Newbie question: what's a good distro for netbook to start with?
 

I've looked into quite a few and tbh I really need something I could pick right off and start doing work with. since running win7 on a netbook is just painful.
I am getting PingEee now and just wondering what you may suggest for a beginner on a netbook.
Many thanks.

Hi,

I've installed Peppermint OS on a couple of netbooks for friends and colleagues and they're very pleased with it. It boots very fast and has all you need to get started on board. Give it a try, I'm sure you'll like it.

PS: Sorry, didn't notice it's your first post here.

Welcome to LinuxQuestions. Looking forward to your participation in the forums.

Kind regards,

Eric

Hello himegoto, welcome to LQ,

Ubuntu comes with a "Netbook-Edition", the advantage is that the default install-method is via USB (because netbooks lack a DVD-drive) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ubuntu_Netbook_Edition

Also Mint is known as a good distribution for beginners and works well out of the box.

For better advice I'd recommend that you tell us more about the hardware-specifications of your netbook.

Markus

Canonical have now merged their Netbook Edition with their Ubuntu Standard Edition running Unity Desktop. :)
Still a good option for a newbie though!
I run Crunchbang on my Acer Aspire One ZG5 (AOA110L) It runs well and is very stable.

Thanks for the warm welcome and tips.
my netbook is from around this time last year, a samsung NF210 running at n550 1.5g cpu and a 1gb ram. I placed an order on a 2gb ram and expecting it in the coming week.
at this point I am really looking for a fast substitute to win7 for normal office work and browsing and youtubing. so really looking for a beginner and netbook friendly distro thats capable to work as a work station.
arch and crunchbang looks real slick to me but I guess it's a steep learning curve?
some of the xfce distros also appeal to me. is peppermint a lighter version of mint?
for now I'll install the PingEee I just finished downloading and report back for further questions.
do you also have some good pages for beginner guides? Thanks again.

I'm not a big Ubuntu fan for various reasons that have more to do with Canonical than with Ubuntu, but my netbook came with 8.04 from factory and is now running like a champ on 11.04.

I've been putting OpenSuse on my laptops for years now it just works.

I currently have Mandriva 2010.2 installed on my AAO, which I bought around '09 and haven't had any issues with it since. I'm also thinking of switching from Mandriva to Mageia, but Mandriva is running so perfectly on my netbook, that I hate to switch distros.

I have a Lenovo x100e with 2GB of RAM and 1.6 GHz prozessor (AMD 64 X2) I'm running Slackware64-13.37 on it.
With your hardware you can install any distribution on it, maybe the graphics is to weak for Gnome-3 or KDE.
Another constraint: I had Gentoo installed, but a subnotebook is not adequate for a distribution which expects every package to be compiled on the system. The machines become very hot and the fan is overstrained.
As a substitute for Windows I think (as above written) Ubuntu or Mint should be adequate.

Markus

I have Debian Squeeze on my Asus 1000PE and all is well.