Linspire Linux Distro

Linspire, earlier known as Lindows, is a distribution of Linux primarily

focused towards home users. Its look and feel is similar to Windows, with eye

catching icons and Windows like desktop themes. These make it easier for users

to switch from a Windows environment to this distro. Other than that, you will

see familiarly sounding components on the desktop like My Documents, My

Computer, Control Center, etc. The file manager resembles Windows Explorer but

has an additional tabbed option, which shows Network, My Computer, My Documents,

etc making it easy to navigate through.

It has an Instant Messenger through which you can login to Yahoo, MSN, etc.

The Hardware requirements for Linspire aren't very high. Any ordinary P4 or even

a Celeron with 128 MB RAM and 4 GB of free hard drive sapce for the OS are

sufficient, though 512 MB RAM is recommended.



Linspire comes with good support options, but they have to be bought separately.
It also has something called CNR (Click and Run) service, which facilitates one

to manage, locate and install almost 20,000 different Linux products and

applications. Since last month, this CNR service has been extended beyond

Freespire and Linspire and is now available for fedora, Debian, OpenSuSE, and

many other distros.

Using CNR services you can find, install or manage Linux applications. Now CNR is also available for Fedora, Debian and OpenSuSE

The Linspire CD comes with OpenOffice and many other software. It supports

mp3, flash player, DivX, real player, etc out of the box, which fairly reduces

the burden of finding these software elsewhere.

The hardware detection of the system is very effective and detects devices

that are plugged into it and installs the respective drivers without any user

intervention. We even tried plugging some MP3 players and TV tuner cards to the

machine running Linspire, and it was detected all without any hassle.

Linspire is simple, easy and quick to install. You will find all the required

software that a normal user would need for regular productivity work. It can

also be installed on laptops and comes with support for Synaptics touch pad and

a power management feature. Lastly, if you want to get a look and feel of this

distro, then you can try out the free version of it called FreeSpire.

Bottom Line: Organizations that want to switch from Windows to an

alternative OS could try out Linspire, especially due to its Windows like look

and feel.