switched to ubuntu; windows has failed me for the last time

about a couple of weeks ago my brother woke me up after having had only two hours of sleep to tell me that the computer wasn't working. i grumbled while trying to get my eyes open long enough to register that it was still light out. i asked him a few questions to figure out what had happened. he had just tried turning on the pc and it wouldn't go into windows. i tried and couldn't get into any of the options at start-up; why do they call it safe-mode? maybe because the full on windows experience is like wearing a target for an attack of one kind or another. before this i had prided myself in keeping all the security software that i used up-to-date and that the only virus i encountered was screened ahead of time and came from a friends mp3 player. i had gotten windows xp home (sp 2) working exactly as i wanted. i had tweaked everything and downloaded everything until i had gotten everything to how i had wanted them.

i had gone through this once before; windows turning my computer useless until i had re-installed it. the last time, my product key had 'expired' and i had to get a new one. when i called up tech support i got someone from singapore to help me out. he gave me a new product key and i was able to continue with the installation. then there are the updates; that was a good day of downloading the appropriate drivers and other third party apps to keep my precious windows box from getting the latest bad boy, malware out there. after i was done i told myself that i would never go through that again.

right before that last windows install i had received a copy of ubuntu fiesty which i had requested through the mail. i asked for 3 copies and that's what i got. i still can't over the fact that someone sent me an os through the mail. i asked for and got a legitimate, working copy of an os through the mail. i got three copies too. one of which i gave to a friend at the office who was interested in this 'linux desktop' movement we kept reading about. the other two stayed in the back of the desk drawer, seeing light once in a while so i could check out what the live cd had to offer. i tried wubi at one point and dual booted the pc but gave that up because most of the things i did on this home desktop was windows based and switching everything over would be too much work.

well, sink-or-swim time came around when i couldn't figure out how to save my windows installation. the oem cd that came with this computer was utterly useless. i never thought of making a recovery cd because i never thought something i paid about five thousand pesos for would fail so badly, several times. after about an hour of rooting around, i had given up and slipped in the live cd to install fiesty. after clicking through all the usual questions and the not so usual ones (partitions, which i didn't understand) i explained to my brother that i was wiping windows out of the computer and that we were going linux. we got into it because he reacted after realizing that yahoo messenger wouldn't be on there. i had been using pidgin for a long time and am very comfortable in losing the bells and whistles, he had grown up on windows and everything else was of lower quality. everything else had to be. my concern was we both needed the computer up and running but i didn't have time to spare working on a windows install. my cousin and my brother needed it more than i did since they do their schoolwork on this machine so i figured i could get the internet connection up and some productivity apps in there so they could get some work done while i tried to figure things out. i thought maybe some weekend i would go into getting windows on this box. i thought it was inevitable.

about two weeks now and i haven't picked up my xp installer except to put it back in the cd wallet i have for apps on cd. i have found a suitable freeware version for everything i need to do. i have not missed out on anything like email or feed updates since that day. my brother balked less after i installed the advanced desktop settings manager. wobbly windows beats smileys for him. and i have found wine, a Godsend. who needs windows when there is a compatibility layer like wine on the job? so after going through all the settings i could possibly think of tinkering with (without messing with the terminal) and applying configuration changes; what do i think so far? my pc is doing great! its going at a speed i didn't observe when running windows apps. maybe in part to all the security i had to have running. i thought it would be a geeks world here to get a linux distribution to run but it has been relatively easy. i upgraded to gutsy since i read somewhere that the read/write access to ntfs partitions was improved. and as a previous microsoft zombie, my second hard drive has partitions in ntfs. i'm not much of a gamer so i don't really miss that part. it is a shame that cedega (wine's proprietary cousin optimized for playing windows games on linux boxes) isn't a freeware program, however i have read that wine can handle most of the challenges thrown at it. i thought my world would slip into chaos after the switch but this os has been more accomodating than what i am used to. which leads me to the last point . . .

my concerns about the product stem from being a windows user. there is a disturbing lack of documentation on virus security and maintenance available out there. i haven't been searching long enough but i have picked up a pattern on both topics. i don't know if it is conceit on the part of the writer's or my own ms paranoia. people who have been answering n00b questions about security and maintenance are of the opinion that there really is no need. i still don't know what to make of that. they suggest virus scanners and firewalls but they explain that there is no 'in the wild'/real threat to a linux user at the time. if ever i am attacked to the point of a broken box, they suggest slipping in the live cd and run fsck or somthing that sounded a lot simpler than i expected. besides, (i have read) that at the worst my box would be a carrier for windows disease. there was even one opinion that said i shouldn't even bother screening even for friends on windows. just in case i pass them something bad. it should be there own responsibility to check for it when i give them the media with whatever they needed from me.

that is what i am currently having a problem with in terms of using ubuntu. i still have to be convinced that there really isn't a bad man around the corner with a worm or trojan out to cripple my system because i'm not wearing the windows logo anymore. is it true that this runs so much better than windows in terms of file/space usage that defragmentation is now a thing of the past? i remember reading somewhere that microsoft suggested defrag and disc check at least monthly if the computer was about 3 years old. i felt the need to do after a year; if my install of windows lasted that long. i don't feel too good about being a carrier for malware, but there have been virus scanners suggested that i can take a look into as a final screener when passing along data.

would i suggest it for anybody? yes. definitely. i no longer see the point of shelling out a large amount of money when there exists so many free options to get a pc up AND running. installing ubuntu was simpler than i thought, after upgrading to gutsy i have had to use the terminal less to get things changed. gamers may have to wait, i hear cedega hasn't been moving much for linux distros since they are focusing on apple users (more money i guess). for my simple uses, this fits.