Ubuntu Rocks (A Review with Tips) Dec 22, 2008, 13 :01 UTC (1 Talkback[s]) (3815 reads) (Other stories by Dr. Steven Taylor)
"The office desktop was actually my original motivation, as it was underpowered (the university hardly went all-out, shall we say) and it would frequently get bogged down on fairly commonplace tasks. Really, Ubunutu’s features and available software compares quite favorably to XP, and I really haven’t had any cause, save for one work-related program, to ever boot the machine in XP. For all of its problems, I will admit that there are a few Vista features/programs that I prefer. For example, I am not yet 100% sold on OpenOffice 3.0 v. Microsoft Office 2007. I prefer both Word and PowerPoint to their OpenOffice counterparts, but the jury remains out, as I have yet to do any major projects since making the switch. I also have not yet been able to get my scanner to work in Ubunutu, nor one of my printers.
"In general, however, I have been quite impressed and would recommend anyone would is thinking about giving Linux a try to do so. If you have an older machine that seems to have gotten too sluggish, you might have revitalize it with a Linux install. Granted, it will depend on what you need your machine for, but if it is for web surfing, e-mail and office stuff (word processing, spreadsheets and the like) then you will lose no functionality. I will note that peripherals can be problematic. My HP printers at school (a laser and an inkjet all-in-one) worked without me doing anything, but my Brother all-in-one laser and my Epson photo printer at home have been a different story."
