A whole new world.

I'm sorry, but it is a technology ramble from me today.  

I recently built a new PC with a considerably newer and more powerful graphics card.  The entire PC has more of everything, faster cores, more cores, more ram, solid state HD, etc. etc.  The one thing it doesn't have is MS Windows.  Since I was trying to do power on a budget, this is a good thing, I could spend more on hardware and nothing on the OS.  MS Windows as we all know is most definitely not free.

I've been dabbling with Linux for home use for several years now.  And I've found that since I don't play PC games much, the only things that really kept me "bound" to the Windows band wagon were Netflix and an old copy of Paint Shop Pro from Jasc software that I just loved to use for editing graphics files.  Firefox & Chrome, Office and solitaire are the programs I otherwise use the most.  And they come free for, or often included with, most distributions of Linux.

Well, I can watch Netflix other ways now, though I still haven't found a way to do so in Linux that works for me.  And I've committed myself to learning to use GIMP a powerful free graphic program.  With my issues addressed I have only installed Linux as the OS.  But, like JayR, I am trying out multiple viewers in different distributions.


I have Linux Mint 14 xfce 64 bit, running Singularity 64 bit.  Everything installed relatively easily.  And I am able to run SL at maximum graphics settings at about 19fps.  Not a great frame rate, but smooth enough for my purposes.  It seems fairly stable, and I must say that Singularity seems to be the best mix of the new and the old I've tried.  The interface looks close enough to Phoenix that I don't notice any differences.  But at the same time, it seems to handle multiple tattoo and alpha layers, add, etc.  There is one new control that is much like the Firestorm easy pop up slider, though it lacks the Z-axis adjustment, so you still have to go into preferences to change that just like in Phoenix.

I have also installed Ubuntu 12.04 LTS 32 bit (I tried the 12.10 install but something in updates made it bork and I haven't quite figured out how to fix that yet.)  This time I stuck with 32 bit because as far as I can tell Firestorm does not have a 64 bit version yet, and rather than kludge things up with a 64 bit OS running 32 bit compatibility stuff, I just stuck with 32 bits.  Yes I know it's like running a sports car with a economy car engine, but as it turns out, for my principal concern, it doesn't seem to matter that much.  Even though both Mint and Ubuntu are running proprietary graphics drivers, the frame rate I get in Ubuntu at Ultra graphics setting is essentially the same.  And so far, while Singularity/Mint 64 has crashed on me twice, Firestorm/Ubuntu 32 has not!

So, that's why it's a whole new world for me.  New viewers, new OS, and now I'm running SL at Ultra.  And while going up that one notch did not make  huge difference, I am seeing things I did not see before, or seeing things I saw before in new ways.

Here's to hoping we all continue to enjoy all our lives.