Mandriva 2008 Flash: A Review

MANDRIVA, or Mandrake as it was back in the day, was the first Linux distribution I ever tried.
It wasn't a great first date.
I was a Windows 95 user at the time and was baffled by Linux terminology and particularly the way Mandrake handled software installation, via the RPM package system.
After stumbling around in the dark for a few months, I gave up on Mandrake and, if I'm being honest, that initial Linux experience probably soured me toward the company.
It's now around ten years since that early Linux adventure and so much has changed.
I've probably tried every one of the top 20 distros in the Distrowatch rankings – and a good few outside it - and I have to admit that few have impressed or surprised me as much as Mandriva 2008 Flash.
It comes on a 4GB USB stick, around 400MB of which is taken up by the operating system – although you can expand this if you plan on installing a lot of extra applications - leaving plenty of storage space for your files.
The idea behind this Flash-based system is to give you a complete, portable Linux desktop operating system.
If your computer is already set up to handle booting from USB devices, then installing and using Mandriva Flash is simple.
To make sure your PC boots from the USB stick first, you need to go into your computer's BIOS, set USB as the first boot device, plug in the Mandriva Flash drive, and reboot your machine.
If that's too scary – and Mandriva do offer a detailed guide – there's another, easier way.
It's called ezBoot and, while it works like a dream, it's also Mandriva Flash's weak point.
When you insert the Mandriva Flash stick while running Windows, a simple launcher offers you several options, including booting into Mandriva Flash.
When you choose it, the launcher installs a minimal bootloader, so when you reboot the machine, you have a choice of starting your original system or Mandriva Flash.
This is clever, but it has one huge drawback: it leaves the bootloader on the host machine.
This is fine if, like me, you're using Mandriva Flash on your own PC, but if you want to use on a public machine or a pal's, it's a problem.
What's needed, therefore, is a simple tool to remove this minimal bootloader when you're done.
I've been using Mandriva Flash on my Dell Latitude X1, a tiny laptop with a modest, 1.4Ghz processor, 512MB of RAM memory and graphics which share system memory.
Despite the X1's graphical limitations, I have been able to use the notoriously memory-hungry KDE with full Compiz 3D desktop effects – including wobbly windows, drop shadows and spinning-cube desktop - which come as an option with Mandriva Flash (along with the alternative, Metisse 3D desktop).
This is particularly impressive as the X1 is a long way short of being Vista-capable.
Further, though anything I do in Mandriva Flash has to be written to the stick via a USB connection, it's a really quick system – noticeably quicker than the Windows XP Pro I have on my hard drive.
All the hardware on the X1 was detected and correctly configured during the first run, including the X1's Intel Pro/Wireless network card – all I had to do was enter my WEP key to connect to the internet.
Usual laptop functions like Suspend and Hibernate work fine, as do the keyboard function keys for setting the screen brightness and volume, and the built-in SD card reader.
Accessing files stored in your Windows installation is a breeze, too – my X1's 30GB hard drive shows up in the Mandriva file system under Storage Media, again with no configuration needed by me.
When it comes to included applications, Mandriva Flash is pretty much the same as the full-blown Mandriva Linux 2008; in other words, there's a comprehensive selection.
If what you want isn't included it's a short download away, either from Mandriva's own repositories or the excellent Penguin Liberation Front servers.
It's true that there are other Linux distros designed to run from USB sticks, and there are many more that can, with knowledge and patience, be made to run off a stick – and that all of these are free.
Mandriva Flash will cost you around £60 (79 Euros) but it's worth every penny.
All the hard work has been done for you and Mandriva Flash offers a full-featured desktop with all the frills and fancy trimmings.
If Mandriva do something about that bootloader issue, it could be all the computer you need – on a tiny, pocketable USB stick.