Hi folks,
I wanna install linux on my laptop but I dont know which distro is the best one for this. Fedora has option for laptop during installation but I have no idea what it custommizes. Gentoo is more flexible but I dont know which packages should I choose to emerge to support common function such as battery monitor, suspend when lit is closed, pcmcia wireless support, light GUI, small kernel ...
Thanks in advance

In my experience, the machine being a laptop versus a desktop was not nearly as important as the actual hardware specifications of the machine.

For the most part, all distributions are now using advanced power management on all machines, and are set up to handle that regardless of what type of computer you are using. After all, people use power management on their desktops as well.

You might have some issues with the WLAN hardware in your machine, but frankly, Linux as a whole tends to be sketchy in regards to WLAN drivers, and one distribution isn't going to do substantially better than any other here. If drivers are available for your device, you will be able to install them under any distribution.

What you really need to consider is how fast the machine is, how much RAM you have, etc.

If your laptop isn't top of the line, you might want to stick with Slackware, Debian, Gentoo, etc. Distributions which are heavy on customization and granular control.

If you have plenty of power, then take a look at Ubuntu (or Kubuntu), Fedora, etc, etc.

Use whatever you want. Most distros have good support for laptops, but I here Ubuntu, Debian, DSL and Puppy are the best.

Most if not all distros will work fine on laptops depending on the hardware configuration of the laptop. I have had great success with openSUSE, Mandriva and Fedora on our Acer and Lenovo laptops.

Thx for the suggestion, guys. I'm using fedora 5 on my desktop (celeron 1Ghz 512 Mb ram) now and it really slow. I tried Gentoo before but it's just take too long to emerge all packages. I have a IBM A22e celeron 800mhz 256mb ram, 4mb graphic memory. I guess I gonna try Debian. BTW, has anyone open a thinkpad and reuse the screws? I want to replace my PCMCIA wireless card with a mini pci wireless since the card I have doesnt have linux driver. However, IBM website says that all the screws used in their thinkpad have a nylon coat that can only be used once so i dont know if I can reuse the screws to reassemply it.

Pick one and install it.