28 August 2013

Openlinux 13.07 kde 64 bit review :Take the New kde 4.11 to ride with efficient , fast spin and solid performance .

Today I was not so much interested to review the openlinux 13.07 kde completely  as just want to  peep about what actually kde 4.11 is all about ,so just made a  live usb  of the iso which I downloaded from their openlinux site which is around more than 1.5 gb .

Truly speaking I was not actually impressed what openlinux kde came up with their first kde spin of ubuntu ie just before 13.07 version as when I used just  felt that it was just another kubuntu remastered only icons changed up and brand but all applications were like simply kubuntu 12.04 LTS .

But my impression changed with it after using openlinux 13.o7 version they have now added some stuffy software so their distro can be called as good alternative to kubuntu . when I actually fired my laptop with it and just begin to install the openlinux and the installation is same as about  another ubuntu clan .so not to tell more about the famous kubuntu installer you can just look at kubuntu or Netrunner os which I just reviewed earlier for detailed installation process .Its just same as age old kubuntu you are asked things like your language preferences , keyboard preferences ,time-zone and other things like  user Id and root password and your home folder encryption and login automatically by user or by password all this various boxy-stuff you have to make up .For me the installation took around 10 minutes along with third party codecs .

For installer procedure head on to Netrunner review page .

One thing now I dont like that of kubuntu installer is that its default to the country origin , really considered as a stupid stuff let the installer man choose where and what actually he want to put the location where he/she  resides that would be more professional .Also the slides show of installation procedure like kubuntu was cut offed only plain installer for openlinux may be they have not developed slides according to their brand is missing , what effect does it have on public its hardly to tell .




APPLICATIONS.

OS4 OpenLinux 13.7 KDE has all the stuff you needed in daily life.

****Office: Ktimetracker ,LibreOffice 4.1.0.4  (Math, Calc, Impress, Draw, & Writer) , Okular document viewer .

****Internet: Chromium,Thunderbird 17 , KPPP, BlueDevil, Kopete IM,  Quassel IRC ,Google voice .

****Graphics: Acquireimages, GIMP 2.8.4, GWenview, Hugin Batch Processor, Hugin Callibrate Lens, DigiKam, DNG Image Converter, ExpoBlending, Photo layout editor  ,Hugin Panorama Creator,Ksnapsot, Panorama .

****Multimedia: Amarok player, Openshot video editor ,Amz Downloader,  Dragon Player, K3b, Audacity, Audio Recorder .

****Accessories and other stuff : Ark,  Kmag, Krusader file manager,synaptiks, Konsole, Neopmuk cleaner ,GDebi package installer , Kvkbd virtual keyboard, backup, Kate, calc, Klipper,SuperKaramba desktop widgets, startup disk creator,  Remastersys.


Now lets move to what new stuff I found out in this edition compared to kubuntu LTS edition instead of rekonq/firefox  as default browser here chromium browser used so actually its good as one of the most widely used browser chrome is present as I dont care about rekonq at all . You can install firefox from default repos , so to install it started searching software centre but oh my god it doesn't feature any ubuntu like software centre but your so called synaptic package manager  will be a friendly friend of you if you need any Gui installer otherwise be ok with it or use konsole to add software stuff. Now after starting up the youtube its played the video very well as flash is pre-installed in chromium browsers but if you want youtube to play in firefox you have to install flash player .

In terms of aesthetic appearance nothing well sort up or eye-catching , even their boot up gui screen didn't impress me feels like a comet moving in the sky but its was very thin so visibility is too poor so gui screen was a total failure and wallpaper according to brand was just normal and simple displaying logo as we see in mirror .So nothing impressive there but ok for normal use as its kde bunny you can customize to your choice as you can make various foods from single stuff in a different manner .But one thing surely kde is famous for aesthetic but this spin deeply taken the word aesthetic here and it could be said just it will do, ok after-all .But one thing is surely appreciated the screen to go from boot splash to kde screen and from other to it vice-versa very proficiently very fast and smooth it should be as its LTS.

Also default desktop was almost bare then I was able to search widgets like cpu monitor , network monitor etc. all of the thing I could easily found out .Now freshly booted system  took around about 390 mb of system memory which I would be saying just normal as since its  kde based distro but one thing sure as compared to kubuntu 12.04 its less whereas used to get around 680 mb of system memory in monitoring screen so its naturally less but one thing to tell you that I had not tested it with recent kde 4.11 so it wouldn't be fair to compare it .

Now one thing to tell you that its based on kubuntu 12.04 lts version  so its the last version of it which will be maintained by canonical and afterward Bluesystems will be the king of the distrubution .Afterall this distro is based on LTS so see this how good it plays on my system it should be solid rock solid distro .The kick off menu and the classical launcher were fast and easy to navigate in the distro as the distro is just plain kde distro offering blazing speed .But now naturally keys like ctrl+f11 worked fined and I was able to take cube snapshots easily .Also other keys on my laptop for brightness and volume worked out-of-box .

Also a surprise of one element like Google maps can be seen  here it will make users happy as its best navigator on the planet in terms of apps .So it will bring a smile on kde users. But things to note I didnt find a stuff like Fogger in the  default pre-installed apps which can be found in their xfce spin  but you can very well installed from it default repos.They also come up with google voice apps so you can call someone from your desktop , I will call it good web app to be must for every distros .Now it comes with kopete as instant messenger client and kppp as internet dial up tool .Also it boost with up to date Thunderbird 17 client good for desktop messaging client as many user just prefer .

Afterall anyone is bored of reading a long review with not more images then you can simply keep patience and play kpatience if you like card games and itf the game doesnt add your choice simply download steam and play some 3d games but remember you will need 3d graphic card for all your game enjoyment otherwise be satisfied with 2d games .Apart from that typically it supports OpenGl 3.0 as much as OpenGl 2.0



The office productivity section is good as you get libreoffice 4.1.0.4 version which is almost latest and since its based on 4th version its themes are also customizable . For more information head on to its site 
I found libre office very smooth to use and no crash while working stuff on it .Also one thing surprised me as torrent client was not installed by default but I installed it from repos .Default document viewer and e book reader which can be used for good desktop productivity for viewing desktop and reading other books .

Dolphin version 4.11 has overall recieved a quite good uplift of icons and its played my mp3 audios well with default music player amarok and mp4 videos with dragon player as default , by the way single click is enabled by default .but if you want you can change in default setting to double click to open folder stuff .  so overall fastness of dolphin response has increased and it was just nice to enjoy it . Als dolphin is named according to kde 4.11 instead of usual Dolpin 2.1 /2.3 etc   . Here one thing to note amarok also comes with amazon integration but sad thing is that work only in restricted countries so just feeling like second class citizen don't like it otherwise simply change the player head onto clementine light and good alternative which you have to install from synaptic 0.75.9 which semes to be fast for software repo installer  .Also you get audacity for sound editor system .It comes with k3b record most used dvd burner on linux system and other tools to be used for it .It also posses open-shot editor one of the best movie editor available in open source ware .Here record my desktop by which you can record your desktop activity through video and proper sound activity system.

skype was not available in default repos only pidgin plugin available but to install it head on to default site download it so you can use it .So it installed skype package using Gdebi package manager fine without any issue .Also I didnt found any changes in kde settings manager which is almost same as previous kde . So all the integrated stuff for customizing you get at one place which is actually good for user and novice user will found it friendly like windows . Also you found Deja dup and remastersys are a handy tool for back up and restoring the system if something went wrong .

Hardware recognition is as good as past one wireless , bluetooth , touchpad . sound and graphic card etc worked fine ,I was able to connect to my wireless stuff efficiently .The repositories consist of default ubuntu ppa and os4 maintained stuff and backports from kubuntu kde 4.11 repos . Performance wise it very fast and efficient .Also update from default repos was seemingly fast and way better than kde 4.10 openlinux .

The performance of battery was good as I got around 3 hrs back up while in windows 7 normally gets around 3 and half  hrs . Notable to its size has good number of application and it doesn't make distro cubmersome . Now also the system update went cool and it remains performed well for a long time . It still uses grub 1.99 while most distros has moved on to grub 2  . Start up disk creator will help you to make live usb of operating system. Something was really confusing as Fs -UAE launcher whats the key for using and to come up from default system will be tough for novice users .

Graphics section is quite rich in section has Digikam 3.3.0 which is mostly used for raw image for negatives and has ability to edit Exif Metadata with different stuff management like aperture , device branded model , shutter speed , focal length and much more to scan various images .Even face -detection and recognition works fine over here . As Gimp is not there but most retouching software not present but Inkscape and krita fills the gap .  Panorama is the one of the best photo-stitching tools present for stitch for combining image into one stuffed panoramatic image. Now also it consist of hugin batch processor which creates one project from multiple one and stitch of processing tools parallely .Also photo layout editor can be useful to manage and edit layers of photos .

Other screenshot here


SPECIFIC POINTS

Aesthetic : - 0+1
Performance :- 1
Hardware (bluetooth/touchpad/wifi/lan ):- 1+1+1+1
Applications(internet/office/games/multimedia/other) :- 0+1+0+1+1
cpu :- 1
Extra-software :-0+1
ram at boot up( less than 500mb/more than 500 mb) :-1+0
boot up time :-1+1
kernel ( old/recent):- 1+0
Install time (less than 15 min / more than 15m) :- 1+1
Install size (less than 5gb/ more than 5gb) :- 1+1
Package manager (gui/non-gui):-1+0
Easy of use :-1
flash :-1

Overall :- 21/30


Time to conclusion 

Speaking of my review everything just worked well also the system was robust but still the system has kernel 3.2 generic as soon we will get to see kernel updates as we got in kubuntu but I didn't found in default  synaptic kde repos . Aesthetically not beautiful but performs very fast but didn't see good laptop battery configuration stuff which is by default present in opensuse 12.3 kde . wireless worked fine so usual on my Dell Inspiron laptop .I didn't see any kernel panic also desktop seems clean and beautiful .Also functionally everything works well as expected. honestly,  speaking kde 4.11 seems to be more faster than ever any kde you have used .Taking to note one of the best kde you should surely try and spin it the way you want and download version  here .






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