Oh boy, let's see...

I don't know which Ubuntu you are talking about but the three machines that I run don't have any problems that they wouldn't have under (or because of) Vista. And I can maintain all three free of cost. ... Just because it doesn't fulfill your expectations doesn't mean it's not a good desktop. Windows doesn't fulfill mine ... so what do you say to that?

I ain't saying nothin'. It's the users the ones who are doin' the talkin'. Ubuntu is buggy. Period. The fact that Vista, or any Windows for that regard, might be buggy too, does not invalidate that perception.

Correction: It's a FREE Ferrari that outruns the MS Ferrari at many many occasions and you don't have to buy a special screwdriver for thousands of dollars to open the hood. What is KDE then? A Lamborghini in first gear? Same here, they do a lot of stuff but it has it's problems too.

Don't compare apples to oranges. Compare Ubuntu (a distro, or a complex of distros) to other distros: CentOS, PCLinuxOS, LinuxMint, Mandriva, OpenSUSE, Slackware... you get the idea.

I stand by my point. Putting a slow, buggy distro with a GNOME frontend = big mess. I've seen that before (summoning Red Hat Linux versions from the dead...).

You might get a decent implementation of GNOME on another distro, who knows... (Debian, perhaps?). You might also get a good, stable distro who also happens to be very fast (Vector Linux).

But these two damning factors (GNOME and a slow, buggy linux) are present in Ubuntu and this is a trend that is only going to get worse as far as I can see.

Having that handed out as a flagship Linux desktop is like having a Ferrari in first gear.

btw, want a decent Linux desktop and don't want to use KDE? Great, just use XFce, which is a great desktop too.

So, who is the fanboi here...? ;-)

Agreed in a 99%. My only nitpick is that depending on the user's level of technical wizardry, there might be a Linux desktop good enough for him.

That's a good clarification, and was sorely needed after the flames of some less enlightened Ubutu fanbois.

However, I'd like to point out that there are several problems with Kubuntu's implementation of KDE 4.x. You can also check this. Funny thing is, most of the problems people experience with Ubuntu are absent in other distros (e.g., in my box I use Slackware and I haven't seen those horror stories).

That's why I say that Ubuntu is buggy. Ubuntu's QA needs to be better, and the distro layout should be better (i.e., include Flash and Java out of the box, make things stable, and so on).

Ubuntu undoubtedly has potential; but there's something that's killing them. I don't know what it is, but it's making them do releases that are more and more unstable. In this way, they negate whatever advantage they could get. ("Linux? Oh yea, it came in my netbook but I wiped it clean, it never got my screen right and apps crashed every time!").

Let Microsoft go after Ubuntu. Because Ubuntu is slow, buggy, and not a good desktop.
Ubuntu is not the best GNU/Linux distribution. For starters, their quality assurance could be much better, and it is not economical in resource usage. Moreover, it was infected with the "Red Hat" disease of patching everything, introducing more, difficult to track and patch, bugs.

Worse yet, Ubuntu uses by default the GNOME Desktop. It's my personal preference, but I can't stand GNOME, period. It is so aggravating I can't even use it. A GNU/Linux desktop using GNOME is like using a Ferrari car only in first shift. Its vast potential is completely underused.

Therefore, my guess is that Ubuntu is in fact a low-hanging fruit. Let Microsoft go after Ubuntu; meanwhile... KDE will eat their lunch. 4.2 is just the harbinger of things to come and it's that terrific. Period.

That was my comment. I wasn't trolling; I was just expressing my point of view on the subject. How sad that some with mod points thought I was trolling -- obviously they cannot handle dissent.

So what? Windows became leader because it *was* the best desktop (at least, the one that offered the best value) at one time. It became the leader then, and since then, it has maintained that position aided by monopolistic practices. All this is commonplace.

And I say, it's better for them to distract their gaze on slow, buggy implementation of Linux while the best ones (say, LinuxMint, PCLinuxOS, gah... there are many of them) begin to steal MS's lunch.

Let Microsoft go after Ubuntu. Because Ubuntu is slow, buggy, and not a good desktop.

Ubuntu is not the best GNU/Linux distribution. For starters, their quality assurance could be much better, and it is not economical in resource usage. Moreover, it was infected with the "Red Hat" disease of patching everything, introducing more, difficult to track and patch, bugs.

Worse yet, Ubuntu uses by default the GNOME Desktop. It's my personal preference, but I can't stand GNOME, period. It is so aggravating I can't even use it. A GNU/Linux desktop using GNOME is like using a Ferrari car only in first shift. Its vast potential is completely underused.

Therefore, my guess is that Ubuntu is in fact a low-hanging fruit. Let Microsoft go after Ubuntu; meanwhile... KDE will eat their lunch. 4.2 is just the harbinger of things to come and it's that terrific. Period.

I know, I know, Reps are all for greedy corporations, but Dems are all for government intrusion in your life.

This was predictable. To all you who voted Dem, this serves you right.

In Eleventh Hour, the main character needed a T3 connection to perform online search on a patent. And the girl offered him to go to her dorm where she had Wi-Fi, "in case you need more privacy"... ouch.