Re:'04 is not the Year of the Desktop for Joe Sixp (Score 3, Interesting)

... because many important peripherals do not work by default. For example, getting 802.11x is still a pita in linux unless you plan ahead by making certain that your hardware works with it.

Amazingly enough, on my Dell Latitude C610, I have given up - after hours of effort - on ever getting my built-in Orinoco wireless to work under Win XP or Win 2K. It is a dual boot system, and in Linux it was a piece of cake, but even with Dell support files, flashing the bios, everything I could throw at it, it just doesn't work. Of course, it is an end-of-life item, so no support from the actual manufacturer.

While troubleshooting before installing Linux on the laptop, I noted that Knoppix auto-configured the wireless properly. So, I knew it worked, which led to the endless fruitless attempts to get it functioning in Windows.

Even more interesting to me was that when I was searching for tips on getting it working under Windows, I found 10 helpful Linux links to every 1 helpful Windows link. That's the kind of support that Windows can only dream of, and it believe it shows the strong future of Linux and of free software in general.