I am a big Debian fan, so I am glad, actually, to see plain Debian fare so well, even against the "polished" commercial distributions. If you take the commercial implementations of Debian - Ubuntu, MEPIS, Xandros, Linspire, and Knoppix - on this list, you can see that Debian based systems ran away with it from the respondents. I use plain Debian when I am doing testing and experimenting, and SimplyMEPIS on the desktop for every day use.

Glad to see slackware is still getting its due... not first but still running strong...

Well for this "old man" PCLOS is the bomb. Great out of the box - great forum. Some of the most tolerant and patient people that USERS (advanced to newbie) I have encountered and am proud to be a member of.
The Final release will ROCK ! Thanks Texstar

The results for "Distro of the the Year" are very interesting. I was surprised by the fact that Redhat has really declined, and although the final numbers for PCLinuxOS (which I had never heard of) were fairly small, there were *alot* of flattering user comments.

Anyway, I was wondering whether people's choices are different when considering setting up a machine primary as a server as opposed to workstation? Is Ubuntu just as good as any in that role, too?

My previous experience was all Redhat, so before reading the poll and other research, I would probably just be picking Fedora Core 5 or 6. The machine I'm planning will most of the time run in non-GUI mode, though I'm sure I will sometimes also use it in GUI mode as a workstation... Would people choose differently for a server installation as opposed to a desktop/workstation?

I have a ubuntu server running 6.10 running in headless mode and it works perfectly, once everything is set up there is no hassle with it. It has never crashed or hung and always ran perfectly no matter how many services its running. This machine is only a PIII 500MHz, 64MB RAM, 4GB HDD. I have no complaints about it. The LAMP server that it runs is a bonus as well if you are using Apache, MySQL and PHP.

Definitely, if you ask me. My choice for a desktop Linux operating system would be something like Ubuntu; nowadays desktops have pretty much machine power, and it's nice to put something on it that "just works" out of the box, has easy-to-use application install/remove/update(automated) tools and a wide range of binary packages available with one click. In that case it's not that important how huge the kernel is, if there are some unneeded packages installed or so..but for a server I'd probably pick up Slackware and consume more time in configuring it the way I like it to be; I've also found Slackware the best when it comes to compiling software (it's never as easy on any other distribution right out of the box), and overall there are a lot of reasons why I like it (or some other distribution that resembles it) when I need a server.

I'm not saying a "server distribution" couldn't be a "desktop distribution" or vice versa, but I'm saying people -- including me -- do choose differently depending on whether it's a server or a desktop they're hunting an operating system / distribution for. And I guess everyone has their own reasons for that..

i think Mandriva 07 is also quite nice & intuitive,,,
specially with the new "drake3D" stuff.

I find SimplyMEPIS to literally be a "burn the CD" and run - I do that each time there is a major release, then simply do a periodic upgrade to keep my desktop current. To me, there is less work to do to get SimplyMEPIS to perform routine desktop functions. You can get the same thing using EasyUbuntu once you have installed either Ubuntu, Kubuntu, or Xubuntu, but then you have a bit more work to do to get the desktop to run routine stuff.

For a server, I have not found anything more stable or secure than Debian. OpenBSD brags about only one flaw in ten years, but that is for a really tiny base OS. Debian Stable is really stable and quite secure, too, and by regularly applying the Security updates, it is hard to get a more secure server that is easier to maintain or any more stable than you can get with Debian. With Ubuntu, you get a more well known support and upgrade path, but it is no more stable or secure than Debian.

Ubuntu will NOT be as stable as Debian Stable, simply because it uses a less stable, more cutting edge, version of Debian as its base. That being said, Debian Stable will obviously be more stable as a server.

I love Ubuntu as a desktop system, but I haven't had a chance to look at Mepis yet. Mepis has been recommended by other Ubuntu users for people who are migrating from Windows or want a more easy/comfortable start in Linux.

I enjoyed starting with Ubuntu because I wanted something that was going to be easy to install and use but would require a little command-line at times, to get my hands dirty and learn a bit about Linux. As a middle of the road-easy to use distro, Ubuntu has served me well for about a year and a half.

Hallo!
I 'm new bie for linux,i just want to know which fedora will compatible with my laptop, presario v3000, core duo processor, TQ,

hello mhdridhuan you can try fedora 6 or wait for fedora 7 or pclinuxos (live cd ) 2007. I recommend opensuse 10.2 or pclinuxos 2007. because suse and pclinuxos linux seem to work on every system I tried so far. With a live cd you can see if everything works before you install it on harddrive. One day soon all linux operating systems will be on live cd's. plus many other live cd's are coming out every month too. I also recommend at least 512mb of ram memory for any computer you may use and at least a 60gb hard drive for extra storage.

I have the OpenSuSE 10.2 Live DVD and ran it on my HP Laptop yesterday.

Although I didn't spend much time on it, it wouldn't detect my wireless card, so I had no internet connection.

When I tried the Ubuntu LiveCD 1 1/2 years ago it just detected my wireless card and I had instant internet access.

I've only heard good thinks about PCLinuxOS and hardware detection. PCLinuxOS is based on Mandriva and is apparently very user friendly. Once again, I only really have experience with Ubuntu, but that's my experience, and what I've heard.

I believe people should be able to use the same distro on their desktop and laptop. The only one that works halfway decently on both is Debian Etch. If anyone has a laptop that won't let them install, or doesn't work after they do install, try Etch.

There are several distributions which work without problems on desktops and laptops. For example, Mandriva 2007 (I have it on several different desktops and Dell Inspiron 9300 laptop), PCLinuxOS, Ubuntu etc.

You can add XandrOS 4 to that list. It all depends on the hardware, of course; but on most laptops XandrOS installs just as easily as it does on most desktops.