Mandrake Linux 8.2 review

by Peter Smart, 30 April, 2002

I first tried Mandrake 8.2 about 6 weeks ago, it stayed on my hard drive for about 2 and a half hours after it became dramatically unstable.

About 2 weeks ago, Laurence asked my to review it. I told him to kiss my ass, so he threatened to get rid of my cool address if I didn't stop pissing about and get a review out. (Laurence: Lies! Damn lies!)

So here it is, totally under my own free will...

Same old same old

Now before we start, let's just make it clear that an updated distro does not excite me. The only reason I bother with them, is because I'm stuck on a modem connection and can't update all my packages overnight, every night. And Mandrake 8.2 is no exception. Yes, it's better than 8.1, but only because I never got round to updating Gnome.

Speaking of which (see that, that's a link that is), "What happened to Gnome?" It went all slow and shitty, and now it's sprung back into life. Not as nippy as KDE mind, but still a vast improvement.

KDE... nothing new, but then KDE 3.0 is just out, so you might want to get hold of that.

Apart from that, it's all the usual things you'd expect from an updated distro... updated packages.

Problems with X and my PDA

I did however have some problems with X. I usually have to get drivers from nVIDIA to get the best performance from my card. However on my first instance of installation, X was so unstable that it was impossible! Perhaps this was a freak ocurrence, perhaps not. I'll never know because now it's running fine... before I've installed the proper drivers. Oh well.

Another gripe (here we go), I've recently aquired a Handspring Visor PDA. I didn't expect it to work with Linux, but looked into it anyway. And lo and behold, Evolution, and KDE conduits are already there, waiting for me to sync with.

Sadly though, these conduits don't really, do what they should. Sure I can sync, but it seems to be with random apps. Call me fussy, but I'd rather keep all my calendar and contact entries in Evolution. Perhaps this is an oversight on my behalf, but it's things like this that will make Linux on the desktop. As mobile devices become more common place, their ability to communicate back to a single app on your PC, is essential.

My stuff's being backed up, but where's the fun in having to read my email at my desk? Why not in the car on the way to work, or whilst sat on the loo?

Nice additions

A nice addition for business use, is Mr Project. this is a project management tool that allows you to manage resources, create Gantt charts, and other project management tasks. Now I know that if I where to present this to my work's Senior Project Manager (Hi Paul!), he'd likely go into hysterics at the sight of such a product not branded by Microsoft. But tools like this are going to prove important on the desktop market. So keep an eye out for that one in the future.

A nice addition for the new user, is the "What to do?" entry in the KDE and Gnome menu. This contains sub-entries like, "Enjoy music & video", "Play games", and so forth. Just shortcuts to everything that you'd use anyway, with a nice label attached, for those who don't know their Grip from their Licq. Again, nothing spectacular, but a nice touch.

Mandrake 8.2 is also presented with a generous amount of games, nothing ground-breaking, but enough to keep most puzzle freaks busy for a while.

Bottom line

Bottom line, this cost me £9 from Linux Emporium, 3 CD's, plus postage and packaging, that's £9 well spent. In fact, I have such a little problem spending that £9, I'd quite happily spend that £9 every few months just to keep my system up to date... oh wait hang on, that's what I do anyway.

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