What is easiest to use out of SuSE and RedHat for a Windows user ?

I've tried RedHat 9 (download version) and I've decided to buy Linux so that I get a manual and some extra stuff but they only seem to sell SuSE around where I live and I can't buy online at the moment.

i've never used suse, but linus torvalds does so i'd say it's ok . one thing i'd be wary of is that red hat doesn't want to make it's desktop operating system anymore and they're only in the server business now. red hat 9 is their latest and last desktop release. i reccomend however that you use slackware linux, it's hard to learn at first but you'll learn fast and it's definitely the best.

well I mainly want to use it as a small file server (using samba) but I would also like to try out everything else that comes with it.

And if Linus uses it then that's good enough for me

I would say SUSE. They really seem to be targeting window users with the 9.0 release. With SUSE you can install and be ready to go without having to know much about Linux. While Red Hat or Fedora the install is easy also, but you will probably want some other progams that are not there. Some will argue and say it is easy to install the extra programs, but if you are wanting something that just works and not wanting to learn how to install other programs at the time I would definitely say SUSE.

ok, I think I'll install SUSE.

kirvnet is wrong about SuSE. SuSE works just like all the other distros. You can learn just as much from SuSE as you can from Redhat/Fedora or Slackware. SuSE (like redhat) has the RPM manager, which makes installation easy. SuSE is ready to go out of the box and is the perfered LinuxOS for desktop use, as well as linux hacking. SuSE gives you everything you will ever need in a linux distro, its easy to start out with, and if you want to do advanced linux usage, its ready for that too. Leave it up to the germans to make somthing so damb good!

Well everything else I've got that's made in Germany is ok so there's no reason why that shouldn't be.

I would definetly go with SUSE. SUSE is truley aimed at Windows users as stated above and not only that but navigation with SUSE is much easier. Get SUSE 9.0 for sure.

Try the suse live-eval to see if you like it first.

I have just signed into this site.

I wonder which one of the two (RedHat - SuSE) is easier to configure. What I look for, is a linux platform in which to do some SDL/OpenGL/XLib programming. I don't want to spend much time to configure it. I have heard that SuSE makes use of Yast which is thought to be awful (correct me if wrong here ) I recently installed Mandrake and I cannot find any real configuration tool (maybe I haven't search enough). It seems that all has to be done by manually editing configuration files...

Which one do you think is the easiest to configure?

I used RedHat for years, and liked it allot. It was fairly easy to use and set up, however in my humble opinion SuSE 9.0 is far better. YaST while not perfect is absolutely the most complete and functional GUI configuration tool I have tried to date.

There are allot of good distributions out there, but if the comparison here is between SuSE and Redhat then I have to say grab SuSE, install and enjoy..........

I agree with all the other people. I'd been a Redhat Junkie until recently I was asked to put together a webserver, and to use SuSE. It was all awesome. I've since become a fan of SuSE. Even though Redhat if focusing on their server stuff, they still have Fedora, which still has the same feel as RH9. I'm still a big fan of SuSE. YaST is good too. Even though it's not a solve all and has a few issues, it's great for those who don't want to delve into the command line stuff.

Go for SuSE!

As a desktop environment I've used RedHat5-9 + Fedora 1 as well as SuSE briefly. For me, Fedora FC1 was the easiest to install and configure (keep in mind I have many more years of experience with RedHat than SuSE). The key factor for me was I found that installing software on FC to be so easy... Train of thought: Fedora, "Hmmm... I need a proxy. Squid sounds good. yum install squid HEY! I now have squid!" vs. SuSE, "Hmmm... I need to install xfce... where do I go.... ok... find some SuSE rpm... dammit, there's like 50 of them which ones do I need? Lets download them all... then rpm... dang... dependency hell... ok... finally all installed. Voila... uh, huh? No xfce? What the???"

So I've had better experiences with FC than with SuSE but if I had to do it over again, I would go with SuSE because of it's future. I think IBM just dumped $50million into it plus the whole Novelle thing... SuSE is the future for my desktop. Well... as soon as I buy a new box 'cause there's no way I'm rebuilding my FC box again.

(p.s. My SuSE install is still without an xfce desktop. *sigh* I hope to have time fix it soon.)

squid and xfce are included in SuSE, sitting right there in install remove software. Doesn't get much easier then that.

Yeah, I know what you are talking about. I wish that SuSE (YaST2) handled the dependencies like YUM or APT-GET...It's a pain to need to go hunting down the dependencies. Maybe one day.... They do have a lot of them already on the CD as mentioned with Squid....Not bad, but always room for improvment.