I'm considering on downloading the Official Debian testing ISO image from

http://cdimage.debian.org/cdimage/we.../i386/iso-dvd/

but need some advice weather or not it is worth to try.. So i'm asking anyone who had tried these version release to share your experience with me e especially concerning about stability.

I dont have the luxury of a fast internet connection (i'll pay someone to download these ISO for me), but i want to use Debian testing as my OS (Debian stable package are way too old for me) that's why i need these ISO images so i can burned it on DVD and use it for installing package from "testing" on my computer.

But first i need your advice before i give it a go..

Any help would be very appreciated

Thank You

There is nothing wrong with the stability of Debian Testing. I recently installed it on AMD-64 and it is rock solid.

However, because of this stability it does not offer the latest and the greatest packages. I am saying this because you are worried that Stable is too outdated. Lenny is more up-to-date, but lags other distributions like Ubuntu or Linspire.

jlinkels

testing is a good release to have relatively new packages and ok stability. it's not as stable as etch though. for example i've had issues with getting a left handed mouse in KDE. Getting the right movie players/drivers running. It's not going as smoothly as with Etch. Therefor it's better to have internet access to update and get the right packages once in a while. But if you're willing to look for an answer once in a while then this release is good, I use it as my desktop system as well

Thank you for your reply... after reading your reply i've decided to give it a try, and see how it will work on my machine. BTW does these official testing release ISO's had an installer in it?? just like the official etch release..


Thank's again

Yes Lenny has an installer. It also gets security updates. I use Lenny on the computer I am typing this with and it has been very stable. One thing to consider. Eventually,there will be a "freeze" placed on Lenny. From that point on, only bug fixes and security updates will be applied. So as Lenny approaches release, it will become a bit out dated. For those of us who value stability over cutting edge, that is OK. If you really want to stay on the bleeding edge, and you have a bit of skill with the command line interface, you might want to try SIDUX. Its based on Debian SID, (unstable,) and has more cutting edge apps. The downside is that there is a slightly greater chance for breakage. As long as you keep up on their release notes and forums you should be OK. Good hunting.

Joe

Jml1 hit the nail on the head. Lenny is stable and cutting edge for many. I actually use Lenny as my "stable/default" distro, while "playing" with sidux, which resides on its own hd. My plan is to continue with testing after lenny gets released.

Sidux has been very resilient over the course of the past month after install. It does take a little more thought with installing dist-upgrades, but well worth it. I am enjoying it, just installed c-f and it sails!

Cheers

Since you're paying someone to download the .iso, I'd be prepared to have him download both the weekly and the daily builds ... There isn't really a beta installer yet for Lenny and it is under heavy development, so while most of the time, things work ... it's good to have a fallback.

Just for what it's worth, it took me four different downloads before I got one that would actually install. As pointed out, the installer is under heavy development and it is broken more often than it works. As an alternative, you could install stable and upgrade to testing but that is not really an option, I guess, if you don't have a fast connection.