Fedora Core 6 - Configuration a Breeze

So I finally found out what was causing all the headaches with my Fedora Core 6 install; it had installed the wrong kernel. Not a big mistake, like installing the wrong architecture or whatever, but a small error. Small enough to make it almost work. It put the xen kernel on the system - this is designed for virtual machine environments. It had also put the real kernel on too, except that it had instructed Grub (the boot loader) to install this as the default. Easy fix, rpm quickly removed the xen kernel and now the system is fine.

All the changes I'd made to the wireless config were backed out. I'd used the firmware cutter to get the firmware out of the windows drivers, and dropped that in the right place. wpa_supplicant was a particularly straightforward config, and I took a look through the newest xorg.config - it doesn't even define my monitor, let alone set flags for it; it just doesn't need them.

I checked the nvidia driver version installed from Livna, and it was new enough, so I turned on the desktop effects. Wow. I have fluid menus and tool tips, and everything takes on a more natural feel.

Applications went on by the dozen, I popped up kyum and pulled in dvd support (mplayer/kplayer), dvb-tv support (kaffeine & xine), mp3 support (a wide range of apps - really) and it all just works. I must admit that I've not even missed Windows on this laptop for one moment. There is nothing I use that doesn't work. Kaffeine is better at playing dvb-television than its windows counterpart that came with the card, I didn't have to type in an extraordinarily long license key for a windows dvd player, and I've got Cedega installed so I can play windows games. Or, at least I could if my video hardware was detected correctly. It seems to think I've got half the video memory I should have (I've got Geforce Go 64MB chipset - but it tells me it's only a 32MB version, and its interfering with the ability of openGL to function).

So everything isn't quite smooth yet, but it's a very long way along the line. This is the first release of Linux I've ever used where the interface seems better than Windows rather than just keeping up with it. There seems to be quite a bit of new stuff gone into this Fedora release, and I'm pretty impressed. I hope the coming RedHat EL5 which is supposed to be based on FC6 is this good.