openSUSE 13.1 Shows Off Nice Performance Improvements

[phoronix]

Phoronix: openSUSE 13.1 Shows Off Nice Performance Improvements

If you haven't yet upgraded from openSUSE 12.3 to the openSUSE 13.1 release that greeted the world this week, for many users there will be performance improvements to find with this major Linux distribution update. Here's some benchmarks showing off some of the performance improvements.

http://www.phoronix.com/vr.php?view=19360

[tarceri]

This really emphasises how quickly the open source drivers have been progressing.

[Calinou]

I have tried openSUSE 13.1 in VirtualBox yesterday and it doesn't seem to be that good. It does OK, but is very long to install (3-4GB to download using netinstall on KDE... 3 hours of downloading or so, installing only takes ~30 minutes with Xubuntu) and the font rendering is ugly (it was hard to read, the window was in fullscreen so it is not due to screen resolution).

In comparison to Xubuntu 13.10 (my host OS), which installs much faster and has a simpler install process, it isn't better.

+1 to openSUSE devs for letting users easily have a separate /home partition though. I know how to do it, but it is helpful to newbies.

[Sonadow]

I have tried openSUSE 13.1 in VirtualBox yesterday and it doesn't seem to be that good. It does OK, but is very long to install (3-4GB to download using netinstall on KDE... 3 hours of downloading or so,

That's not an OpenSUSE issue, that's more of a 'everyone-is-fighting-for-download-bandwidth-on-the-first-day-of-release' issue.

The (personal) best way of getting new distributions on their day of release is always to use the torrent links, because one is guaranteed to have a ton of seeders available.

[mischael]

I'm using openSUSE natively and font rendering is perfect, so the problem is with your VM. In addition, comparing a full openSUSE KDE install with xubuntu is highly unfair, since KDE is a lot bigger than XFCE and openSUSE does not kick out packages to fit the install on a CD. Installing openSUSE from a cd or usb stick is really fast as it uses images and not packages.

At last, with 13.1 I can run my Lenovo W520 off the nouveau drivers. This is a huge win since it enables me to use Tumbleweed.

[Cyber Killer]

I have tried openSUSE 13.1 in VirtualBox yesterday and it doesn't seem to be that good. It does OK, but is very long to install (3-4GB to download using netinstall on KDE... 3 hours of downloading or so, installing only takes ~30 minutes with Xubuntu) and the font rendering is ugly (it was hard to read, the window was in fullscreen so it is not due to screen resolution).

In comparison to Xubuntu 13.10 (my host OS), which installs much faster and has a simpler install process, it isn't better.

+1 to openSUSE devs for letting users easily have a separate /home partition though. I know how to do it, but it is helpful to newbies.

It's not a fair comparison - you should use the DVD, not the netinstall, and you should choose the xfce desktop during install, only then you can compare the installation time and size. About font rendering - it would help if you could provide a screenshot to show what you mean by it being "ugly".

[staalmannen]

My wife runs OpenSUSE with KDE. It is my favourite distro for the "I-just-want-the-damn-computer-to-work-and-be-easy" users. Personally I use Arch, but my first distro was OpenSUSE and it still holds a special place in my mind. That and that the OBS is a great service that more people should discover (I have done some packaging via OBS for all major Linux distros and it is pretty easy).

[deanjo]

It's not a fair comparison - you should use the DVD, not the netinstall, and you should choose the xfce desktop during install, only then you can compare the installation time and size. About font rendering - it would help if you could provide a screenshot to show what you mean by it being "ugly".

Actually, if he is going to compare the two for installation, he should probably be looking at the live CDs and install them.

[Cyber Killer]

Actually, if he is going to compare the two for installation, he should probably be looking at the live CDs and install them.

No. OpenSUSE livecd's are not meant to be installed and used as a production system. The option to install them is there, but you won't get any updates etc.

[Sonadow]

My wife runs OpenSUSE with KDE. It is my favourite distro for the "I-just-want-the-damn-computer-to-work-and-be-easy" users. Personally I use Arch, but my first distro was OpenSUSE and it still holds a special place in my mind. That and that the OBS is a great service that more people should discover (I have done some packaging via OBS for all major Linux distros and it is pretty easy).

Same, OpenSUSE also holds a special place in my consideration for a desktop-centric distribution. I'm usually partial to RPM-based distributions, so the preference is typically:
1. Fedora
2. OpenSUSE
3. Mageia
4. Mint
5. Ubuntu

The fact that OpenSUSE is probably the only popular RPM-based distribution that has not been forked or rebased on adds to its appeal.