I use Gimp, Inkscape and these run well on SimplyMepis 8, but I am flirting with a very quick AntiX RC-1...

I looked at Mint, toyed with PClinuxOS, and tried Bluewhite64 Linux again...

JR Namida

To Jeremy

Now I understand. I think I must whip off a massive number of posts! I loathe the expression "newbie" It's not even a proper word! Can't I be a "new member" instead?

I know you geeks will want to kick me hard, but I vote Ubuntu. I know Debian and Slackware and all that are expected to be better in many things and Ubuntu is for noobs and all that stuff but you can not expect any user of your OS not to be a noob.

Ubuntu is the desktop environment which is really an alternative to other non-open OS for the most of the people. Without Ubuntu my mother, father, sister, girlfriend, aunt, cousin and many neighbours wouldn't even knew open source existed and my parent's dog wouldn't be named Linux.

:^)
Yet You surf off Vista

where's slax?

I just had a skim over all the posts. How do all these distro-hoppers manage to get a personalised, organised setup on their computers, or get any method of work going. Imagine the scene:

"Ah! yes! I need to write a letter today, and I shall use openoffice. Now which distro shall I use? Shall I use openoffice on Debian, Slackware, Ubuntu, Mint, Mandriva, Redhat or one of the others?"

It has taken me a long time to get my linux functioning in the way I want it, and there is no way I could do that on half a dozen different varieties of linux.

How could a newbie choose one unless (s)he's tried them all? In the few months since I first discovered that Linux isn't "just for geeks," I've tried a few flavors and I like them all! Oh, decisions, decisions! I just can't pick a favorite in such a broad category!

If it was "best desktop for newbies," I'd prob'ly pick Mepis (even though I started in Ubuntu and kinda liked it).

If it was "best desktop to impress your geeky friends," I'd pick Crunchbang. Minimal, stark, mysterious, and beautiful, but oh-so-powerful and versatile. I keep it on a laptop. Awesomeness!

If it was "tried enough to kinda sorta know what I want now," I pick Debian (Testing)/Xfce4. I do hope they'll make an installer as easy as Ubuntu's though. The Netinstall is easy if you know just what you want, but I still don't know what I really need and want yet. And I keep changing my mind, lol.

If the poll was "best Xfce desktop for silly newbie dixiedancers," I'd pick Xubuntu, hands down. Easiest to share with friends, easiest for newbies using older hardware. Likely to become my "main" OS for home and school. It's familiar-looking enough and simple enough for several dancers (mostly kids) at the studio I teach at to use without any "coaching" from me. Most don't even know they're using Linux, and when they ask, I love to tell them (and share a live CD). Gaming? Meh. That's what the Playstation is for.

This is my first post! I've been lurking here for quite a while, reading and learning. Maybe I'll have something to offer others, but my experience so far has been so trouble free (except with PCLinuxOS which had hardware issues) thus far, I haven't had to fix very much. Thank you to Snowpine, who I met on Crunchbang's forums, for referring me here (a long time ago - you pro'lly don't even remember).

-Robin

Well, dixiedancer, knowing some of these distro's doesn't make the choice any easier

And welcome

I am not really distro hopper, but I do like to try different distros. I always have at least 3 different distros on my desktop and laptop.
I mostly run Slackware on my desktop. That is where I get stuff done. I will also use Ubuntu, Zenwalk, or Debian on the desktop though. The laptop sees a rotation of different distros. I always have Ubuntu on the laptop. The other distros on the laptop are what ever I feel like checking out at the time.
If you run multiple distros, the thing that is a bit time consuming is keeping them all up to date; and keeping up with new developments in all your distros. I can get work done on just about any distro I have ever tried though.
Configuring a linux system to your liking becomes easier the more you do it. Under the hood, there are more similarities than differences between different distros. The variety comes with the package managers and the distro specific configuration tools.
Your profile says you use Gentoo. If you can handle Gentoo, you should easily be able to manage Ubuntu, Debian, Zenwalk, Slackware, Mandriva, or just about anything else. Those are the distros that I mostly follow. I am accustomed to how they work, so it is not all that difficult to use them all.

One of the great things about linux is that it is all about choice. Some say there are too many distros to choose from. Others say the more distros there are the better. Personally, I have always hated giant "too big to fail" monopolies or duopolies. The way I see it, the more decentralized and diversified the linux community is, the better off we all are.
You are already ahead of the game in learning about different distros since you hang out here at LQ. This is arguably the best "one stop shopping" source for all your linux distro needs.
I also like reading reviews. Distrowatch has links to many reviews for all distros on their top 100 list.
Also, http://howtoforge.com/ has their "perfect desktop" series of beginner friendly how-to articles on how to install and configure many linux distros.

Arch has been my OS for a couple of years now, I can't see using anything else with any regularity. I love the simplicity and that it helps me learn more about Linux in general.

At the same time, I also love Ubuntu. It's not just a great linux newbie distro, it just works when I need it to. I don't always have time to go through an Arch setup (not that it's difficult, except on that pesky broadcom wireless chipset on so many laptops) and Ubuntu is convenient and easy.

I do quite a bit of distro toying, usually on a secondary machine.
I run Debian on my living room big screen machine, Ubuntu on a netbook, PC-BSD on a laptop, and FreeBSD on my main work machine. That one has so many VMs on it that it's approaching silliness

As for "writing a letter" or whatever - usually I just grab whatever machine is closest!

Mandriva was my first distro and still my favorite, and it seems to get faster and better with every release.

I would have voted for 'none' this year.
In fact I quite liked fedora10 until I realized the distros are only mantained for about a year! And after it started freezing at some random time like a windows95 I am wondering if it is worth the trouble. But it is still the niciest distro. So none for this year.