[fbb] Which OS to use for WinFBB on a new PC

[Ray Wells]

Hello Alan,

Definitely Linux if you're looking for reliability and flexibility, 
provided you don't mind having to learn something new. With Linux you 
will not have the comport problems that are reported with XP, and you 
can even use your old Baycom modems if you wish. Linux supports ALL AR 
hardware.

Which distribution? That's really a personal choice but since I suspect 
you might be a newcomer to Linux it probably doesn't matter much.

Some say Redhat is easy to install but that's not been my finding.

Mandriva (Redhat based) is suggested by Bernard, F6BVP, who is heaviliy 
involved in fpac and xfbb (to a lesser extent) but I don't like it's 
commercial parentage.

Debian (and Debian based distros) probably provides more AR support than 
the others. It used to have a reputation (probably well earned some 
years back) for being difficult to install but live CD distributions 
based on Debian have overcome such problems. Ubuntu, Kubuntu and Knoppix 
are some that spring to mind. The difference between Kubuntu and Ubuntu 
is that the former uses the KDE desktop while the latter uses Gnome.

I tried Knoppix but didn't like it.

My recommendation for a newcomer to Linux is Kubuntu and for now, v7.04. 
There have been issues reported with fbb and 7.10.

If you have a Linux-user mentor you can call on for help, use the 
distribution that person uses. If you will be flying alone my choices 
would be Kubuntu (1), Mandriva (2) and Knoppix (3).

If you subscribe to the xfbb and fpac mailing lists you'll be able to 
get help from active users.

My active system for the bbs/node/xastir (APRS) is pure Debian (v4.0) 
running on a P300 with 128M RAM. It also runs the KDE desktop. My other 
system that I was building up as a replacement runs Kubuntu 7.04. It 
runs the same things as the in-service machine. It's a P700 with 256m RAM.

I hope that's been of some assistance.

Ray vk2tv


Alan Murray wrote:

> Most of the newer PC Operating System (OS) comes with Vista or Windows 
> XP. 
> Will these new OS's work with WinFBB 32.
> So what would be a better OS, LINUX - UBUNTO, REDHAT, etc. ?
> -- 
> ---
> Are you looking for a Red Light Camera? Then there's one look'n for 
> you in NY City!
> http://groups.yahoo.com/group/NYCRLC/
> --
> Interested in GPS on your Pocket PC
> http://groups.yahoo.com/group/PocketGPS/
> --
> Amateur Radio Packet Bulletins via email twice a day.
> http://groups.yahoo.com/group/pbull/
> --
> FBB bbs:  telnet://n2bqf.dyndns.org:6300
> --
> OpenBCM: http://n2bqf.dyndns.org:7373 <http://n2bqf.dyndns.org:7373>
> --
> Webpage: http://n2bqf.org
> -- 
>
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