No, I don't know exactly what that means either, but I'd bet that you are more likely to be happy with KDE than Gnome. KDE 4 is still a work in progess, so try to get the latest KDE 4 that you can (or KDE 3.x...some themes look ok, and it is as stable as a very stable thing, but it isn't the last word in eye candy). It may be a bit much for your hardware, so Enlightenment or XFCE may be better suited there, but most of the lightweights like XFCE give up eye candy for lightness.

Although, overall, Gnome tends to be a bit more Mac-ish than KDE. The upcoming version should be a bit more eye candy, but initial releases of software tend to a bit rough around the edges, so it is unclear whether you'd be able to put up with that.

Try a few Live CDs; you don't have to install and can get a feel for different versions essentially for free (the cost of a download and a blank CD); that should give you a better idea of what you want. In any case, in no particular order, you might like to try some of:

Ubuntu/Kubuntu
Simply Mepis
Mint
openSUSE
Fedora

and if these feel too heavyweight:
Puppy
DSL
Slitaz

The very last KDE + maximum of Compiz. It will require powerful computer but will be really eye-candy. Probably the most eye-candy of GNU/Linux these days...

P. S.
But I personally like this style:
http://distrowatch.com/images/cgfjoe...stemrescue.png
http://www.guidebookgallery.org/screenshots/win2000pro
If I was creating my own operating system, I would make GUI like these above.

Compiz probably isn't necessary, KWin (KDE's default window manager) has a lot of cool 3D effects.

With 512 MB RAM I would avoid KDE and Gnome too for that matter except to familiarize yourself with linux for a bit(I'd still go Gnome). I think the lighter DE's can look awesome with effort. I personally think fluxbox looks pretty nice with some of the stock wallpapers. It becomes more attractive with the lack of clutter and when you see how fast and responsive your underpowered hardware becomes.

Thanks guys!!
I just installed Ubuntu and i am very happy with it.

This i smy second time installing it on my computer. (I just got an iPod touch and i cant sync with it, so now i am dual booting XP and Ubuntu.