I'm running Debian ETCH on my Efika.

The technical spec of my Efika are not much different than a typical AMD K6-2 or Celeron systems used to be a few years ago.
CPU: 400 Mhz
Memory: 128 MB

I somewhat surprised how Linux runs on my machine.
Switching from Gnome to Enlighment did improve the situation a bit but still I would not use this Linux system as my main computer.

Is Linux so much slower than e.g. Windows 98 ?
Or am I missing some settings to improve speed?

Could it be that Linux got bloated that much over the last years?

Help or insights are appreciated.

Cheers
Gunnar

Hi,

I run Slackintosh on my EFIKA. It runs well enough to be usable as my main computer. Gnome desktop is too heavy for the EFIKA. Slackintosh seems much faster than Ubuntu and Debian on my machine.

Gnome is bloated. And 128 MB RAM with a slow non-DMA ATA controller hurts alot.

The only usable Desktop Environment for Linux and EFIKA is XFCE4. It's alot faster than Gnome.

Linux is really slower than Windows. The reason for this is non-integral structure of a Linux system.

Can you explain "non-integral structure" in detail?

What can I do speed up my EFIKA Linux ?

Is there is simple way of installing an optimized EFIKA Linux version?

Cheers
Gunnar

I think he means it's not as tied together as something like MorphOS. You get something like Amiga or MorphOS where you can assume to be running a fairly strict desktop with fairly strict functionality; Workbench or Ambient or DOpus (which both emulate Workbench) and a specific 3D library, and a specific this and that, which interoperate very well.

On Linux you have GNOME and KDE, and a bunch of others which run over abstractions and ioctls and sockets and ports, message passing, if they interoperate at all (some desktops don't support half of the Freedesktop specs).

_________________
Matt Sealey

Even XFCE does not make me very happy :(

Would like to give Slackintosh a try.

Fingers crossed, hopefully -actually, no doubt- the arrival of MorphOS 2.0 will make Efika users VERY happy as far as speed is concerned :)

Hi all.

Try Fluxbox (maybe with iDesk) or ROX. Works great on the EFIKA.
Gnome, KDE and even XFCE are just not designed for the specs the EFIKA is running. And it makes sense - the EFIKA is an embedded device, not a desktop computer.

That said, it works well as a 'kind of' desktop computer. Add a screen like with the portable (portable.powerdeveloper.org) and you have a great system you can run 24/7 to quickly check email after coming home from work, browse the web to check the latest news and write a quick note using Abiword, without having to start your main PC or unpack your Laptop.
And that could be integrated with the audio installation to play your favorite internet radio channel while having dinner.


Best regards,
Johan

_________________
Johan Dams, Genesi USA Inc.
Director, Software Engineering

Yep, I have a blog... PurpleAlienPlanet

I really think at an optimized PPC/Efika Linux is the way to go.

I think it will benefit all people.

Looking at myself as example: I'm a very heavy computer user.
I work with the PC at work and after work, alltogether much more than 70 hours each week.

But frankly the majority of my work is:
- reading email
- accessing the internet (webbrowser)
- accessing other computers over SSH
- and at home I often listen to MP3 on the computer.

So actually I could do all of my computer work with an EFIKA.

I think what we need a fast and fool proove way to get an tuned EFIKA system installed.

Will Genesi/Bplan work on this?

Cheers
Gunnar

Gunnar:

http://bbrv.blogspot.com/2007/08/efikalinux.html


Best regards,
Johan

_________________
Johan Dams, Genesi USA Inc.
Director, Software Engineering

Yep, I have a blog... PurpleAlienPlanet

What do you guys think of GoboLinux? :)

_________________
Matt Sealey

:( sorry, but it seems rubish !

I would really prefer something based on good and standard distrib like Debian or Ubuntu like the "efikalinux" idea.

Please no only-genesi-non-standard thing again like the Efika board's size or I won't use the damn-thing at all !

I have not tried this distro.
But the "every apps in its own folder" idea sounds intuitive to me.

I have to admit what I really like about Mac OS,
I mean besides beeing well designed, user friendly, intuitive etc, is that you can copy apps by copying their folder/icon.
"drag app xyz from HD to USB stick, go with USB stick to friend, click on app icon on USB stick -- voila"

There are exceptions but in general this is a real neat feature.


But in the end, I fell its not that important what distro you guys chooce for the EFIKA/PEG.

I'm sure it will be a big win if you big one default distro!
And it will help developer especially developer working on commercial non opensource software. Please pick one supported default distro - this will help the developer to test and validate their apps again the choosen GenesiOS.


Cheers
Gunnar

If you have a spare PC or something with VMware on it, please do... I'd like some more opinions on it.

Personally I'm loving it but it's a little ways from a Power Architecture port right now.. not that far, though :)

_________________
Matt Sealey