Rowan wrote:

Hello, Rowan.

I'm not unsympathetic to your plight, but I've lost count of the many family and friends that I've helped to resolve problems caused by new releases, or incompatible upgrades, of Windows that didn't recognise hardware on their PC's. I don't think their Windows 'hell' was any less frustrating than your experience with Linux has been to date: I've got to say that I've found the online Windows community every bit as helpful to each other as the Linux community are in resolving problems. Quite a lot of knowledge is actually shared between these two user communities.

What I witnessed in response to your post on this list was many people responding to you and offering to help you resolve your problem. I was one of the people who responded, and suggested you tried booting from the Ubuntu 'live' CD. Matt Daubney also suggested your try booting from the 'live' CD and Rob beard suggested you look at some Linux magazines. We were, of course, trying to help you to resolve your driver problem yourself because that is part of what Linux is all about and why people like to use it. However, what seems to have frustrated you most is that few of us realised that you wanted someone else to solve the problem...

That's not unreasonable if you can't or don't want to solve the problem yourself, but there is a community of people here who are used to a way of solving problems that appears unfamiliar to you. I think you've put your finger on a genuine problem, but I don't think that it's unique to Linux. What I would say to anyone considering starting to use Linux is that making contact with other people who are already using Linux can be helpful, and an up-to-date list of UK LUG's (Linux User Groups) where you can meet them is published every month in 'Linux Format' magazine.

Bye,

Tony.