From Ubuntu back to MS Windows

After one month of testing Ubuntu Feisty and having it as my primary operation system, I’m going back to Windows. Ubuntu disappointed me, again (since I tried every stable Ubuntu release so far). But it was the best GPL competitor I used so far.
Ubuntu isn’t able to increase my productivity. The opposite is true. Let me explain some things, the good and the bad.

Out of the box, using the live cd, Ubuntu recognized my NTFS disks (even the external ones), showed me a list of wireless networks in the neighborhood (and asked me for the WPA key) and had a very pleasant look and feel. Installing went quite well (I had to unplug my external disks first, since the partition editor didn’t want to show up).

Another nice thing: upon opening a video file in the default Gnome player, codecs are searched for automatically. Good! Not good however, is the disappearing of the video itself when the player isn’t moved around (when using .wmv files). Happened with this Gnome player and with VLC.

Since I own an Acer Travelmate 6003, my native resolution is 1400×1050. This resolution is standard: SXGA+, but Xorg didn’t recognize it. I had to install the 915resolution package, which patches some display modes at startup. Very ugly solution, but hey: it works.

Afterwards, I had to install the ntfs-3g package (why don’t they install this package natively?) and was very happy to be able to write to my NTFS disks. ‘Desktop effects’ (compiz) were ok (a little bit slow), but I didn’t like the wobble effect too much (started irritating after a while), and the maximize effect was too much, so I turned off the wobble effect. The 3D cube effect for the workspaces worked fine using the live cd, but once installed it refused to work, even when I changed my number of workspaces back to 4 (why did Ubuntu change it to 1 in the first place?). I especially loved the Apple Exposé effect and the one-click minimize all/previous state (in the lower left corner).

After installing my favorite programs and some debs from GetDeb (Pidgin e.g.), I started to configure Ubuntu the way I liked to.
I dislike the anti-aliased fonts in Ubuntu. Those fuzzy things are not only ugly, they are more difficult to read than the ‘normal’ fonts on Windows systems. But hey, I found the ‘msttcorefonts’ package, and changed some configuration files. Nevertheless, fonts were never as clear as in Windows. But I could live with that.

From any Operating System, I expect things to work out of the box. If it doesn’t, I’ll be happy to search our mutual friend Google for some minutes, but not for hours.
As they say, Ubuntu Feisty has become a competitor to Microsoft Windows, the command line should be seen as a handy tool, not as a primary way to change settings or to do something. You *cannot* expect users to use the command line for very easy, obvious tasks.
Let me explain:In my previous post, I explained how to install UT GOTY on Ubuntu Feisty. Everything went well, but upon starting the game, as described in the post, the cpufreq was too low, so I had to change it to the highest possible GHz. Why did the Ubuntu devs/community choose NOT to add the SUID bit by default? Users should be able to change their power scheme their selves without any hazzle. But since I love the command line, I could live with that too.

Next thing I noticed is how greedy the Ubuntu install was. I do like a silent computer (therefor I bought a Centrino, some years ago), but Ubuntu manages to use more resources than Windows, resulting in a noisy fan at all times. Even when the computer is idle for 20 minutes, the fan blows. This ain’t nice.

What I did like, again, is the GLSlideShow. However, by default, this doesn’t work: an .xsreensaver file had to be created and silly options had to be entered. Developing a front end for these things couldn’t be that hard! Even worse, my CPU fan blowed like hell at every picture change, which didn’t occur fluently.

When I wanted to put the computer in stand by (suspend as they say in Ubuntu), one time out of two the whole system just froze. I had to press the on/off button for 4 seconds and lost my work. Moreover, when it did succeed to suspend, I closed my laptop lid, and turned off the power of my external hard drive. Apparently, this is not a good choice: Ubuntu waked up from suspend mode upon turning off or removing a removable disk (even when it had been unmounted before). This is just stupid.

Another thing I use very often in Windows: selecting a word/phrase, dragging it to another application and releasing the button. This way, the text (or image) will be copied. In Linux, this works fine, but they didn’t implement it completely: when the main application is maximized and something should be copied using drag&drop to another application, the alt+tab behavior doesn’t want to work no more. Nor when I drag the thing to the other application residing on the task bar (it doesn’t show up). Annoying.

Now the click though bug. I just cannot imagine Feisty is released with this bug. E.g., if there are 3 applications maximized and you want to close the upper one, the second or third one could be closed instead of the upper one. Very unexpected behavior!

Then there is the lag. How irritating. E.g. try to select something in Firefox: in comparison to Windows the text will not be selected right away.

Gnome is known of its simplicity. I like simplicity, since it often goes hand in hand with intuitiveness. That’s the reason I didn’t install Kubuntu, the KDE version: it’s too bloated and settings are all over the place: they aren’t grouped nicely like in Gnome (Edit -> Preferences). But Nautilus, Gnome’s file manager (which I use very frequently) is just too simple. I like the detail view in Windows Explorer, and for photographs I like the filmstrip (and often the thumbnail view too). Nautilus doesn’t have a detail view. Well, it has a list with some options, but it’s impossible to sort files using the EXIF info of a picture (e.g. when it is taken) or the bitrate of music files. What a lack of features.

About the lack of features: there are programs on the Windows system I hardly can live without:

• Adobe Photoshop. Don’t you *dare* to mention the GIMP as a replacement for Photoshop. Call it a replacement for Paint, maybe for Paint.NET, but not for Photoshop. In addition, the GIMP is very illogical. Why can I open a file in the main menu, but why can’t I save the currently opened file in the same menu? *sigh*.
• MSN. Since all my friends are on MSN (Live Messenger), I’m there too. Pidgin is a nice replacement, but the features lack too much: no offline message support, no webcam support, … I know there are alternatives too, but I’ve always got a feeling that there is something ‘not right’, and I don’t have this feeling with Pidgin.
• Microsoft Office. Again, OpenOffice.org isn’t bad, but it’s still buggy and compared to Office 2007, it’s no good.

Last but not least: Unreal Tournament ran at 14 frames/second. In Windows, I choose 16 bits color and the frame rate increases. In Ubuntu however, I was unable to change the color depth without changing xorg.conf. But I do want to keep 32 bits color depth in X, and use 16 bits in UT, just like I do on Windows. Not possible, at first (and second and third) sight.
Well, ok. I changed Xorg to use a 16 bit color depth and played UT. I had a ‘playable’ frame rate and I was quite happy. Suddenly, my screen started to do weird things, and my system froze. Even my mouse, ctrl+alt+backspace or alt+F1 didn’t want to work no more. I tried different maps, same problem.

So, well: goodbye Ubuntu, for now. I’d be happy to try again, in half a year. In the mean time I’ll keep using my Debian console only (ssh) servers