h3xis Posted November 1, 2005 Share Posted November 1, 2005 this isn't exactly linux but i can't see where it would fit in the other forums. long story short, BeOS was Be's operating system that was pretty hot back in its day. however, it died but a company named yellowtab picked it up and named it ZETA. yellowtab recently released a livecd for ZETA 1.1 and i had the chance to test it out. the system requirements are as follows: * Pentium 200MHz (or Cyrix, Athlon, Via...) * 32 MB RAM * 600 MB Hard Disk Space * 8 MB Video Memory * bootable CD-ROM Drive * Mouse, Keyboard, 14" Color Monitor check my sig to see what hardware i ran it with. anyway, it seemed to run pretty fine EXCEPT it didn't detect my network card. i assume there's a select few that work but i'm using a Linksys LNE100Tx Version 2.0 Fast Ethernet NIC if anyone's wondering. the icons looked very "gnome-ish" and overall the way everything was set up was linux-like. i couldn't figure out how to get into a command line. the closest thing i could find was a kernel debugging console window which i had no idea how to get around in. but, aside from that, it came with the usual apps - firefox, a nifty photo editing app called Refraction, and a bit of games. i was impressed with the speed of the sysem in general as it seemed to be way faster than any OS i've ever used. the only thing i had to do was change the language to English, but even then some of the menus were in German as yellowtab is a German company. it was able to detect my reiserfs and ext3 drives perfectly fine i just didn't know enough about the system to be able to access them. there's a nice selection of audio/video players and i really liked the "panel/dock"...thing. i also liked the fact that the desktop menu (start menu, kde menu, or what have you) worked the way fluxbox's does. instead of having something to click on to pop up a menu i was able to right click on the desktop and go from there. surprisingly, openGL support worked extremely well as did my sound card. so overall, i was impressed with what yellowtab had to offer, especially for the size of the company. it's not meant to run on bleeding edge technology, which i am thankful for. i didn't see any software package managers like yum, apt, portage but i didn't really look all that hard, either. the server from which i downloaded the image (174.5MB) file from (comes as 2 .img and 1 .cue file, i recommend neroLINUX or just nero if you're in windows for this job as k3b and xcdroast didn't work) is almost hammered and i could only get a download going at around 80kb/s. i really hope that yellowtab picks up where Be left off and makes this a worthwhile OS because i'd consider using it. yellowTAB - makers of ZETA Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ThunderRiver Posted November 1, 2005 Share Posted November 1, 2005 For some reason.. it does not boot on this two years old laptop, Compaq Evo n610c. Oh well.. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lostspyder Posted November 1, 2005 Share Posted November 1, 2005 man I rember using BEOS way back when. Im gonna have to try this out :D Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
xp1ode Posted November 1, 2005 Share Posted November 1, 2005 Yes, finally i been waiting for this. I got tired of waiting so long for it that i actually stopped checking back, and it looks like i had bad timing. Anyways, great post, thanks for the link, gettin some horrible speeds but downloading now.... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
h3xis Posted November 1, 2005 Author Share Posted November 1, 2005 For some reason.. it does not boot on this two years old laptop, Compaq Evo n610c.Oh well.. 586751299[/snapback] yeah, i didn't see anything about laptops so one would assume that it's meant for desktops. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mitch00 Posted November 1, 2005 Share Posted November 1, 2005 screenshots? seems cool... thanks for the heads up Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
h3xis Posted November 1, 2005 Author Share Posted November 1, 2005 screenshots? seems cool... thanks for the heads up couldn't find a screenshot utility :( Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
El_Cu_Guy Posted November 1, 2005 Share Posted November 1, 2005 Wow, where did you get your info!?! long story short, BeOS was Be's operating system that was pretty hot back in its day. That's a matter of opinion. Anything more than 10 users and BeOS supporters consider it alive and well. At most, it's on life support and someone should pull the plug already. however, it died but a company named yellowtab picked it up and named it ZETA. BeOS is owned by Palm. YellowTAB has got a license. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Barney T. Administrators Posted November 1, 2005 Administrators Share Posted November 1, 2005 (edited) Hi Guys, Downloaded and tried this distro. I haven't had any previous experience with BEOS, but I wanted to see what this was all about. From my initial experience, I had these thoughts............. My initial download showed a .cue file instead of an .iso file once I unzipped it. Since I haven't really seen this type of file (my inexperience here) I had to assume that it worked like an .iso file. It did, of course... The boot-up went fine. No problems with hardware or network configurations. Sound worked fine. Internet was really slow. It took a good 45 seconds to boot up to Neowin. I have broadband cable, so it shouldn't take nearly that long. Interestingly. though, a Google search pulled up their website instantly. Since I use English, it took some time to find where to change German to English (Preferences). And there were still lots of German language menu items even after I converted..... There is a Reboot window that opens on the desktop. This is a little annoying to those who want a "clean" desktop. And on reboot, the computer does reboot. I do not see an option to simply shut-down. Realizing that this is a beta Live CD, it is interesting..... but I think that it needs lots more polish before it is ready to go mainstream.. Barney Edited November 1, 2005 by barneyt Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rytis Posted November 1, 2005 Share Posted November 1, 2005 Wow, where did you get your info!?!That's a matter of opinion. Anything more than 10 users and BeOS supporters consider it alive and well. At most, it's on life support and someone should pull the plug already. BeOS is owned by Palm. YellowTAB has got a license. 586752209[/snapback] Well, a bunch of people are recreating BeOS from scratch and ensuring full compatibility with good ol' R5. The project is called Haiku, and it's even progressing :) The whole point of it is to opensource the whole code, and that can only be done by rewriting it from scratch, as it is unavailable (Palm has it). Also, this way they can unsure that no original code is used and Palm cannot sue them for recreating it :) Some modules of original BeOS can already be replaced with Haiku counterparts. It will be interesting to see what they can get from it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Aaron Veteran Posted November 1, 2005 Veteran Share Posted November 1, 2005 Man, I loved BeOS way back then! Anyway, here is a quick review and here are some screenshots. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
protoss_chaos Posted November 1, 2005 Share Posted November 1, 2005 t3h Sweet! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
El_Cu_Guy Posted November 1, 2005 Share Posted November 1, 2005 Well, a bunch of people are recreating BeOS from scratch and ensuring full compatibility with good ol' R5. The project is called Haiku, and it's even progressing Yeah it used to be OpenBeOS. BeOS Developer Edition is nice too. However, the OS is on life support at best. People have moved on. When Be Inc went bye-bye many turned to AtheOS. which died a quick death. Still more felt that the BSDs or GNU/Linux had better longevity. Thanks for the screenshot Armeck. Been awhile since I've bothered checking out Zeta. the icons looked very "gnome-ish" Look like the same ol' BeOS icons to me. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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