The Big Switch!

Recently, because of curiosity and maybe also because of boredom in Windows 7, I decided to move to Linux Ubuntu. And so far, I'm not regretting it.

Above:  My new desktop

The setup was easy. I just had to download the disk image file which is more than 600 MB in size. Make a bootable USB stick through Universal USB creator. Plugged it in my notebook, rebooted and then that's it-- the installation began with no hassle at all.

I completely wiped out my hard disk and install Ubuntu Natty using the entire disk-- besides I guess I won't be needing the use of my Windows 7 Starter.

The challenge is this-- after the fresh install I had to install additional software to suit my needs. I listed some of the applications which I previously used in my Windows 7 notebook below:

• Office Applications - from Microsoft Office 2003 to Libre Office 3
• Music Player - from iTunes to Banshee Media Player (that's because iTunes is not available in Linux OS variants.
• Video Player - no change since I use VLC media player previously
• Email Client - from Thunderbird to Evolution Mail
• Offline Blog-writing Tool - from Windows Live Essential to Blogilo
• Web Browser - from IE9 and Firefox to Chromium and Firefox
• Bittorrent Client - from Bittorrent to Transmission
• PDF Reader - from Adobe Reader to eVince PDF Reader

Basically, that's all the application I use frequently. And because other programs have no Linux counterpart (or they may have but I'm not yet aware), I also installed Windows Emulator (WINE)

so that I can still install Window-based software like Treepad Lite and other games like Plants vs. Zombies and Angry Birds.

I also encountered some minor problems after installing Ubuntu like the problem in which my notebook automatically hibernates whenever I unplugged it even when the battery is fully charged. But after some research in the internet, I found the right solutions.

For every problem that you will encounter in using Ubuntu, there are surely solutions to them-- thanks to Google and the Ubuntu community. Also thanks to Ubuntu and Linux dedicated websites like OMG! Ubuntu, Unix Men, and some others.

By using Ubuntu, I can tell that my notebook reflects my personality since it is fully customizable unlike Windows.

Please share your Linux experience.

Linux rocks!