What's the best Linux for a newbie?
 

My friend has a collection of Linux OS's on ISO discs, and he said that I can borrow them any time I'd like to put them on. I've grown rather tired of Redhat, even though I still really like it. I enjoy its simplicity and all but I might be ready for something a bit more impressive. I'm still new at this but what would be good for me? Here is what I'm kind of interested in:

Suse

BSD

Slackware

Peanut

Are any of these too much OS for me to handle? I want something easy and simple. Are there any that act like Win? (Although I don't really want Mandrake...)

One other question: Does anyone know by chance of which Java I need to download to run Limewire on Redhat?

suse

limewire only requires jre, if i recall... i suppose the linux rpm here: http://java.com/en/download/linux_manual.jsp should do it

OK, thanks. I was leaning towards Suse actually. What makes the others hard[er]? Do you have to code or something? They said at the Limewire forums that you had to have some sort of Java but I dunno, I downloaded the .bin file if that helps at all..

EDIT: Oh what am I talking about? That is Java, nevermind...

the others are harder, because they have "more typewriter, and less computer" in them...

http://homestarrunner.com/sbemail34.html

With a current favorite running, leave room and try any distros that strike your fancy.
Your opinion of what you like is worth a lot more than other people's opinions of what you like.
For a newbie, anything that installs on your hardware and has the instructions you need is best.

My friend says he loves Peanut, but I haven't really checked it out to be honest with you. Suse looks cool, Slackware looks like it's for the pro's and BSD I haven't heard very much about, but it kind of looks cool. Could someone send me a link of the possible desktops to some of these OS's? (Maybe BSD, Suse, Fendora and a couple of others) thanks.

you can put desktops on any of the systems... then you can customize those desktops to make them look like the screen shots... the big boys are kde and gnome, but there are lots of choices.

like 2dc said... try it out... test the waters... we can debate what'd be best for you 'till underverse come, but you won't have any better grasp on what actually suits you best (and that'll probably change anyways...)

Hmm... ok thanks. I use KDE on my Redhat. It's just that RH deeply bores me sometimes is all. I don't want something too difficult, but I do need a change. I think Suse would probably fit me best in this situation. Well thanks for the help.

BSD and Slackware probably aren't for you just yet but in saying that I don't mean avoid them like the plague or anything :)

Never used Slackware, used FreeBSD and I'm installing OpenBSD as we speak so we'll see how that goes :p Suse is a nice newbie distro and I've never used Peanut to have a clue.

I am a newbie:newbie: and I like slackware 10.0.
I am running fluxbox as wm and it is very fast on an old P2.

Slack helped me learn alot of command line stuff I missed in suse 9.
Plus = really stable.

My .02

Regards,
Blair

Judging only from your list, I'd go with SuSE.

If your fed up with redhat, Suse probably will bore you too. I Gotta go with Slackware. If you used redhat and don't like it, suse is about the same.

I always felt that I only really started understanding Linux once I got into Slackware, now I try just about every new distro I can find but every single time I end up going back to Slackware. Its true that its not as easy to configure as some but I've also used FreeBSD a bit and found that harder than Slack.

Another good thing, I just installed LimeWire last night on a default Slack 10.1 install and it worked straight away, I didn't need to download anything extra. :D

i completely agree... nobody really learns 'linux' from rh/fc or suse or the likes... those providers have such warped versions of linux that you won't learn much unless you run a less 'newbie-friendly' version...

slack comes with jre, that's why