Yeah I got one of those cds in a mag and thought this looks interesting.

It promised very little set up, autodetect my graphics card and come with all the codecs for dvds etc. But when I put the cd in the drive it only gets to 35% then crashes.

But apart from that has anyone else used it? Btw I've gone back to ubuntu since open suse 10.2 was just too hard to get to work.

At the mo, I got my internet and my printer working.

Xandros is based on Debian (like Ubuntu) but uses KDE instead of Gnome. I'd guess that installer crashes/problems may have been fixed in later releases. As far as I know the full version of Xandros is not free. If you want a free Debian based KDE distribution I suggest trying Kubuntu or MEPIS (or the latest version of Xandros which I think has a 30 day free trial).

i used it and i don't like it one bit!

i've said this before, why pay for linux? i used the server distro as it was close to windows server, but that takes away from linux.

I've used Xandros a few years now. Lotsa Linux users dont care for it, it takes longer to boot up. But- for windows users, its the way to get started in LInux.

I'd install a new drive as primary, putting the win drive on the secondary. But the install CD, if it finds only one drive with windows on it, will offer to repartition using free space for the Xandros install.

But drives are so cheap, why risk the problem? Anyway, Xandros has recognized and properly run video cards and monitors that other distros dont do so well with. No questions asked.

It does stop during the install to ask what kind of user interface you want: Mac, win, or linux. One click or two on an icon. Then after it boots, if you open the file manager, there are all the other partitions in the system listed and available. It *NEVER* tells you you dont have "permission" to access any partitions on any of the drives.

It reads & writes all the windows file formats, and moves them to or from the windows drive. It also comes with 'CROSSOVER', a WINE windows emululator that also takes time to load up when called, but then runs lotsa windows software. When I put Nero in the cd, it found it, called crossover, and installed it without asking any questions.

Kinda kewl, it'll burn backup Xandros install CDs. And when intalling, never asks for that stupid 20 digit windows number for the CD. Moreover, when you install new eqiupment, it dont ask, like windows does, for you to put the install cd in. It already copied all the drivers it had onto the IDE, and sets it all up.

Xandos 2 found my UW SCSI controller and drive, but Xandos 3 dont have a driver for it, and mite be a hassle if you want it on scsi. Seems like the newer IDE is so fast now there's no advantage in scsi. I've had crashes, trashed file systems, but I've never had the money for first class hardware, always bought el cheapo gray market stuff.

One of the ways I cope is that with every install I make sure there is a dos partition (I still do a lotta work in dos), where I park my own work or whatever other stuff I dont *EVER* want to loose. Xandos dont have any problem coping whatever I want to fat 16 or fat 32.

So- even if the boot crashes, hung on LI.... all I havta do is stick a floppy in the drive, boot dos, and there's all my personal data still there.

IIRC, the personal Xandos desktop CD is 50$. Well worth it for Windows users wanting to try Linux. then, after you've become familiar with it, if you do have a crash, you can still try Suse, Mandrake, Slackware, Debian... By that time, their installs mite be easier.

the thing Xandos has is the install scripts from Corel's Debian. Corel had been writing user software for decades, and provided the best Linux manual I ever saw. It also came with their graphics app. It was the first distro I saw that would boot right to your desktop no questions asked. You did not need to provide a password. And the first to run the graphics without any screwups. Mandrake has been bad about that.

But now, if Mandrake'll run your graphics, at boot it can go right to your desktop. Its no biggie for folks who leave the PC on 24/7, but my sense of energy consuption dont care for that.

Xandos also ran the video stuff from youtube or whoever, while some distros want you to buy some plugins or whatever. The only problem I've had is that some links dont seem to know Mozilla exists, and only works with what it thinks is IE.

I cannot say enough good about xandros. It is the distro that finally convinced me that I would stop playing the continuous M$ pay for upgrade game. XP was the last Windows product that I intend to buy.

Over the past five years, I have tested most of the major distros. That includes Red Hat, Fedora, Mandriva, SimplyMEPIS, Ubuntu, Kubuntu, Debian, openSUSE and several live distros. They all had strong points to recommend them. None of them proved to be something that I wanted to live with long term. Then I downloaded the xandros 3.0 iso about a year ago. It was the first distro that recognized all of my equipment and laoded the drivers unassisted. With other distros, I had sometimes spent days of looking for drivers and then coaxing printers to work.

Six months later, I bought the Xandros 4.0 Home deluxe version. I found a copy for $55. From the beginning it has exceeded all of my expectations. My lan consists of four computers, a network printer and a ps3. Two of the machines are running xp and two are running xandros. You can install xandros on as many computers as you want. I have gradually migrated most of my work to linux and have encountered very few problems.

The thing that drove me crazy with other linux distros was the difficulty of installing new software. With xandros, you install software via the Xandros Network. When you register the new installation, you are given an activation code. This code which can be used on all additional installations and provides access to Xandros Network and CrossOver. Xandros Network allows easy one click installation from various debian repositories and CrossOver allows the use of Microsoft Office and other Windows software within Xandros. I have never tried CrossOver because it is my goal to gradually migrate totally to linux.

Some would say, "Why pay for linux"? My answer would be that you shouldn't unless the features offered are important enough to you to justify it. In my case it was. One benefit that I forgot to mention is that Xandros 4.0 Home deluxe comes with a built-in security suite. With other distros, you have to buy it.

yeah tried xandros once. really crappy.

stay clear of xandros, linspire etc...

xandors sucks. they made it look like windows, which is retarded. it's ugly and sucks.

go ubuntu!

>xandors sucks. they made it look like windows, which is retarded. it's ugly and sucks.
I'm so sorry you consider an operating system 'sucky' when it doesn't match your definition of 'beautiful'. And unless someone can give a number of valid reasons why Xandros is a lousy operating system, I'm more inclined to agree with posters such as efc and Dark Brown.

they are in bed with microsoft like novell