.
The others are hit and miss.

--
RabidPedagog
Catholic paleoconservative
Linux Mint patron

On Wed, 31 Jan 2024 21:58:08 -0500, RabidPedagog wrote:

> No, I can tell you for a fact that even when following the instructions
> to the letter, some of the ISOs burned to USB don't actually boot. It
> might be the hardware itself blocking it for some reason, but I can't
> help but notice that Ubuntu usually works (though it might need a safe
> graphics selection), Mint always works and Pop! OS also always works.
> The others are hit and miss.

I had a problem with Kubuntu a while back and finally went with straight
Ubuntu. Debian was no problem either.

So far Fedora/KDE looks good with one exception -- Discover. I don't know
what it does but it does it extremely slowly and is harder to kill than a
cockroach. It's been working on gvim for about 15 minutes. I don't know if
it's the flatpack or what. I finally did 'dnf upgrade' to get it updated.

I sort of miss DVD installs where you got everything in the box rather
that the starter kit that has to download a few GB right off the bat.

RabidPedagog wrote this copyrighted missive and expects royalties:

> On 2024-01-31 21:26, rbowman wrote:
>> On Wed, 31 Jan 2024 15:34:15 -0500, DFS wrote:
>>
>>> No rebooting or burn to device required. I guess it blocks and doesn't
>>> test memory already in use.
>>
>> That's the problem if you run from an OS. It may have worked but I had
>> problems with some other applications I tried. The machine in question had
>> two choices, Windows 7 or SUSE 13.2.
>>
>> Anyway Fedora is happily running on the new SSD and installing 926
>> updates :)
>>
>> fwiw, the handy dandy Fedora bootable USB was a bust. It failed in the
>> attempt but it did download the KDE spin iso. At one point it said it
>> couldn't write to the device, not surprising since the device not longer
>> existed. Windows would not longer even recognize the stick. I mounted it
>> on my Linux box and saw it had created three partitions before it died. I
>> formatted the whole mess to vfat.
>>
>> Since the iso was already on the Win 11, i plugged it back it. It was
>> recognized and rufus happily got the job done. Since my work Linux box is
>> a Dell of the same vintage as my Dell at home I tested it and was happy to
>> see the live Fedora come up on reboot.
>>
>> I'm starting to think some of the 'make a bootable' apps assume UEFI.
>
> No, I can tell you for a fact that even when following the instructions
> to the letter, some of the ISOs burned to USB don't actually boot. It
> might be the hardware itself blocking it for some reason, but I can't
> help but notice that Ubuntu usually works (though it might need a safe
> graphics selection), Mint always works and Pop! OS also always works.
> The others are hit and miss.

The Arch USB installer worked fine on this Lenovo Flex.

--
Whoever has lived long enough to find out what life is, knows how deep a debt
of gratitude we owe to Adam, the first great benefactor of our race. He
brought death into the world.
-- Mark Twain, "Pudd'nhead Wilson's Calendar"

On 2024-02-01 1:00 a.m., rbowman wrote:
> On Wed, 31 Jan 2024 21:58:08 -0500, RabidPedagog wrote:
>
>> No, I can tell you for a fact that even when following the instructions
>> to the letter, some of the ISOs burned to USB don't actually boot. It
>> might be the hardware itself blocking it for some reason, but I can't
>> help but notice that Ubuntu usually works (though it might need a safe
>> graphics selection), Mint always works and Pop! OS also always works.
>> The others are hit and miss.
>
> I had a problem with Kubuntu a while back and finally went with straight
> Ubuntu. Debian was no problem either.
>
> So far Fedora/KDE looks good with one exception -- Discover. I don't know
> what it does but it does it extremely slowly and is harder to kill than a
> cockroach. It's been working on gvim for about 15 minutes. I don't know if
> it's the flatpack or what. I finally did 'dnf upgrade' to get it updated.
>
> I sort of miss DVD installs where you got everything in the box rather
> that the starter kit that has to download a few GB right off the bat.

The problem with DVD installs is that all of the packages were outdated
by the time you got the media. A lot of people don't mind though.

--
RabidPedagog
Catholic paleoconservative
Linux Mint patron

On Thu, 1 Feb 2024 08:31:44 -0500, RabidPedagog wrote:

> The problem with DVD installs is that all of the packages were outdated
> by the time you got the media. A lot of people don't mind though.

The Fedora iso I downloaded yesterday needed a few packages.

'sudo dnf upgrade' pulled down 926 packages. After that it went back for
12 more. I don't know how far you would get from what was initially
installed.

It's up to date and happy. Discover even installed the Brave flatpack
without stalling. I did gvim-x11 and the dotnet SDK via dnf. VSCode was a
rpm and installed okay. I'll flesh out the rest of my workload as needed.

It won't make much of a difference in day-to-day operation but the
difference between a SATA SSD and NMVe really shows up on reboot.

On 2024-02-01 11:36 a.m., rbowman wrote:
> On Thu, 1 Feb 2024 08:31:44 -0500, RabidPedagog wrote:
>
>> The problem with DVD installs is that all of the packages were outdated
>> by the time you got the media. A lot of people don't mind though.
>
> The Fedora iso I downloaded yesterday needed a few packages.
>
> 'sudo dnf upgrade' pulled down 926 packages. After that it went back for
> 12 more. I don't know how far you would get from what was initially
> installed.
>
> It's up to date and happy. Discover even installed the Brave flatpack
> without stalling. I did gvim-x11 and the dotnet SDK via dnf. VSCode was a
> rpm and installed okay. I'll flesh out the rest of my workload as needed.
>
> It won't make much of a difference in day-to-day operation but the
> difference between a SATA SSD and NMVe really shows up on reboot.

It should be noted that the Brave flatpak is maintained by the community
but not an official package from Brave. I didn't let it bother me, but
it should be known that there is always a chance that a bad person would
deploy malware through it to unsuspecting users.

As for the SSD and NVMe differences, I can't say that I have experienced
them yet. I know that my current NVMe does about 3.5GB write as far as
speed goes (if I remember correctly, I'm not on that machine at the
moment) and that the MSI GT72's NVMe did about 1.5GB. What's the highest
speed of an SSD connected to SATA? 500MB?
--
RabidPedagog
Catholic paleoconservative
Linux Mint patron

On 2024-02-01, rbowman <bowman@montana.com> wrote:
> On Wed, 31 Jan 2024 15:34:15 -0500, DFS wrote:
>
>> No rebooting or burn to device required. I guess it blocks and doesn't
>> test memory already in use.
>
> That's the problem if you run from an OS. It may have worked but I had
> problems with some other applications I tried. The machine in question had
> two choices, Windows 7 or SUSE 13.2.
>
> Anyway Fedora is happily running on the new SSD and installing 926
> updates :)
>
> fwiw, the handy dandy Fedora bootable USB was a bust. It failed in the
> attempt but it did download the KDE spin iso. At one point it said it
> couldn't write to the device, not surprising since the device not longer
> existed. Windows would not longer even recognize the stick. I mounted it
> on my Linux box and saw it had created three partitions before it died. I
> formatted the whole mess to vfat.
>
> Since the iso was already on the Win 11, i plugged it back it. It was
> recognized and rufus happily got the job done. Since my work Linux box is
> a Dell of the same vintage as my Dell at home I tested it and was happy to
> see the live Fedora come up on reboot.
>
> I'm starting to think some of the 'make a bootable' apps assume UEFI.

I was kind of curious how Fedora 39 would run on my Latitude E7440 with 8
GBs of RAM, so I installed the Cinnamon Live "Spin" of Fedora 39. I just
used the Linux Mint USB Image Writer to make the bootable USB. I was lucky,
it worked fine. Installation was simple, just followed the prompts and
basically let it use its defaults, it overwrote a Linux Mint install that I
hadn't really used (this is a cheap Goodwill E7440 with 500 GB hard drive
and a 128 GB SSD that fit in the WAN port, for cell phone access). I checked
for updates, and had 669 package updates (1232 files) and it took a while
(probably 20 minutes), I got a notice that the Nemo File Manager crashed
(but it was working), so I rebooted and it came up fine. (It also crashed
momentarily when I installed Simplenote — it seems to need to reboot for some
installations and updates on my computer).

Overall it's pretty much like using Linux Mint (since both use Cinnamon).
Even the terminal commands are basically the same, except you use "dnf"
instead of "apt." A difference is what happens you do an update. On Debian
(and Ubuntu/Linux Mint) "update" lists the files that can be updated, you
then use "upgrade" to update your files (kind of convoluted). Update on
Fedora does what you would expect it would do, updates the files (instead of
only listing updateable files). I'm guessing upgrade probably upgrades to a
newer point version of Fedora, but that's just a guess.

A couple things I like better in Linux Mint. When updates are available my
update icon shows up in my panel (you can choose that option). In Fedora it
doesn't look like there's any way to get rid of the notification icon on the
panel. Fedora has Synaptic for package management but there are a couple
things I don't like about it. First it's quite a bit "busier" than the
Synaptic version in Linux Mint (and Ubuntu and Debian). Second, it keeps
your from doing anything until it finishes refreshing its cache (and it
seems to refresh several times when you use it. And, after you install the
package, it won't let you close it until it's done another refresh. Synaptic
in Linux Mint allows to manually refresh the repository but it's not
mandatory.

Other differences. Newer packages, newer kernel (6.6.13-200), Fedora
defaults to the btrfs file system, while Linux Mint defaults to ext4. Sound
seems a little better (louder) with Fedora. It defaults to 7.6.4.1
LibreOffice, which is (much?) newer. (I don't use it much.) No Snaps or
Flatpaks installed by default. I don't see any Fedora "store" (like Ubuntu
and Linux Mint have).

I've still got other applications to test but, so far, it doesn't seem a lot
different than Linux Mint (when using the Cinnamon desktop).

--
"Evil preaches tolerance until it is dominant, then it tries to silence good."
-- Archbishop Charles J. Chaput

On Thu, 1 Feb 2024 19:58:11 -0000 (UTC), RonB wrote:

> I was kind of curious how Fedora 39 would run on my Latitude E7440 with
> 8 GBs of RAM, so I installed the Cinnamon Live "Spin" of Fedora 39.

I'm currently using 5.8 GB. VS Code is heavy at 2.1 GB. Given my habit of
working on multiple projects I figure $30 for 16GB of DDR3 RAM was a good
bet.

> I checked for updates, and had 669 package updates (1232 files)
> and it took a while (probably 20 minutes), I got a notice that the Nemo
> File Manager crashed (but it was working), so I rebooted and it came up
> fine. (It also crashed momentarily when I installed Simplenote — it
> seems to need to reboot for some installations and updates on my
> computer).

I had a lot more packages but I'm running the KDE spin. So far I'm up to
13.5 GB of the 1 TB drive. Plenty of room for cat videos. After I get the
3.5 tray for the SSD I'll plug the HDD in. Dolphin was always stable and
so far they don't seem to have screwed that up. The jury is still out on
the Discover package manager. It seems a lot slower than dnf.

> Even the terminal commands are basically the same, except you use "dnf"
> instead of "apt." A difference is what happens you do an update. On
> Debian (and Ubuntu/Linux Mint) "update" lists the files that can be
> updated, you then use "upgrade" to update your files (kind of
> convoluted). Update on Fedora does what you would expect it would do,
> updates the files (instead of only listing updateable files). I'm
> guessing upgrade probably upgrades to a newer point version of Fedora,
> but that's just a guess.

https://discussion.fedoraproject.org/t/dnf-update-and-discover/83926/4

I'd seen update is a deprecated alias for upgrade before. I'm glad I hit
the link because there is a discussion of Discover/PackageKit.

" When you run Discover it always refreshes the PackageKit repo metadata
(which makes it reaaaaallly slow sometimes) so you always see an up-to-
date set of updates in Discover. "

and suggests

sudo dnf update --refresh
sudo fwupdmgr get-updates
sudo flatpak update

The second one only runs with UEFI. The flatpak updated vim but it was
fast.

> Other differences. Newer packages, newer kernel (6.6.13-200), Fedora
> defaults to the btrfs file system, while Linux Mint defaults to ext4.
> Sound seems a little better (louder) with Fedora. It defaults to 7.6.4.1
> LibreOffice, which is (much?) newer. (I don't use it much.) No Snaps or
> Flatpaks installed by default. I don't see any Fedora "store" (like
> Ubuntu and Linux Mint have).

Fired up LibreCalc and saw it was 7.6.4.1. Put that back in the box real
fast. At least it loaded fast. I didn't look at the file system. I had
problems with the OpenSUSE btrfs and GRUB but this boots fine so I don't
care. The relative merits of file systems is another thing I don't lose
sleep over.

> I've still got other applications to test but, so far, it doesn't seem a
> lot different than Linux Mint (when using the Cinnamon desktop).

So far the difference for me is KDE. I like the start menu rather than the
Ubuntu button that shows all the apps. I suppose it could be configured
but they seem random rather than being categorized into Development,
Office, and so forth.

On Thu, 1 Feb 2024 13:45:36 -0500, RabidPedagog wrote:

> As for the SSD and NVMe differences, I can't say that I have experienced
> them yet. I know that my current NVMe does about 3.5GB write as far as
> speed goes (if I remember correctly, I'm not on that machine at the
> moment) and that the MSI GT72's NVMe did about 1.5GB. What's the highest
> speed of an SSD connected to SATA? 500MB?

SATA 3.0 is 600MB. A 5400 RPM HDD is under 100MB where the Crucial MX500
claims 560/510 r/w. Compared to the original HDD it's smoking; compared to
the BeeLink with a M.2 NMVe it's a turtle.

On 2024-02-02, rbowman <bowman@montana.com> wrote:
> On Thu, 1 Feb 2024 19:58:11 -0000 (UTC), RonB wrote:
>
>
>> I was kind of curious how Fedora 39 would run on my Latitude E7440 with
>> 8 GBs of RAM, so I installed the Cinnamon Live "Spin" of Fedora 39.
>
> I'm currently using 5.8 GB. VS Code is heavy at 2.1 GB. Given my habit of
> working on multiple projects I figure $30 for 16GB of DDR3 RAM was a good
> bet.

I like 16 GBs also, but this laptop was just a cheap one and if too much
into it it's no longer cheap and not really worth it. For what I do, 8 GBs
is enough anyhow.

>> I checked for updates, and had 669 package updates (1232 files)
>> and it took a while (probably 20 minutes), I got a notice that the Nemo
>> File Manager crashed (but it was working), so I rebooted and it came up
>> fine. (It also crashed momentarily when I installed Simplenote — it
>> seems to need to reboot for some installations and updates on my
>> computer).
>
> I had a lot more packages but I'm running the KDE spin. So far I'm up to
> 13.5 GB of the 1 TB drive. Plenty of room for cat videos. After I get the
> 3.5 tray for the SSD I'll plug the HDD in. Dolphin was always stable and
> so far they don't seem to have screwed that up. The jury is still out on
> the Discover package manager. It seems a lot slower than dnf.

As I mentioned, I just bought a 128 GB SSD for this one. It fits in the WAN
socket. (Kind of nice that you can have to SSDs on these Latitude E7440s.)

>> Even the terminal commands are basically the same, except you use "dnf"
>> instead of "apt." A difference is what happens you do an update. On
>> Debian (and Ubuntu/Linux Mint) "update" lists the files that can be
>> updated, you then use "upgrade" to update your files (kind of
>> convoluted). Update on Fedora does what you would expect it would do,
>> updates the files (instead of only listing updateable files). I'm
>> guessing upgrade probably upgrades to a newer point version of Fedora,
>> but that's just a guess.
>
> https://discussion.fedoraproject.org/t/dnf-update-and-discover/83926/4
>
> I'd seen update is a deprecated alias for upgrade before. I'm glad I hit
> the link because there is a discussion of Discover/PackageKit.
>
> " When you run Discover it always refreshes the PackageKit repo metadata
> (which makes it reaaaaallly slow sometimes) so you always see an up-to-
> date set of updates in Discover. "
>
> and suggests
>
> sudo dnf update --refresh
> sudo fwupdmgr get-updates
> sudo flatpak update
>
> The second one only runs with UEFI. The flatpak updated vim but it was
> fast.

One thing I definitely like better in Linux Mint is Synaptic. That
dnfdragora seems like a poor substitute, but if I know what packages I need
to install I'll just use dnf from the CLI. (Which is how I've installed most
everything.) I've also now installed gnome-software, which the Cinnamon
Spin doesn't install by default. To install Birdtray I was told to install
something called "Copper" (I'm guessing a repository.) So far I don't have
any Flatpak packages installed.

>> Other differences. Newer packages, newer kernel (6.6.13-200), Fedora
>> defaults to the btrfs file system, while Linux Mint defaults to ext4.
>> Sound seems a little better (louder) with Fedora. It defaults to 7.6.4.1
>> LibreOffice, which is (much?) newer. (I don't use it much.) No Snaps or
>> Flatpaks installed by default. I don't see any Fedora "store" (like
>> Ubuntu and Linux Mint have).
>
> Fired up LibreCalc and saw it was 7.6.4.1. Put that back in the box real
> fast. At least it loaded fast. I didn't look at the file system. I had
> problems with the OpenSUSE btrfs and GRUB but this boots fine so I don't
> care. The relative merits of file systems is another thing I don't lose
> sleep over.

I can see why they call Linux Mint a "beginner's distribution" now. When you
add fonts in Linux Mint you can just click on them and an application starts
and installs them. With Fedora they tell you to create a fonts directory,
then a subdirectory where you copy the fonts, then you a command "sudo
fc-cache -v" so Fedora will see the new fonts. Same thing when you download
a package, there's a small utility application to install it. With Fedora it
all works through dfndragora — which is kind of clunky, especially waiting
on the cache being refreshed before and after you use it.

>> I've still got other applications to test but, so far, it doesn't seem a
>> lot different than Linux Mint (when using the Cinnamon desktop).
>
> So far the difference for me is KDE. I like the start menu rather than the
> Ubuntu button that shows all the apps. I suppose it could be configured
> but they seem random rather than being categorized into Development,
> Office, and so forth.

I tried KDE recently, still not crazy about it. But that's partly because
I've been using Gnome for so long that I know the applications it uses. I
originally used KDE through 3.5, but the early 4.0 wasn't really ready when
they released it. (Which is why I went to something with Gnome or Xfce.)

--
"Evil preaches tolerance until it is dominant, then it tries to silence good."
-- Archbishop Charles J. Chaput

On 2024-02-02, rbowman <bowman@montana.com> wrote:
> On Thu, 1 Feb 2024 13:45:36 -0500, RabidPedagog wrote:
>
>> As for the SSD and NVMe differences, I can't say that I have experienced
>> them yet. I know that my current NVMe does about 3.5GB write as far as
>> speed goes (if I remember correctly, I'm not on that machine at the
>> moment) and that the MSI GT72's NVMe did about 1.5GB. What's the highest
>> speed of an SSD connected to SATA? 500MB?
>
> SATA 3.0 is 600MB. A 5400 RPM HDD is under 100MB where the Crucial MX500
> claims 560/510 r/w. Compared to the original HDD it's smoking; compared to
> the BeeLink with a M.2 NMVe it's a turtle.

The highest I've gone is SATA 3.0. Still plenty fast for me.

--
"Evil preaches tolerance until it is dominant, then it tries to silence good."
-- Archbishop Charles J. Chaput

On 2024-02-01 11:05 p.m., rbowman wrote:
> On Thu, 1 Feb 2024 13:45:36 -0500, RabidPedagog wrote:
>
>> As for the SSD and NVMe differences, I can't say that I have experienced
>> them yet. I know that my current NVMe does about 3.5GB write as far as
>> speed goes (if I remember correctly, I'm not on that machine at the
>> moment) and that the MSI GT72's NVMe did about 1.5GB. What's the highest
>> speed of an SSD connected to SATA? 500MB?
>
> SATA 3.0 is 600MB. A 5400 RPM HDD is under 100MB where the Crucial MX500
> claims 560/510 r/w. Compared to the original HDD it's smoking; compared to
> the BeeLink with a M.2 NMVe it's a turtle.

Admittedly, 600MB/sec no longer sounds as fast as it used to. However,
it's definitely still better than 100MB/sec. Anyone who is still using a
hard disk, for whatever reason, should consider using Linux which
doesn't constantly use the HD for swap. The performance benefit a user
would get from that is worth the migration.

--
RabidPedagog
Catholic paleoconservative
Linux Mint patron

On Fri, 2 Feb 2024 11:47:47 -0000 (UTC), RonB wrote:

> The highest I've gone is SATA 3.0. Still plenty fast for me.

So far the difference I see is rebooting. The Fedora machine with the SATA
SSD takes longer than the Ubuntu with the NMVe SSD. Longer is relative
though. I haven't timed it but Fedora is up and running in a matter of
seconds. I'm spoiled by the Ubuntu box.

Most of what I do doesn't beat on the disk so at that point it's down to
an older Intel Pentium with 2 cores versus the 8 core Ryzen 7. Still not a
big deal for what I have in mind.

On Fri, 2 Feb 2024 11:46:17 -0000 (UTC), RonB wrote:

> I tried KDE recently, still not crazy about it. But that's partly
> because I've been using Gnome for so long that I know the applications
> it uses. I originally used KDE through 3.5, but the early 4.0 wasn't
> really ready when they released it. (Which is why I went to something
> with Gnome or Xfce.)

I used to prefer KMail but after using T-Bird for a few years it looks a
little clunky but I didn't do any configuration. KNode appears to be dead
and gone. It says a lot that there is no NNTP client of any type under the
Internet tab.

rbowman wrote this copyrighted missive and expects royalties:

> On Fri, 2 Feb 2024 11:46:17 -0000 (UTC), RonB wrote:
>
>> I tried KDE recently, still not crazy about it. But that's partly
>> because I've been using Gnome for so long that I know the applications
>> it uses. I originally used KDE through 3.5, but the early 4.0 wasn't
>> really ready when they released it. (Which is why I went to something
>> with Gnome or Xfce.)
>
> I used to prefer KMail but after using T-Bird for a few years it looks a
> little clunky but I didn't do any configuration. KNode appears to be dead
> and gone. It says a lot that there is no NNTP client of any type under the
> Internet tab.

From my headers:

X-Mutt: The most widely-used MUA
X-Slrn: Why use anything else?

:-)

Note the special anagram of the author of the following quote :-)

--
“If you maintain a consistent political position long enough, you’ll eventually
be accused of treason.”
-— Mort Sahl

On 2024-02-02, rbowman <bowman@montana.com> wrote:
> On Fri, 2 Feb 2024 11:47:47 -0000 (UTC), RonB wrote:
>
>> The highest I've gone is SATA 3.0. Still plenty fast for me.
>
> So far the difference I see is rebooting. The Fedora machine with the SATA
> SSD takes longer than the Ubuntu with the NMVe SSD. Longer is relative
> though. I haven't timed it but Fedora is up and running in a matter of
> seconds. I'm spoiled by the Ubuntu box.
>
> Most of what I do doesn't beat on the disk so at that point it's down to
> an older Intel Pentium with 2 cores versus the 8 core Ryzen 7. Still not a
> big deal for what I have in mind.

Fedora wanted to update again last night. If I remember right, 69 packages
and over 90 files, including a new kernel. I guess if I continue using
Fedora I'll have to get used to that. This is something those who need
"cutting edge" are accustomed to accepting. For me, it's not that much of a
draw.

Apparently I missed what computer your were using for Fedora. Is it an i5
dual core, or older? My Latitude E7440 uses an i5 dual core (4 thread) CPU
(i5-4310U), but it doesn't seem too slow. I think the UltraBooks are
designed to be lower power for longer battery life.

At any rate it looks like I can do anything on Fedora (Cinnamon Spin) that I
can do with Linux Mint but it's a little easier on Linux Mint. If I needed
"cutting edge" it would definitely be better for that.

I'll keep experimenting with Fedora, for a while anyhow. I should mention
that it does sleep and wake up fine (to RabidPedagog), the extra keyboard
buttons work out of box (speaker volume, brightness adjustments), etc. So
just like Linux Mint in that respect.

--
"Evil preaches tolerance until it is dominant, then it tries to silence good."
-- Archbishop Charles J. Chaput