Comments from a Lindows^H^H^H^HSpire user

Posted Apr 20, 2004 17:43 UTC (Tue) by rjamestaylor (guest, #339)
Parent article: Lindows goes for an IPO - a detailed look

Thanks for the analysis, Jon.

Over the weekend I committed my family's Internet PC to Linspire 4.5. (I guess I'm into commercial Linux; I have Xandros on my laptop, RedHat ES 3.0 on my servers). My youngsters will play their Windows-based educational games on a non-networked Windows box (not sure if I will revert to Win98SE or leave it XP Home). I'm quite happy with CNR at $4.95/mo (on going) and the packaging Linspire brings to the home desktop. My wife, a non-technical RN and mother of three, has agreed to participate in GrokDoc's useability study and switch to using Linux (via Linspire) for her usual email, web surfing, letter writing, budgeting, and all-important solitare playing. To me it was either ~$50 a year for Lindows/Linspire or ~$50 a year for anti-virus software on Windows (I am not going to spend time administering my home systems while I can afford otherwise).

Though I may have committed my home PC to Linspire I will think hard before jumping in on the "Refund Michael" IPO, especially with a "going concern" qualification from its auditors. This is 2004, not 1997. While CNR may go away, Debian, the distro beneath the covers, won't; therefore I am confident in my investment. Stocks, on the other hand, stand or fall on their own.

Comments from a Lindows^H^H^H^HSpire user

Posted Apr 20, 2004 19:06 UTC (Tue) by proski (subscriber, #104) [Link] (3 responses)

On the Windows side, Dr. Web is free and includes free updates (both "as in beer", of course). On the GNU/Linux side, Fedora is quite stable, and running "yum upgrade" is no more hassle than running an antivirus in Windows.

Comments from a Lindows^H^H^H^HSpire user

Posted Apr 20, 2004 19:16 UTC (Tue) by rjamestaylor (guest, #339) [Link] (2 responses)

Oops. Dr. Web isn't free, anymore. It costs EUR40 for 1 year (evaluation versions are for evaluation not free long-term use).

RedHat, er, Fedora requires more "know how" than Lindows, er, Linspire, and more hand-holding than I wanted to give my home PC. I want my wife and kids to run the home PC without involving me. This is at their loving request so that they actually have some time with me when I'm actually making eye contact with them and responding to questions within the hour they were asked.

Free as in Freedom is something I'll gladly pay for.

Comments from a Lindows^H^H^H^HSpire user

Posted Apr 21, 2004 15:52 UTC (Wed) by proski (subscriber, #104) [Link] (1 responses)

Sorry, I missed the distinction between "non-free freeware" and "non-free shareware". But then there is Avast, which claims for be free for home users.

Anyway, I'm not trying to dissuade you from trying Lindows. I'm just trying to correct the notion that antivirus software costs money for home users. Windows users should not have an excuse not to run antivirus software as long as they run Windows.

free-as-beer windows anti-virus

Posted Apr 22, 2004 8:51 UTC (Thu) by gyles (guest, #1600) [Link]

There's also AVG anti-virus from http://www.grisoft.com