Which distro?

Merve

So, this winter, I'm gonna finally have the time to install Linux on my old tower...yay! I was wondering what distro I should use. I would prefer not to have to spend a penny. I've checked out Red Hat, Lindows, Xandros, Debian, Gentoo, Antarctica, Mandrake, SuSE, Yoper and Icepack. I need a distro for a dork-ass who doesn't know jack about computers (me). At this point in time, I am probably going to use Icepack, as it would be the Linux distro that seems right for me (I already said that I didn't want to spend a penny.) So, I need your input...are there better distros out there that I should use? Which one seems best for a dork-head like me?

Moonglobe

look up my thread on the same topic. it doesnt really have to do with a newbie distro but it does give some good arguments.

LordShryku

Fedora is really "user friendly", and IMHO, probably the best for a starter. Lycoris is also another desktop-oriented distro.

piersk

Guys, guys, guys.

What about Debian? So easy to install software and keep updates. And all you need to install are 4 disks and an Internet connection.

LordShryku

Well, unless they put a GUI to their front end, I wouldn't consider it to be easy to install. Don't get me wrong, I'm a long time Debian guy, but I think the two above are better suited for people fresh outta Windows.

piersk

Which front end? the one for the apt-get? What about aptitude?

LordShryku

Sorry, GUI for their install

Merve

I have already checked out Fedora...shoulda listed that one. Lycoris costs money, and I have seen distros just as good for free. Debian seems like a nice route to take with all its built-in security features, but I am pretty sure that it doesn't come with something like Gnome, KDE, or WindowMaker. (Remember, I'm a dork-ass!) I am also considering Icepack...seems like a cool distro.

LordShryku

Debian has WM and Gnome, and I'm fairly sure on one of the excess disks, it has KDE. I'd suggest trying Debian. If you can get through the install, everything else is a snap.

You can get Lycoris for free from the link I provided....

I've never tried Icepack, so I can't really comment on that...

Merve

Oh, it does...I guess I'll be using that if Icepack turns out sucky...if I can figure out where to download it from because the site keeps switching to German! 😃

BTW Shryku, are there any other download locations for Lycoris? Those download links don't work.

But there must be other good free distros out there! Or has Linux gone pay! I research a few distros everyday. I was looking at Elx and Puppy today...Elx is a piece of crap and Puppy seems very good, but is not really substantial...

LordShryku

Well, I noticed they went pay. That's just where I got the iso's from, but that was a while ago. May be able to rip them and send them to you if you want it.

I take it you didn't think too highly of Fedora?

Most distro's are the same. Some put things in different places. Some use different package managers. There's subtle differences. I noticed you hadn't mentioned Mandrake or Slackware or any of the BSD flavors. Those are a couple more bigger ones. Slack is known as being an OS for the geeks since it was one o the irst nix distros out, but Mandrake is supposed to be real user friendly.

One thing about Debian is it's known for the "bleeding edge" crowd. I use it at home, and I think apt-get rocks. But I would go the Red Hat route on boxes at work. Mainly because I'm required to get support contracts and all, but they're time tested stable boxes also

Merve

I've already checked out Mandrake.

I've realised that I'm not the dork-ass that I thought I was. I realised I wanted a no-nonsense distro that doesn't try to sell me crappy features that they make look good like: "fine art backgrounds" and "click and run installation". So therefore, I will go with Debian for now. When Icepack Version 3 comes out, I will install that, as it will probably come out before the March break (they're fast to release things).