Greetings! I am a new user, name's Carter. Now that the formalities are out of the way, let me get down to business:

I have an Acer Aspire One netbook,160GB HDD with Windows XP pre-installed on it. I would like to put on the Linux operating system on it, but I am COMPLETELY new to Linux. Linux Pupi, Kuki, Ubuntu, all these versions that are out there, I figured my first best bet is to figure out which one is best. In the end I want to have the OS on a SD Card and stored there so I can boot up the Linux whenever I please to, without getting rid of the Windows.

So I'm asking you guys. Which Linux version is best for a newbie like me? A version with less work required overall, maybe simpler to use then others(?), I don't know. But any help is appreciated!

For a new user I would recommend Linux Mint every time. I would say it's the most user friendly of all distros, especially for those moving from Windows.

Ubuntu / Linux Mint are the most user-friendly for beginners. As far as booting from an SD card, the BIOS has to support it, which is highly unlikely. Your best bet would be to install Wubi. Wubi installs inside of Windows and runs great. I would highly suggest it when just starting out. http://www.ubuntu.com/desktop/get-ub...dows-installer

Otherwise, it is possible to install on a USB hard drive / flash drive. I have done this in the past and it works well also.

If you need any help let me know.

Please check out
http://peppermintos.com
for your netbook. There is nothing wrong with Mint, either. Kendall, developer, works on both (mint-lxde). Take your pick.

Me to. I found that

http://www.ubuntu.com/netbook/get-ubuntu/download

Works out of the box on Mine. I don't use the Netbook Desktop. I selected Gnome at GDM login on sessions to run Gnome Desktop. I Shrunk XP by 32 gig or so and installed Ubuntu 10.04 LTS Netbook via Unetbootin on one of my other Linux boxes to Pendrive on that unallocated 32 gig partition I made. Dual boot is painless.

Wubi is OK. But kinda Flaky from all the posts I have read on it.

Never tried Mint. Happy with my Install. Camera,Sound, Mic (I had to tweak Pulse audio for skype), all works. Fan runs OK. Temp OK.

Can't tell you what is best. Only what works for me. AntiX on my EEPCs and Ubuntu Netbook on my Acer Aspire one.

All linux - All good - Try them all and choose your flavor.

All you're going to get is a bunch of people's personal opinions. There is no "best."

Here is a pretty intelligent comparison of the top 10 distros:

http://distrowatch.com/dwres.php?resource=major

while I personally have no experience with Peppermint, I will say the recommendation would be solid. Peppermint takes the VERY popular Ubuntu distro, customizes the long term support (supported for 3 years so you're not constantly upgrading), updates the kernel (better hardware support), updates a few other programs. So you've got the incredibly easy to install and configure goodness of Ubuntu, the warm and fuzzy feeling of not having to upgrade your OS constantly, yet keeps the most important parts up to date. Definitely an OS I wanna take a look at.

1 members found this post helpful.

Hi Carter!

Personally, if I had a better computer to use, I'd try a virtual machine. That way I could test quite a few in maybe the most quick way. There are some pre-made virtual machines too that are simply download and boot. See vmware's virtual appliances and their player. Also Oracle's virtualbox is similar.

I go for Ubuntu also...

The 'best' is the one that does what you want/need it to do.

Ignore the fanboys and try a few. Most can be ran as livecds so you can try them before actually installing anything.

You've really opened up a can of worms here - there is no "best" distro; just various distros that are suited to different people/applications. As per some posts in this thread; your best bet would be to install multiple VM's and try out different distros - try the top 10 @ Distrowatch and that should give you a good feel for what is out there. Generally for a total beginner, starting out with Mint/Ubuntu would be great since most of your hardware will work out the box; however again it depends on what you want to use Linux for.

Wow, thanks for all of the responses guys!

I seem to have-as alli_yas put it-"opened up a can of worms" here. But I have the suggestions I need. I know trying them all is the dream, but I am very new to Linux. All of it is a matter of opinion, which I get. But I am also seeing a common suggestion, which is Ubuntu, or Mint. These along with links to other sources make them sound like they are pretty user friendly, and though I may not stick with them, will be good for me to get a better start on it. So I'll work with Ubuntu first (because why not) and see where things go from there!

for new Linux users I recommend Ubuntu. It's very easy to install and configure. Good Luck!

So I'm working on Ubuntu, it's on the USB drive of mine (figure I'll work on an SD card some other time, stick with whats easy for now) But it's not quite doing what I want it to do.
When my laptop starts up and loads Ubuntu off the USB drive I get an option to either "Try Ubuntu", or install it either A)side-by-side with Windows or
B)completely replace it.
Well what I wanted to do was have the whole OS on the USB drive ready to go, and have it boot Windows if the USB isn't in it, and if I want Ubuntu I just insert the USB and it will load it all up ready to go. I want to avoid having an option to choose between the two when I boot up my laptop. I know of friends that have tried that option, and they say it usually starts screwing up after a few weeks.
Am I making any sense here? If so, can one of you guys help me out, or direct me to a source that can?