Review: Xandros 4 Home Edition Premium

By Jim on August 4th, 2006

It’s been a while since I looked at Xandros. True to form, it has remained one of the easiest to use and flat out slickest Linux distributions available. This version of Xandros focuses on the “digital lifestyle” and includes wireless network profiles, a music manager with iPod & MP3 support, photo manager, video players and internet telephone via Skype, among other things. This version also provides good security tools such as a built-in firewall and anti-virus

Xandros comes with an installation disc and a separate disc with additional applications. I installed Xandros on our test box:

Athlon XP 3000+
Nvidia GeForce 5900 XT
1GB of RAM
160GB Hard Disk

My test system also had Vista Beta 2 installed on it. Xandros had no problem resizing the Windows partition to make room for an install. The Xandros installer is extremely easy to use. When my install began I opted to install the Complete Desktop. This included Nvidia video card was found during installation and the appropriate drivers were installed for it, with no work required on my part.

Even if you’ve never installed Linux before, the Xandros installer is about as easy as it gets. I’d easily put it on par with doing a Windows or a Mac OS install. Xandros has done a good job in eliminating installation anxiety for folks new to Linux.