On Wed, 30 Nov 2005 13:17:56 -0500 Matt Price <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> Hi folks, > > as a result of various events, I have an extra laptop and no cd > player, so I would like to convert the laptop into a stereo > component. It's an HP Omnibook 4100, PII MMX 266, with 96 megs RAM, a > pretty big hard drive (30 megs) and a CD-ROM (no DVD). I'm trying to > figure out which audio player to use and, more generally, how to > configure the interface for maximum efficiency and ease of use by my > (non-technical) family members. > > Here's a few considerations: > > KERNEL: > I want to support my PCMCIA wireless card, the suspend2 kernel patches > from suspend2.net, and hopefully ACPI, so I think I will go with a > recent 2.6 kernel and udev. I know this is a significant strain on > the limited CPU/RAM resources, but I hope it's not fatal. > > GUI: > When I had a little more RAM in this machine I used XFCE4, but I'm > wondering if I should switch to something even more stripped down. > Because security is of limited importance now (I'd want anyone to be > able to just start the thing up) I would also be interested in > dropping WDM and just starting X directly (I used to do that at one > point; don't really remember how, but am sure I can dredge it back > up). My only requirements are that it be pretty to look at and > relatively intuitive for a Windows user (so, window behaviour should > be pretty similar to 'doze). > > PLAYER: > The idea would be to play mp3's and cd's off of this thing. > > My family hates using xmms; they find it hard to look at and a little > disconcerting, I think mostly because ofthe multiple windows. Also > there's no built-in playlist manager, which confuses them. > > I've lately taken to using Amarok on my desktop, which I find a pretty > satisfying experience (though occacionally buggy, e.g. crashes when it > encounters a radio stream it doesn't like). But I hesitate to install > something that depends so heavily on the kde environment to work. > Haven't used Rhythmbox for a while, but it used to crash on my all the > time when I did use it. BMP is easier to look at than xmms is, but it > still doesn't have a playlist manager (far as I can tell). [by > playlist manager I mean a usable GUI that lets you choose among > playlist you've created. Not sure this is the right term...] > > So none of the options with which I'm familiar seem perfect. Does > anyone have any suggestions? Like, can amarok work without loading > hundreds of megs of kde/qt stuff into memory? Is there a playlist > manager plugin for bmp? > > It would be great if all of this worked well enough for a 10-year-old > to be able to use it. > > SOUND DAEMON: > I'm used to using esd , seems to work ifne, thought I'd stick with it > unless there are other suggestions... > > Thanks much fory our help! > > Matt Hi Matt Maybe it is wise to see what a normal desktop install of Debian 3.1 (Sarge) or Ubuntu 5.10 can do for you. I think it meets your requirements. On a side note: Totem is my favourite media player, but that is of course just an opinion. Linux can be tweaked and fine tuned to your desires, it is just a matter of doing it. For example suspend; downloading one of the latest kernel (e.g. http://www.kernel.org/pub/linux/kernel/v2.6/linux-2.6.13.4.tar.bz2 ) and the acpi patch (e.g. http://ftp.kernel.org/pub/linux/kernel/people/lenb/acpi/patches/release/2.6.13/acpi-20050902-2.6.13.diff.bz2 ) did the job on for me; that is suspend to memory and disk using acpi :) (forget apm in such case) Rob de Graaf -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
