Security updates for Windows XP end today

[64Guitars]

my old laptop specs are "Intel(R)Pentium(R)M processor, 1.60GHZ 590MHz 504MB ram. with a 74.5GB hard drive.

... and orh for the "oh f*** it, let's GO!" spirit of adventure on his old laptop Cheesy

my laptop was virtually useless, it took ages to boot up, and you could never run more than one programme at a time or it would ground to a halt.

I think the main reason your laptop was so slow with Windows XP is that you don't have enough RAM. Linux doesn't need as much RAM as Windows, so it will run better on that machine than XP did. But if you can increase the amount of RAM in the laptop, it will run even faster. It shouldn't cost much. Around here, you can get 2 GB of RAM for about $25 or 4 GB for about $40. Based on the exchange rate, that should be about £14 for 2 GB or £22 for 4 GB. I think you once said that you have a friend who sells computers. Maybe he could boost the RAM in your laptop for you?

You'll notice the speed difference mostly when you have several programs running at once, which is very common in Linux music. That's why XP was so slow when you tried to run more than one program at a time. It didn't have enough RAM so it had to use virtual memory (the much slower hard drive) and everything becomes unbearably slow. When you boost the RAM, your computer will seldom, if ever, have to use virtual memory so it will be fast no matter how many programs are running at the same time.

[64Guitars]

lmms seems to work but i need midi soundfonts or somesuch, to get midi files to play.

A good SoundFont for General MIDI is "FluidR3_GM.sf2". You probably already have it as I think it comes with KXStudio. If not, it shouldn't be hard to find with Google.

Here are some other sources of SoundFonts:

https://sites.google.com/site/artifakelabs/ (Redtron SE Mellotron samples)

http://www.sf2midi.com/soundfonts/

http://www.hammersound.net/

And you can find huge collections of SoundFonts on the bit torrents.

[cuthbert]

lmms seems to work but i need midi soundfonts or somesuch, to get midi files to play.

You can get lots of (mostly) free SoundFonts here: http://hammersound.net/cgi-bin/soundlink.pl

I don't know anything about lmms, though. I wonder why it can't access the audio device's built-in synthesizer?

[Speed Demon]

I'm still trying to update Windows 95.

[dasilvasings]

I'm still trying to update Windows 95.

lol! I am trying to update my ZX Spectrum!

[Speed Demon]

If I had a ZX Spectrum I'd update that also.

[64Guitars]

I don't know anything about lmms, though. I wonder why it can't access the audio device's built-in synthesizer?

From what I've read, that should be possible. But I've never been able to get it to work so I just use software. There are lots of ways to play SoundFonts in Linux and they're all pretty easy. In LMMS, the SoundFont player looks like this:



If you click the pink folder icon, you can specify the SoundFont file you want to use. Clicking the wrench icon below it lets you choose a patch from that SoundFont.

[64Guitars]

There are a bunch of LMMS tutorial videos here:

http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL4A3490E6C3313341

They're based on an older version but that shouldn't matter.

Here's the first one:


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-OK6YXDHrvU

[Lurker]

I love this thread.

I loaded Ubuntu on an old laptop as an experiment a couple of years ago.  I found it very easy to use and faster than XP.  I bailed back to XP because 1) I had a lot of software for windows, 2) I thought that a hardware problem was a software problem, and 3) when the newer laptop crashed, my wife didn't want to learn a new system until the repair was finished.

When I get some time (ha ha), I may try linux again.  I'm not sure that I'm ready to make the plunge with our desktop.  Is there a decent finance program for linux?  We've been using Quicken and Turbotax for years.

[64Guitars]

Is there a decent finance program for linux?  We've been using Quicken and Turbotax for years.

I've not used them (no money) but there are quite a lot of financial programs for Linux. The most popular program seems to be GnuCash. It can import Quicken's QIF files. And there's a Windows version available too (and Mac OS X), so you could start using it now. Then, when you're ready to make the move to Linux, you'll already know if GnuCash will do what you want. There's even an Android app that lets you keep track of your finances on your phone and upload them to the desktop version later.

Here's a page that lists many more financial programs for Linux:

http://www.datamation.com/open-source/62-open-source-replacements-for-popular-financial-software-1.html

And here's another page about Linux financial programs:

http://www.techrepublic.com/blog/10-things/top-10-linux-financial-tools/