Ubuntu Wins Operating System Wars

I've recently ditched the Windows operating system at home. Why? Am I an anti-Microsoft zealot? Am I a complete, left-wing anti-conformist? Not at all, I'm simply cheap, and I love technology. Those two things have historically been mutually exclusive. My abandoning of Windows was done for simple economic reasons: Linux is free, and Ubuntu is the easiest to get up and running, and meets my needs. Windows, on the other hand, costs nearly $200 per computer, and the software packages that run on a Windows platform, also cost money. This is the direct opposite of the Linux ideology.

I now run three Ubuntu Desktop 7.10 machines in my house. Two were bought as Ubuntu 7.04 Desktops from Dell (Inspiron 530's) but the third was built from extra parts laying around the house. I chose Ubuntu because of its ease of installation and use. I went through an exhaustive search for the "right" Linux for my purposes. I used an old Dell Dimension 4300 1.6 Ghz for my testing. The only upgrade it received was a cheap DVD reader so I could burn DVD install media instead of 12 CDs.

My search included OpenSUSE,Mandriva,Fedora (7 and 8), VectorLinux,Puppy Linux,OpenSolaris 10, FreeBSD,Debian 4.0 and DSL (Damn Small Linux). My first criterion for all of these systems was getting a system installed and connected to the Internet. That was the basis for round one of my testing. Since I was using 5-6 year old hardware, I knew that this would be the ultimate test steering me to the operating system that would form the backbone of my internal systems. It simply had to run on old hardware as well as new hardware. That being said, this round cut out several players, including OpenSolaris 10, FreeBSD, VectorLinux and Fedora 8. I'm not saying that I couldn't get these operating systems running. I'm saying that I had to draw the line in the sand somewhere. And these didn't make the cut. Ease of installation is ease of RE-installation, and I am always concerned with how long it would take me to rebuild a machine in case of failures.