Recently I was given 15 circa 2001 Compaq iPaq desktop computers. The
specs are PIII/733, 256MB, 10GB, CD or DVD. Integrated 10BaseT, video,
etc. I decided that I would use them to try out several different
OSes so I could compare them side by side.

XP? No problem.
Win 2K3? No problem.

Ubuntu 7.1? Install went smoothly. Wait a second, how come my screen
choices only go as high as 800x600? XP is running at 1024x768 so I
*know* the card supports that resolution. I start doing a little
research and find out that I have the i810 chipset and out of the box
Linux won't support this. Hmm, why not? Windows does. I go find the
necessary files to add the driver to my OS. I open up nano and
edit .config files as instructed. No joy. Even after a reboot I
still can't go higher than 800x600. F*ck it.

A couple weeks later read about Fedora 8. I think "Maybe, being more
polished RH will support the i810." I go through the install. Nope,
I still can't go higher than 800x600. I open up google and search for
i810 Fedora and find the name of an RPM I'm supposed to install. I
get it and open it and it tells me a dependency failed. Ok, I go get
that rpm and that one tells me a dependency failed. I go get that
one, and I when I run it it tells me that a dependency failed. I go
try to find that one (libcrypto.so.7) and it doesn't exist!
http://rpmfind.net/linux/rpm2html/se...libcrypto.so.7
(Okay, I know where to get it but a search engine should be a little
smarter.)

At least gentoo knows how to get additional dependencies. I'll pop in
my 2007 Live CD tonight.

I've been using Linux since Slackware .99b14 (you haven't lived until
you download 26 1.44 MB floppy images at 2400 baud) so I am far from
incompetent, I just wanted to see how ready for prime time various
distros of Linux are at this point. I realize I may be being a little
critical but my goal was to see how far I could get before I ran into
major hurdles. I am sad to say "not very long." "People" expect
their computers to just work. This clearly doesn't.

I have yet to go the BSD route on one. We'll see how these go.