How tough is it to install Linux, really?

by Grant Robertson Mar 28th 2007

Got Linux? According to some, if you do, and you installed it yourself, you're a superhero. Linux has made incredible strides towards ease of installation over the years (we should know, our team includes early adopters from way back last century) but, still the overwhelming perception is; Linux is the hobbyist OS, something that takes guts, brains and a serious abundance of time to deal with.

Ed Bott, of ZDnet tried his best to take that notion to task in much the same fashion that you might; He spent a weekend configuring a dual boot machine. His experience was less than encouraging. Ed writes of the experience, "I repeated the process after wiping all disks completely and removing all partitions (i.e., making them RAW). No difference. I tried the different installation options on the Suse DVD, including the Safe option. Still no joy."

He gave it his all, a smart guy -- not without experience -- who writes for a widely read tech publication and still he came up short. Not only did he give it a shot, he gave it three. How many of us would do that? We know that Linux can do better, and we've seen it install without a hitch.

Sure, driver issues are always going to be key but, where's the simple and straightforward error messages -- cough, OSX, cough -- which would light the way and show you that, it's not always the distribution's fault your installation failed?

Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)

Gardiner Westbound said 11:39AM on 3-28-2007

On a real good day I'm an advanced novice. I installed Ubuntu Linux on an ancient HP computer without difficulty, fiddling only with the network. The Ubuntu forums touted me onto ndiswrapper, and the problem was solved.

Todd said 12:01PM on 3-28-2007

I am calling "conflict of interest" on this one.

All due respect to Mt. Bott, who I am sure is quite intelligent, but guess who is the number one advertiser across all Ziff Davis print media?...

...Microsoft.

Will Mr. Bott attempt a green Vista install?

chris said 12:08PM on 3-28-2007

It's seems as though he never installed Windows XP or Previous versions on unsupported hardware out of the box. The problem is just that solutions are known more for Windows than Linux. And since there is such variety it's even harder.

I got Ubuntu installed on one of my machines that wouldn't boot by searching the forums for an answer. Although I shouldn't have to, I did.

Now I am a complete Linux newb, but I'm smart enough to do some research before I say done.

Peter Kn said 12:13PM on 3-28-2007

When I installed ubuntu dapper on my HP system the default screen resolution was 640x480 and I couldn't set it any higher. I had to move the windows around but I didn't know how to do it. It took me a while before I learned how to install the proper ati driver but it helped me learn alot about using the terminal. The only other problem I had was partitioning my drive so I could still boot xp. I did all this and I wouldn't consider myself anything more than a beginner. I'm just happy I had all the internet forums to help me out.

shadekh said 12:28PM on 3-28-2007

The fact is, normal users dont want to touch the terminal. they dont want to mess around with dependencies and drivers. They want to just have a ready and running system.

I tried installing the latest ubuntu release, 6.10, on a friend's pc recently. the live cd booted, but the installation kept on failing. The error message generated was long, and the forums for that message had only the problems, and no solutions whatsoever, except for some mention of bugs somewhere.

If this is the case with ubuntu, a rather user friendly version of linux....

Tush said 12:53PM on 3-28-2007

I installed Ubuntu on several friend's machines and have had no real problems. It's pretty easy if all the hardware matches. I feel that it is stable and easy enough for a lot of users out there.

I've had problems with my own computer, but they stem from the fact that it's PPC which has far less support.

emor8t said 2:48PM on 3-28-2007

Huh? What's the problem? I installed Ubuntu on my computer, no problem. I have never used Linux before. The network port worked, sound, etc. I installed kubuntu on my iBook, same deal.

Installing Linux shouldn't be the hard part, actaully installing anything in it is a different story.

freaktech said 2:50PM on 3-28-2007

Well Mr.Bott's problem could be that he is trying to install Suse instead of researching and finding a distro with better installer.

Eric said 5:27PM on 3-28-2007

Sorry to hear that Mr. Bott had a hard time loading Linux on his machine. I do give him kudos for taking a valiant effort at it. There are other distributions out there that are extremely easier to install than say Suse, Fedora, etc.

I personally use Mepis and have converted some other friends over to Mepis. I chose Mepis for its each of use, its just "works" attitude and its outstanding community support.

I've had friends/co-workers come up to me and ask, "how do you get your wireless to work (or any other hardware) on Linux?" They've tried and tried and they can't get this or that to work. I hand them my Mepis LiveCD and they're amazed that everything works straight from the LiveCD.

Naveen Roy said 4:49AM on 3-29-2007

Well, I have been installing Linux (out of interest) for more than 8 years now and have tried various "flavours"....i love the idea of open source and the freedom it gives.....i understand the shortcomings of Linux....but these are only when you start comparing it with Windblows....otherwise, there really are no other problems I can see with Linux....

jb said 9:38AM on 3-29-2007

I just don't get hard installation complaint.You can practically sleep through an ubuntu install. If you can read and have basic information about your system you can install Slackware, Debian, etc... Fedora core and ubuntu asks for less parameters than an XP install. The only time I've had an install failure was when my install CD/DVD had errors.

Nick said 11:59AM on 3-29-2007

as a relative linux new user, i found that it was actually almost pain free to do a dual boot of windows and ubuntu, after i messed it up and with two days of reading the ubuntu wiki. it came down to defragging the hard drive with windows on it and then using gparted on the livecd to make partitions for linux and then install. however it was a pain to do just out of the blue. if youre bold enough with your pc to play with linux and have a good backup system youll figure it out, as for the rest of the world that buys a computer from dell/hp/compaq/whatever with preinstalled stuff, they really dont care. if it had linux preinstalled on there with firefox and a couple other goodies on it, people would go for it(cuz its free, thus a cheaper computer). until the large corps that sell premade bundle systems for the general populace embrace the idea that opensource isnt evil and microsoft is, linux will get bad press and thus be left to the people that know what theyre doing.

Etienne said 12:10PM on 3-29-2007

I've been trying to get Ubuntu to dual-boot on my macbook with the help of a tutorial but I never was able to get around to completing the task.

Dan said 12:25PM on 3-29-2007

I have installed Linux, Win9X/2000/XP and OSX10.4. Probably the easiest to install was OSX, but I would say that the most tedious, interactive and most likely to go wrong has always been Windows. Linux distributions such as Ubuntu have a graphical installer and ask about 6 questions. You can't get easier than that. I tried Suse around version 9 but will never again install it on my computer because of their relationship with Microsoft. This article was obviously written by a moron or someone deeply in Microsoft's pocket.

gumball said 12:38PM on 3-29-2007

Over the years I have purchased windows systems that were "pre-installed", bare systems and installed Windows, bare systems ans installed Linux, bare systems and installed Unix, bare systems and installed Xenix. In every instance, except the "pre-installed" system, there was usually something small or unusual that I encountered, but it was of no real consequence.

If the "average user" wants to buy it, turn it on, and have it work, then maybe the manufacturers should offer "pre-installed" Linux systems. They will be come lowest common denominator type of system just like the "pre-installed" windows systems are. If a system like that is useful for you, then more power to you.

Just this week I disabled the Microsoft automatic updates to my XP system. The last video driver update from MS really screwed up system and it took me several hours to remove the old driver and choose one (they were all labeled EXACTLY the same) that actually worked! I have NEVER had that problem with ANY Linux / Unix system.

Forrest said 11:12PM on 4-06-2007

I installed Fedora Core 6 on my pc recently. The installer threw an error once after it completed the installation, but I just rebooted and it came right up. After I installed everything I wanted (following the awesome fedorafaq.org), it was ready to go.

Of course, being a software developer, it was less intimidating for me than it would have been for an average windows user. Still, I'd have to say Fedora Core 6 installation is a breeze and most of my semi-pc literate friends could have pulled it off without a hitch.

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