One of the supposed limitations of Linux touted by the opponents of this wonderful operating system is again its supposed hardware incompatibilities. This is far from the reality but it has to be stated that there are indeed some hardware that are not fully compatible with Linux. If you happen to accidentally buy a computer that is not fully Linux supported or one that has to be configured manually and if you are not fluent in Linux you might find it very difficult to get your hardware working in Linux. But not anymore, we are proudly offering our computers built with fully Linux compatible hardware and pre-installed with the latest release of Ubuntu.

We normally install the GNOME Flavor - Ubuntu - on all the computers manufactured by us. However if customers request we can install any other flavor of Ubuntu or even another Linux distro. We also make it a point to update the system with all the updates required and install any/all other applications depending on the need of the customer. We normally talk with the customer to identify the exact use of the computer and the profile of the users to decide on the set of packages to be installed.

For example we install all the educational packages and the different games when there are children under 15 in the household. When there are children above 12 we install packages for software development eg: Apache, PHP, MySQL, PostGRESQL etc. For graphics professional we install packages like blender, dia etc. In all cases we install all the basic software like media players, multimedia codecs, Java Runtime Environment, Adobe Flash plugin etc.

List of common packages we Install

#Firefox Addons
Tab mix plus
Firefox web developer

#Frameworks
Java Runtime Environment
Wine

#Adobe
Adobe Flash Player
Adobe Acrobat Reader
Adobe Acrobat Mozilla Plugin

#Restricted Media files
libdvdcss2 w32codecs

#Media Player
VLC Media Player
VLC Mozilla Plugin
MPlayer
RealPlayer

#Install games
KDEGames

#Multimedia codecs
libxine-extracodecs
gstreamer0.10-plugins

#DVD Playback
libdvdread3

#Stream Stream Directory Browser
streamtuner
streamripper

#Internet TV
democracyplayer

#CD Writing
K3B

#FTP Client
FileZilla

#Development Environment
Apache
PERL
Python
Ruby
PHP
ImageMagick
SQLLite
MySQL
PostgreSQL
Emacs
Anjuta
Eclipse
gPHPEdit

Even though it is expensive for us in actually setting up the system with all these software we firmly believe that if we can meet all the requirements of the customer satisfactorily there shouldn't be any reason for the customer to switch to another operating system. The usability of Ubuntu (and for that matter Linux in general) has become so advanced that it is almost at par (sometimes even better in some cases) with the other operating systems in the market.

It should be noted that the supposed hardware incompatibility is not a problem with Linux but rather a reluctance from the respective manufacturer to release their hardware specifications to the open source community or release open source/closed source drivers for Linux. Things are slowly changing now as more and more people are moving to Linux. Massive countries like India, Brazil and China are embracing Linux and this has already started a cascade of users moving to Linux. With more users let us hope that the hardware manufacturers will identify the economics in supporting Linux and start providing Linux drivers and/or specifications.

We have to confess that finding hardware that are fully compliant has never posed any real challenge for us, as most of the available hardware are fully compliant. Some exceptions include modems, printers, scanners, some rare graphic cards. If you would like to learn more or talk with us give us a call at +91-471-243-7711 or +91-9446-06-9446. You can also drop by our store at 3/118 Kesavadasapuram, Pattom P. O., Trivandrum, Kerala - 695004. See our contact us page to send us an online query or you can email us at info@zyxware.com