A while back, on tv.... there was an advert showing some guy trying to flog his car to a young(ish) couple.... part of the "sales patter" was of him opening and shutting the door and saying..... "just like a Volkswagen"...
Well, this may seem a strange place to put that information, BUT... I have just spent a couple of hours installing all my favourite WINDOWS programs on a LINUX based O.S.
the O.S. is called ZORIN 9....
Download the .iso file and burn to a dvd.... you can run it from the dvd, but it won`t "save" any work you do.... You do need a "wired" connection to your router and the internet to get it installed...
The only issue I had with the initial "install" was that it did not include the wireless driver Broadcom b43.... so had to struggle to find how to get the wireless on my laptop recognised and working.... ( previous Linux experiences were dragged up from the back of my mind....... ) eventually, I did manage to get a wireless driver from somewhere which was the one for my laptop, and not the B43 jobby !...
I had my Windows hdd in a caddy, which had all my "downloads" in the download folder,....... once I had navigated it, and found them it was simply a matter of double clicking on the appropriate program download, and it "installed" just as if I was on a WINDOWS O.S. courtesy of the WINE ( windows emulator ) included with ZORIN.
Only two of my windows progs did not install, one of which was a photo editing program similar to Photoshop, that I rarely use... and the other was IRFANVIEW... ( my favourite editing program )..which is strange, as it worked with WINE on MINT15.... will have to try again on that one...
I don`t like the ZORIN "home page" and the version of Firefox, so I went back to my downloads on my WINDOWS O.S. hdd and installed Pale Moon... once installed, I did all the usual bits and pieces to make it the same as my current FIREFOX on WINDOWS... and all is well...
Took a while to work out how to get my "com port" working.. ( previous probs on MINT 15 with CWCOM ).... searched the PlusNet forum and found some info on there, and eventually got that working..
Taking the Wireless issue and the Com Port issue out of the time frame... I would say it took me about 1 hour from install to having a fully functional ( copy of my ) windows hdd working on LINUX....
There wasn`t time last night to use it to the full, so I don`t know whether I have (or have not) clicked something to show current open page tabs, open at the bottom of the screen, as in windows.... it`s a tad annoying to have to keep going back to the menu to get another bookmark or program page back again....
A final "gripe" , though not too much trouble, is that when you boot up on ZORIN... you need to press the "enter" key to actually "boot" into ZORIN...
All the above was done on a new HDD... and no drivers have been loaded for the Dell Inspiron Laptop that I am using.... ( except the wireless driver, as mentioned)...
Video`s play, and sound works too... I use GOM player, although there is a media player called "Rhythm Box" included in the ZORIN install.... ( Thunderbird Mail is also included ).
So, there you have it.... "Just like a Volkswagen Windows ........"
Oh... and another point.... it is FREE and so will the "newer" updated versions...... !
