What is the best distro for a Laptop?
 

Hello.
I've tried Fedora on my Laptop, a Toshiba Tecra S1, but after my first update, everything crashed! I think that wireless internet is not an easy thing to configure, the battery status isn't accurate, some functions of the Toshiba (such as those with the Fn key like switching screens, brightness, standby, etc) are not easy to get or to configure etc. So I wonder, is there a really good distro, or one better than another, to use for a laptop since its different than a desktop? Or they all behave the same regardless wheter its a laptop or not? I'd like to have your advise / personnal experience regarding that question!
Thx alot!
Max

It's got to be Slackware [but then again, I guess I'm kinda biased in my choice]. The only reason that I'd say is that it's the only distro that had an excellent install configuration. It was the only distro out of several that I tried that would accept my PCMCIA ethernet card without any problem at all. All of the other distros required an hour of tinkering to get it fully working [and Debian had a horrible buffer problem that I could never solve].

Anyway, you know what the usual advice is here. Try loads out, and see what you like :).

Ok, thats why I ask the question since downloading the CDs (around 3 per distro) is quite long and I have a limit of download to respect ;-) I only have tried Fedora now, and now I want to know which one would fit the best for a laptop. I got up a wired connection under Fedora quite easily, but since I have wireless and its a laptop, I don't fully benifit all the possibilities. That's why I have to stick to Windows now if I want to work wireless!

Well, I have peanut linux and it is one 340 mb cd. It is quite nice if you ask me.

Slackware is only two cd's, the other two are source cd's.

Mandrake is a lot of cd's and I dont like it at all.

Maybe Gentoo? I dont know. Ive never used it but I hear you make your system the way you want.

You could try knoppix, isnt that installable too? I thought it was.

mandrake works perfectly on mine.

It tries to put too much crap on my computer. I hate it, I like minimalistic ones which allow me to put what I want on, not include stupid crap like games. I mean comeon here, who really is gonna wanna play crappy games like that?

I think it does as i have only tried Suse apart from it. But I prefer Mandy as they have easy urpmi thingy. One can remove lots of things or select during the installation process.
SS

So saurya, do you think Mandrake 9.2 would fit nice for a laptop, that they have options that are suitable for a laptop? I don't know if you have a laptop or if you know that, but I ask!
And Pauli, I wasn't really complaining for the size but I cannot test them all (well maybe!) and have a complete experience (that requires some time)!
I'm thinking about trying Mandrake 9.2 next, saurya, do you have a laptop?

Yes, it is running perfectly on my laptop which has its specs in my signature, the only thing you will have to install the modem driver. Or just wait for mandrake 10 which should be out shortly.
Best

OK thanks for your input!
And people, do you ave any suggestions about a good distro that would suit well a laptop?
Thx everybody,
Max

Slackware :)

What does slackware has more than other distro that would suit to laptops?
I often hear about Slackware and Mandrake, they seems to be good choice?
Thx,
Max

I aint the one to ask, I just like it. I find it minimalistic without alot of crap on it. It may not have a pretty gui installer, but it is easy. Ask one of the slack physcos :)

gentoo is very nice for laptops in which space is limited and also hard to expand, you can install ONLY what you want/need and if you search the gentoo forums you need you can find a thread about a cflag which will cause your entire setup to be about 1/3-1/2 the size with the same functionality, however, it does break a number of apps which will mean you will need to go back and recompile that app and its dependancies without the small flag if you tinker with it though it can make thigns very very nice

Ok thx again for your comments, I take note of them.
watas* (too long!), I don't think space is a big issue when installing a distro, I currently allocate 5G for Fedora, which is plenty, but I can even go up to 10 without any problems.
It seems that Pauli is very "minimalistic" as he likes to say ;-) But I don't care if there are games or other stuff I won't use.. maybe i'll need some softwares later! So for space there is no problem.
Max