I LOVE Mandriva...and have a question for long term users

I recently installed Mandriva 2008.1 Spring as a dual boot to Linux and I am enjoying it more than any other distro I have tried over the last two years. I've been singing this distros praises and making plans on possibly switching over a few other machines to this distro. One issue though seems to be nagging at me....upgrading. I've seen it mentioned other places but this is the most recent that reminded me of this.

http://www.linux.com/?module=comments&func=display&cid=1191092

Now my skill level is definitely just the smallest step above newbie and I don't want to have a bunch of issues every six month when the new distros come out. When Ubuntu 8.04 came out, I waiting a few weeks and then just told my Mythbuntu box to go ahead and update to 8.04 and it did. Any that was it. No problems, no issues, everything worked perfectly. With Mandriva, is this upgrade problem something that I should expect with every new release, do they have a history of this?

Appreciate any feedback. THANKS!

Monty

 

[OT]
What's with all the I LOVE threads lately?
[/OT]

Being totally new to linux myself, I'm sorry I can't really say for sure. If it's a big enough problem, I would assume (hope!) the community would release a fix, so it's not a recurring problem.
That's one of the things that really attracted me to linux, is the open and very helpful community.
Only suggestion I could give is, if whatever DE it's running, maybe just run a different distro with that same DE?

 

Well, I haven't tried to upgrade, so can't say. However, since I keep a separate /home partition, do a clean install is a 10 minute operation which I'd probably do anyway while keeping all my settings, etc.

But, I agree, it is a distribution to be appreciated. I was just so-so on Mandriva in the past until the Spring release, then that changed.

EDIT: I HAVE done a clean install as mentioned above when I switched to gnome from KDE, just deleted config and KDE files from my home directory from the LiveCD, and it went perfectly 'clean'. BTW, what is the kernel you are running? Here's mine:

Code:

bash-3.2$ uname -r
2.6.24.7-laptop-1.uc1mnb
bash-3.2$

 

Code:

2.6.24.5-desktop586-2mnb

Whatever that means

My /home is in a separate partition so I guess I could do clean installs. I was just soooo impressed with how Mythbuntu handled the upgrade from 7.10 to 8.04 that the bar was sort of set there in my mind.

Not sure I understand the mindset of why clean installs are preferred.

THANKS!

Monty

 

If you have more than 1 gig of ram in your machine, you need to change that kernel (in add/remove) ....find the one I've listed if you need to and install...after reboot and everything is running fine, then you can uninstall the old kernel-desktop. Check Mandriva forums....the default is a one size fits all for older machines. No prob....everyone does it that install the "One" version. The "Free" version will select the right kernel, but you'll have to install all the proprietary stuff....so either way is ok

 

I don't get the question.

Are you asking if you are going to run-in to problems everytime your upgrade your lindis?

 

No this is an older machine, only a 1/2 gig here....runs great with it though so I've never bothered to add any more. Athlon 64 3200+, little over a couple years old.

Appreciate the advice though, might see what another gig will run for this thing when I pick up another gig for my Dell D410.

Monty

 

Yep, in the fall when 2009 comes out I was just wondering if updating from 2008.1 would screw it all up or if it would be totally error free like my upgrade from Mythbuntu was.

Thanks!

Monty

 

You've got what you want then....just checking. That default kernel is fast for that machine.

 

I think it will probably upgrade fine through urpmi....thing is, a clean install in linux is nothing compared to windows....just as easy, and gets rid of all the deadwood. I'll look in Mandriva forums for upgrading..

 

It's always an experiment. Some distros like PCLinuxOS and Mepis are better at this than others.

 

I've liked those two distros, but their hardware support is way behind the curve....what's happening over at PCLOS anyway..? Just checked, and they're still on kernel 2.6.22. What gives?

 

I enjoyed and recommended PCLOS for most of the last two years but it just seems like that distro is running out of steam. I'll keep an eye on them but for now I'm looking mostly other directions.

Monty

 

I was over at their site, and just couldn't find anything happening. The last bit of life I saw was the 2008 miniMe release in January.....strange