Vlogcanic

ArtistX is an italian distro oriented towards multimedia production and edition –graphics in two or three dimensions, audio, music, video, animations, the whole nine yard –based on Debian’s LiveDVD.

The new version 0.4 uses the 2.6.22 kernel (tickless, new WiFi modules) and is available in two LiveDVDs, one for use with Gnome 2.20 and another one for use with KDE 3.5.7. It includes 2500 free software apps designed for artistic and multimedia production and, most notably, a Powua client –Powua is a service offering acceess to an internet distributed super computer from anyplace where there’s an internet connection. The idea is: if you face a very demanding process which will take a lot of your time and your processors’ power, such as an animation rendering, you can upload it to Powua, have it done there, and then get the final product without using too much of your own time and resources.

This Linux distro is available, as noted, in two LiveDVDs, one for each desktop environment which you can try and download from the link in the official ArtistX webpage.

Zenwalk Linux 4.8 appeared forty six days ago for the enjoyment of Slackware based distros but it left the LiveCD enthusiasts with no new toy to play. Fortunately the problem is over, Zenwalk 4.8 GNU/Linux LiveCD has become available.

The new LiveCD includes tools and programs for development and multimedia use as well as office and desktop applications, all running over a 2.6.22.9 kernel, with the new tickless stuff and WiFi module stack. It also includes some new features of which the highlight is probably the brand new support for reading and writing NTFS partitions.

The .iso image available for download is about 500 MB (pretty small for a full featured distro) and you can get it from the Zenwalk download mirrors.

Zenwalk is know for its lightness and nibleness which allow it to run swiftly in systems that can merely do OK in heavier distros such as Ubuntu. In any case, this is one of the most popular Slackware derivatives for the way it combines software simplicity with (relative) usability. Worth a try as far as I’m concerned… that’s what LiveCDs are for.