what kind of other o.s. to install on this machine

[Davno]

Hi, I have a P3 450meg and a voodoo 3500 collecting dust and feel its time to try another o.s. apart from Linux and Win$. Is freebsd different anough to try it and is there other free o.s. to try on that machine.

[WhiteKnight]

maybe u can try BeOS?
their company closed down some time ago..
however there r still people working on it... try googling

[timothykaine]

Originally posted by WhiteKnight
maybe u can try BeOS?

I second that.

You can also check out the latest fork of BeOS as it was recently purchased. Its now called Zeta http://www.yellowtab.com/

[DSwain]

I always wanted to try something like BeOS, but I don't really have money for something like that at this point. If you're like me, you'll try and stick the free road. FreeBSD is a pretty radically different system. For one thing, the installation process is, well it's quite unique but not too complex when you know what's going on. Once you boot into it and such, it'll seem a great deal like a text-based Linux machine because it uses the same shells (csh, bash, whatever you like pretty much) and has a very similar filesystem layout. Things you'll find different though will be package managing (Ports, remotely similar to Portage) modules, sound setup, the BSD init, and so on. So, essentially you could fool somebody into thinking they were using Linux on a FreeBSD machine, but they are quite different. Oh, SkyOS may be another one to try out.

[eyceguy]

BeOS is free. I believe that Be released their personal version to the public just before going belly up and I know that over at www.bebits.com (http://www.bebits.com) there is a developer edition made by the community which also has support for newer processors such as the AthlonXP and the P4. Has a funky kinda setup for burning to a CD. Still need to get around to messing with it.

[nevin180]

Try using OpenBSD. It can be blooy hard to install, but its secure as anything, and pretty lightweight at the same time. Perfect for servers, and very apt for desktop use.

[Davno]

I think ill give a shot at BeOS if i can find a free distro. If none i will try FreeBSD...

[Calipso]

How about Syllable (http://www.syllable.org/)

[GmarAppledude]

OS2 (just kidding) not sure how easy it'd be to get hold of the disks though.

[BMK1st]

Originally posted by nevin180
Try using OpenBSD. It can be blooy hard to install, but its secure as anything, and pretty lightweight at the same time. Perfect for servers, and very apt for desktop use.
I dont find it very hard to install. Once you installed it, you'll know how to install it next time. ;)

[stumbles]

Originally posted by Davno
Hi, I have a P3 450meg and a voodoo 3500 collecting dust and feel its time to try another o.s. apart from Linux and Win$. Is freebsd different anough to try it and is there other free o.s. to try on that machine.


Haven't tried it myself but it does look interesting.......http://www.menuetos.org/ (MenuetOS)

[je_fro]

All these geeks and nobody mentioned Plan 9?
Sheesh :p
http://cm.bell-labs.com/plan9dist/

[x-windows guy]

Might I suggest Solaris? It's free (as in beer), It's kinda cool once you get into it, It's different enough from Linux to be challenging and interesting.

[DSwain]

Solaris does look like a neat thing, but I never could get it installed myself. Maybe things have changed since the last time I tried (a few months ago?) so I'd like to try again myself sometime. How is it anyways? Anything neat to note about it?

[x-windows guy]

I really like the Java Desktop Environment, it's Sun's version of Gnome. Janus (true Linux compatibility as opposed to an emulator or layer of compatibility) is supposed to be coming out soon. I've been using Linux for about 3 years and I was getting kinda bored, I had done pretty much everything that I wanted to do with it so I'm trying Solaris as a change of pace. Solaris is different enough that it is proving to be a challenge. I don't really plan on using it as a "production" system for awhile though, too many things to try to figure out.

I'm curious, what happened with your install?

[DSwain]

Oh man I don't recall at all at this point. I think it wasn't the fault of the installer, but rather the fault of me misunderstanding something. Oh yeah Solaris uses GRUB now right? That's a real nice change of pace.

Apparently, according to news sources, Solaris is building up to be a potential competitor towards Linux. It's a shame that F/OSS companies are coming to battle now. That's not exactly what you'd have in mind in this type of community right? Here's one of the pieces: http://www.osnews.com/story.php?news_id=11594

Hm... I would like to try again though for fun when I get a larger hard disk again. Thanks for the info.

[x-windows guy]

I have it set to boot with lilo from my Slackware. I always get some kind of SunOS secondary boot loader. I think that I read somewhere that it can dual boot from Grub.

As far as a potential battle, I tend to disagree. I think that we (users) will benefit from the competition. I really don't see it becoming a M$ style war, instead, I see the two trying to compete for and broaden their market share which benefits both Linux, and Sun.

[DSwain]

Your point is valid, and that would be nice, but the media likes to make it sound like a war-like style of doing things. That and well, businesses aren't always out to make friends with similar products, so I'm not sure. I'm going to hope it'll be like you're saying.

[psych-major]

All these geeks and nobody mentioned Plan 9?
Sheesh :p
http://cm.bell-labs.com/plan9dist/

This made for a really enlightening read, but I don't think I'll run out and try it just yet...
Too bad these just got disbanded (http://www.unixreview.com/documents/s=9846/ur0508l/ur0508l.html) .
Where will the innovation come from now? Redmond?

[XiaoKJ]

try darwin.....

[mudra]

I recently tried FreeBSD and it works really well for me. Why not give it a try.

Mudra

[nko]

I definitely must second syllable. Spoon is interesting, too, even if it doesn't do much (djm.co.za/spoon). Durand, the main (only?) developer, is an awesome guy and probably wouldn't mind a couple more testers. He writes very legible code.

Menuet, Be, Plan9, Triangle, Haiku, ReactOS, etc. There are a LOT of little projects out there that, while not production-ready, are extremely fun, even if you're just poking around for maybe 10 minutes.

[autuknu]

http://www.openqnx.com/

"v. 6.21" 1st install went fine. o/s is intresting to say the least. might even drag up a box and mess with it some more

regards