Review: DreamLinux 2.2 Multimedia GL Edition

Ever have one of those dreams where everything seems to be going unnaturally well, and then all of the sudden, you wake up and you're late for work? Sure you have. DreamLinux, at least in my experience, was sort of like that, minus the work part (metaphorically, of course). It's a great distribution, with some great features, but it feels cheaply made.
First off, the obligatory background info. DreamLinux is a Brazilian distribution aimed at multimedia enthusiasts and former Mac OS users. Why OS X users? That's what it looks like. It sports a custom theme and Engage, a launcher from the Enlightenment project that looks and feels almost exactly like OS X's Dock.
DreamLinux is supposed to be an installed system, but it can easily be used as a live CD. It includes MkDistro, a tools for remastering the CD on-the-fly, a la SLAX. It can best be thought of as a cross between Knoppix (the behind-the-scenes underpinnings), dyne:bolic (multimedia app set), and SLAX (remasterability). Although a GNOME desktop would seem like the best choice for an OS X look-alike, DreamLinux uses XFCE, a lighter-weight choice with a smaller memory footprint.
However, if you don't like remastering your CD every day, DreamLinux does come with an install option. And what an option it is! DreamLinux is the first distro I've seen to use a one-screen installer rather than a wizard. Sections of the screen ask for a root password, user setup, partition layout, and GRUB preparation, and at the bottom is an "Install" button.
After the install, I tried out some of the programs. Included were Blender, a 3D modelling program, IceWeasel, a completely open-source version of Firefox included with Debian Etch, The GIMP, the ever-capable image-tweaker, Audacity, a powerful audio editor, Kino, a FOSS digital video editor (GASP!), and GTKPod, an iPod managing app. Blender, Gimp, and Audacity worked perfectly (and in Audacity, sound is normally a huge issue). GTKPod failed to recognize my 2nd-generation iPod Shuffle, but at least it's there.
There were, as I remarked earlier, some issues. My native 1280x800 screen resolution wasn't detected (but hey, not every distro comes with 915resolution installed), and reconfiguring the X server didn't help. My Intel PRO/Wireless 3945 card wasn't detected either. Installing firmware-ipw3945 didn't solve this problem. I understood the instructions to turn on Beryl, but they didn't work. (Maybe it was just my graphics chip...) And the forums were of limited use. The language gap between the Portugese-speaking Brazilians and English users was pretty huge.
I can't recommend DreamLinux to the average user, but only because the average user couldn't care less about multimedia production. DreamLinux is a great distro, with a rock-solid Debian base and a great app selection.
Behold, my new rating system! Artwork and Community are now worth half a point each in the final score.
Friendliness: 3.5/5- Wizards are everywhere. Except the installer, of course.
Performance: 4.5/5- Debian is fast. XFCE is fast. DreamLinux is REALLY fast.
Features: 4.5/5- If you're into multimedia editing, make yourself at home.
Packaging: 4.5/5- Synaptic. What more is there to say?
Artwork: 2.5/2.5- I've always liked OS X's artwork.
Community: 1/2.5- Yeah. It's that bad.
Overall: 4.1/5- If you need a fast, solid, good-looking system, try DreamLinux.
Next reviews: Elive 1.0 "Gem" and Wolvix 1.1.0-rc2 "Hunter" edition. You might recall Wolvix... Well, they're up to the second release candidate towards v1.1. I'll go over how far they've come eventually.
From DreamLinux 2.2,
The DistRogue.

Full-length review: Ubuntu, Xubuntu and Ubuntu Studio 7.04, and dyne:bolic 2.4.2

Well, the promised uber-review is finally here. With the release of Ubuntu 7.04 (aka "Feisty Fawn"), a new fork of Ubuntu, named "Ubuntu Studio", was released, to go along with Kubuntu ("LinuKs for KHumans", released with 5.04), Edubuntu ("Linux for Young Humans", 5.10), and Xubuntu ("Linux for Gamers and Humans with Old Hardware", 6.06 LTS). It focuses on content creation, containing numerous tools for audio, video, and picture manipulation and creation. Of course, there are numerous other unofficial forks, not to mention ideas (both serious and non-serious). There's an Ubuntu fork for everyone!
Armed with a working wireless connection, I decided to put Ubuntu, Xubuntu, and Ubuntu Studio through their paces, and compare Ubuntu Studio (aka "Ubustu") with dyne:bolic, a rival content-creation OS.

== Ubuntu and Xubuntu ==

For starters, I repartitioned the disk setup that came with my new laptop and installed Xubuntu over it. Since Ubuntu was installed already, that might seem like a dumb move. Well, I needed to repartition the disk so that the computer had a 40GB shared /home partition (need somewhere to store my music collection...) and various other partitions for other OSes. A 2-gig swap partition seemed like a good idea at the time, but proved invaluable while gaming. (Nexuiz needs at least 512MB of RAM to itself, nothing a simple "sudo swapon /dev/sda5" can't fix.)
Also, I had a taste of the new installer. Other than completely redesigning the partitioner, the major change is the new "Settings Migration Wizard", which swipes settings and documents (!) from other OSes (like Windows) and changes them so that they'll work on your newly-installed system. Oddly enough, my Ubuntu partition didn't show up on the wizard, even though it did on other test systems...
I then installed Automatix and used it to get some codecs, media players, and other things. Automatix is frowned upon by the Ubuntu officials, but it's an easy way to get a working system in minutes. I also added some games- from penguin classics like TuxKart and PPRacer to full-blown shooters like Tremulous and Nexuiz. All with a few apt-gets and a lot of patience- the local ISP was having issues (is a ping of 1500 to Google normal for a DSL user?)
Performance (as always) was a huge problem. Compiz and Beryl (as of Feisty, Compiz is installed by default) ran flawlessly (okay, nearly flawlessly...), but because of crappy on-chip 3D acceleration (and bad drivers from Intel), I scored less than 25FPS in ThinkTanks, a record low, and Nexuiz was barely playable with all the effects turned off. (With the defaults, it was pretty choppy...) Sauerbraten refused to run, and I'm not the only one having this issue- it looks like something's up with Intel chips. BZFlag was just barely playable online with a ton of effects disabled and 800x600 resolution, but in solo, it worked great with the defaults. At least SuperTux Mi1.9 worked, and Tremulous cranked out 60+FPS... (And the problem isn't my hardware. BZFlag worked fine with Sabayon.)
Ubuntu did have some other perks. A new disk-usage analyzer not only looks cooler, but makes it easier to find files and folders that take up disk space. A restricted-drivers manager allows unsupported drivers to be turned on and off. A simpler networking manager allowed for 2-click wireless connectivity from a blank desktop. A codec installer takes care of a longtime complaint of Ubuntu users- easy access to commonly needed multimedia codecs. And Compiz was integrated, with easy-to-use controls.
Ubuntu has been, is, and, judging by the plans for the next release ("Gutsy Gibbon"), will be a great distribution for a while. I once recommended Mandriva to a friend who was drooling (okay, not exactly drooling) over Compiz, but with Feisty, that's not even an excuse anymore (and it's about time!). Compiz was considered for Edgy and almost dropped for Feisty. According to rumors, Gusty will include Beryl, and maybe even Metisse.
Friendliness: 5/5- Other distros, such as Linspire and PCLinuxOS, are still friendly, but Ubuntu 7.04 set an even higher standard. The new changes are worth it.
Performance: 3/5- Xubuntu is much better in this regard. Ubuntu is a somewhat bloated OS, running various Apt-related processes in the background, alongside GNOME. Using XFCE helps.
Features: 4/5- Still not a complete feature set, but the new additions help you get there. So does Automatix.
Packaging: 4.5/5- There's nowhere to go from here except to use openSUSE's YaST2 packager, and only because of its superior filtering options.
Overall: 4.13/5- PCLinuxOS might be the top-dog distro for now, but Ubuntu is still the first choice for any newbie.

But wait! Don't hit that "Back" button yet!

== Ubuntu Studio vs. dyne:bolic ==

To get Ubuntu Studio working, I typed in "sudo apt-get install ubuntustudio-audio ubuntustudio-video" from the command line and waited for the download. Ubuntu Studio, being an official variant of Ubuntu, includes metapackages that can be installed from Synaptic or apt-get. These packages install all the necessary programs for a working Ubustu desktop.
dyne:bolic, on the other hand, is a separate distribution altogether. Put together by Jaromil the Rasta Coder, the inventor of the forkbomb (a code that shuts down a computer: :(){ :|:& }:; ), dyne:bolic fits on a CD-RW and packs 650MB of audio, video, text and image-manipulation/creation programs- all licensed under the GNU GPL. (Translation: The CD is 100% open-source.) It also happens to be optimized for a Pentium or later CPU, and claims the ability to run on as little as 64MB of RAM, thanks to an XFCE desktop. The killer: It's a Live CD, but can be installed nondestructively.
Ubuntu Studio, not to be outdone that easily, has two main edges. The biggest one is the sheer range of available programs. The image is 100MB too large to fit on a CD (if that's how you choose to install it), but it has many more programs than dyne:bolic. I counted 67 programs under my "Multimedia" menu after the install (of course, I also installed some programs of my own, such as XFMedia). There's also a handy launcher to give you an instant, customized recording studio.
The other important part of Ubustu is the kernel. Ubuntu Studio's kernel is of the low-latency flavor- It gives 95% of the CPU power to the currently running program. This is perfect for audio, where robbed CPU power disturbs audio playback, and gaming, where it can cause lag- and in fast-paced games like Quake, a little lag can mean an easy frag.
As far as performance, though, dyne:bolic beat Ubustu by a considerable margin. i586 optimization, combined with a lightweight desktop and little-to-no background bloat, was much more powerful than just tacking on a low-latency kernel.
Also, Ubustu's enormous app selection worked against it. The distributed copy of Audacity was compiled without JACK support, and the JACK drivers for amSynth and Hydrogen didn't work. As a result, some programs needed JACK to be running to work, while the major ones needed it to be disabled. Having QJackCtl handy only helped slightly. Dyne:bolic's selection of programs was more polished and interoperable.
Artwork on both distributions was great. Ubustu included a custom black-and-blue theme that looked sleek and polished. Dyne:bolic included calm, subtly-themed wallpaper that may well have been made using the CD itself. A clean, subtle XFCE theme and an out-of-the-way panel provided a serene, uncluttered workspace.
Both of these distributions are worth a try if you're considering a distro for content creation. Ubuntu Studio will give multimedia enthusiasts all the tools they need, while dyne:bolic is an indispensable tool for people stuck on old computers.

Ubuntu Studio 7.04:
Friendliness: 5/5- See notes for Ubuntu 7.04.
Performance: 2.5/5- In multimedia creation, low performance can have a serious effect on sound quality, even with a low-latency kernel.
Features: 5/5- It's a complete studio.
Packaging: 4.5/5- See Ubuntu 7.04.
Overall: 4.25/5.

dyne:bolic 2.4.2:
Friendliness: 4/5- Takes the pain out of having to use a Live CD.
Performance: 4.5/5- A lightweight, fast CD.
Features: 3.5/5- Not exactly a paltry feature set, but clearly not ultra-complete.
Packaging: 4/5- You can download modules from the site, and they're relatively easy to use- except that they require a hard disk or USB drive. (But where else would you store your files?)
Overall: 4/5.

What's next? SAM Linux 2007. Vector didn't make it past the install. (But Canada still has User Friendly and Billy Talent, eh?)
From Xubuntu Linux 7.04,
The DistRogue.

It's here.

The laptop got here today. I've already repartitioned the hard-disk setup. 40GB for /home should be enough...
Next up: A review of Ubuntu, Xubuntu, and Ubuntu Studio 7.04. PCLinuxOS follows that, and after that, it's time for a little-known Slackware derivative from Canada: Vector Linux. (It's Canadian, and they seem to do everything more sensibly than us Yanks, so you know it'll be good...) So far, it looks suspiciously like Zenwalk. They're both XFCE-using Slackware derivatives aimed at novices, they both come from French-speaking countries, they both have separate Live/Install CDs...
Still need to install Ubustu over Ubuntu and Xubuntu and add an SMP kernel, though...
From Xubuntu Feisty,
The DistRogue.

dyne:bolic vs. Ubuntu Studio

Ubuntu Studio has published a list of programs that it will include. dyne:bolic has the major ones, such as Blender or Audacity, but Ubuntu SE has a number of programs that it lacks, and that could make a major difference. But maybe it's just the fact that dyne:bolic still hasn't published a complete package list of their own... And besides, dyne:bolic is more than complete for most users.
By the way, speaking of stuff that comes with both distributions, check out ZynAddSubFX.