Mandriva Linux 2007 PowerPack Edition review

[Valour]

Though delayed for a while and later to market than most Mandriva fans would probably prefer, the new Mandriva Linux 2007 PowerPack Edition is finally here, nearly a year after the previous release. 2007 is typical Mandriva through and through: attractively themed in KDE, easy to install without skipping the technical details, a little bug-ridden here and there, and full of new and interesting software technologies. This release does have its own identity, though; not only has the standard theme been redesigned for the first time in several years, but this is the first Mandriva release to include a "legal" DVD movie player.

Mandriva Linux 2007 PowerPack Edition review

[Dark_Schneider]

• About The AIGLX/XGL stuff
  To use AIGLX, you need the GLX_EXT_texture_from_pixmap extension support in the drivers. At present only the free Intel and radeon/ati drivers have this extensions. So you can use AIGLX only on computers with theses chipsets. Please note that the free ati driver ( r300 ) doesn't support latest ATI graphics cards and is sometimes unstable.
  GLX_EXT_texture_from_pixmap will be supported in the next nvidia drivers 9x.
  How XGL/AIGLX work : http://principe.homelinux.net/
  More info about AIGLX : http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/RenderingProject/aiglx
  
  So it's normal that the system only propose XGL for nvidia and ATI when using the proprietary drivers.
  
  
• About the window decoration when using XGL/AIGLX
  At present to have 3D desktop, you need a special application named a compositor. This program is Compiz ( http://en.opensuse.org/Compiz ).
  Compiz allow the different 3D effects but unfortunately replace also the desktop Window Manager ( kwin for KDE, metacity for Gnome ) by its own Window manager named "gnome-window-decorator". That's why you loose the Ia Ora title bar when using 3D desktop. The compiz window manager doesn't use kde/gnome theme but it's own theme. A project known as compiz-quinnstorm/Beryl is developping another Compiz implementation with a Window manager that support themes.
  
  So it's "normal" when you don't have the Ia Ora title bar when using 3D desktop.
  
  Unfortunately 3D desktop ( especially XGL ) doesn't play well with video output and others stuff. XGL also disable direct rendering.
  http://qa.mandriva.com/twiki/bin/vie...ktop_AIGLX_Xgl
  
  The solution in the future will be AIGLX+Glucose : http://lists.freedesktop.org/archive...st/017527.html
  
  
• About updates issues
  Your updates issues where due to the fact that FTP mirrors where in bad state and so a complete re-sync has been initiated and it takes severals days to have all mirrors correct.
  see my blog about this : http://www.linux-wizard.net/index.php?id_blog=90
  
  So that's why the tool didn't work at the end of the installation, most mirrors where just ... empty.
  
  To use the applet in the systray, you need to register : https://www.mandrivaonline.com/page.php
  This applet allow to have notifications and manages your updates for your different computers from a web interface.
  However you can still updates your computer with MandrivaUpdate.
  
  Concerning opera, it should be available on the DVD. Opera is also available from the MandrivaClub.
  
  
• LinDVD playback stop
  The linDVd playback issue is due to the wrong location of the licence.
  For further information ( and how to fix it ), see : http://qa.mandriva.com/twiki/bin/vie...7Errata#LinDVD

[Valour]

How are those "corrections?" I said most of that in the review. Did you read it?

[Dark_Schneider]

Sorry for the late reply.

Why do I talk about AIGLX/XGL and the condition to have AIGLX ? it's because of this sentence :

I tried Mandriva 2007 with three video cards: an ATI Radeon X700, ATI FireGL V5200, Nvidia GeForce 7300GS, and an Nvidia Quadro FX 3000. None of them qualified for AIGLX according to Drakconf. The ATI cards couldn't even use XGL, let alone AIGLX. Since that is as diverse a range of quasi-modern ATI and Nvidia cards as you can get, I have to wonder exactly what conditions must be met to run AIGLX.

This was just my answer.

I talk about compiz window decoration just for information in case you didn't knew the underhood.

I talk also about the updates issue to explain that normally it works when mirrors are corrects

that's all.

BTW thank for the great review and good work

[linuxn00b]

hey has that been fixed? I remember installing mandriva and then not being able to download the updates once i signed up. at first I thought it was a paid subscription thing but a friend of mine who bought mandriva 2007 said that he was not able to download updates.

are they all fixed?

[Valour]

Originally Posted by linuxn00b

hey has that been fixed? I remember installing mandriva and then not being able to download the updates once i signed up. at first I thought it was a paid subscription thing but a friend of mine who bought mandriva 2007 said that he was not able to download updates.

are they all fixed?

It's fixed, yes. Updates are free, but if you want the automatic update notification applet to work, you have to have either a Club subscription or a Mandriva Online subscription. In other words, you have to check for updates manually by going to the Mandriva Control Center and clicking the Look for updates button.

[Emrys]

I filed a bugzilla report for what looks like the same DVD bug you mention in the article. The url is:
http://qa.mandriva.com/show_bug.cgi?id=26537

I don't think this problem is specific to a brand/model of DVD-ROM device, it seems to be a "protocol" problem. It just gives the wrong address for accessing a DVD.

I filed this thing a month ago and they seem to be ignoring it (or maybe there's a bug in bugzilla that causes them to not notice it!).

Joe

[Valour]

Originally Posted by Emrys

I filed a bugzilla report for what looks like the same DVD bug you mention in the article. The url is:
http://qa.mandriva.com/show_bug.cgi?id=26537

I don't think this problem is specific to a brand/model of DVD-ROM device, it seems to be a "protocol" problem. It just gives the wrong address for accessing a DVD.

I filed this thing a month ago and they seem to be ignoring it (or maybe there's a bug in bugzilla that causes them to not notice it!).

Joe

I tried to file a bug report about it last month, but Bugzilla seriously did have a bug in it that prevented the report from going through. I tried to report that to the Mandriva Bugzilla maintainer, but I never heard back.

I only had problems with that one DVD drive. Four others worked perfectly, and that one more or less never worked. Perhaps, though, it was actually an IDE controller issue, because I didn't try any other DVD drives in that machine.

[Emrys]

Originally Posted by Valour

I tried to file a bug report about it last month, but Bugzilla seriously did have a bug in it that prevented the report from going through. I tried to report that to the Mandriva Bugzilla maintainer, but I never heard back.

I only had problems with that one DVD drive. Four others worked perfectly, and that one more or less never worked. Perhaps, though, it was actually an IDE controller issue, because I didn't try any other DVD drives in that machine.

I only had one machine to test this on. LinDVD worked and played a movie (I only played a couple of minutes, so I never noticed the ten-minute shut-off). It just brought up the wrong URL (through that "service" thing the distros seem to be going to) when I insert a data DVD. If I can find out where they put that file (probably /etc/somethingorother) I could do a manual patch and make the DVD work properly. That, at least, shouldn't be a big problem for Mandriva to fix. A bigger one is that online update during installation that I've never been able to use for any version of Mandrake/Mandriva.

I'm gonna see if I can get them to do something about bugzilla. I suspect they're not getting bug reports at all. They haven't even assigned mine after a full month.

Joe