Best stable distros based on Debian, CentOs, Slackware and FreeBSD?
 

Hello,


I am looking for the distros based on Debian stable, CentOs, Slackware and FreeBSD which are most stable, yet easy to use and the best in all other aspects. Its difficult to just use Debian, CentOs, Slackware and FreeBSD because it would need high skills. I am a newbie and up till now I have come to the conclusion that these four distros are the most stable and the best. So distros based on them which are user friendly yet do not compromise the stability and all the good aspects would be the best option to begin using Linux. So kindly inform. :)

Welcome to LQ.
Honestly I don't get the exact reasons behind reluctance of not using the distros you mentioned.Have you tried any one of these before by hand?
I'd sincerely suggest you to first try them/any of either in as a VM or in a spare machine, you might get your thoughts of 'required high skills' reorganized.
You can get an a fully functional desktop, ready for use (With minor setting up) as a home workstation or server with these distros, without requiring really high skills of *NIX, just little patience.


Or, if you already have made up your mind on this, try LMDE(Mint-debian) or PCBSD(FreeBSD+nice GUI) or Mepis(Debian Stable). (And BTW CentOS itself is based on Redhat)

Won't mention Slackware, there are some things better be used original. :D

Regards.

Salix is a more GUI-orientated distro, based on Slackware.

Errrr. Kanotix or Mepis or Semplice or Crunchbang or LMDE or Siduction or Antix for Debian Live though some I recommend isn't too stable, (depends on default windows manager and repo preferences). Some are testing based. Some Unstable based.

Scientific Linux for CentOS maybe. Or PCLOS. Or Open Suse.

Don't have any exerience with BSD based distros.

I pay attention to this guys blog also.

http://extonlinux.wordpress.com/

besides DistroWatch.

Salix is very friendly, especially if you get the live CD rather than the plain installer. The pdf guide is good, too. It addes extra software, but most comes straight out of the Slackware repository.

Mepis has an excellent installer, with pop-up help. It's not quite Debian stable; as an annual release (Debian is alternate years) they don't always wait for a new version of a program to make it from Testing to Stable, but they are very careful what they accept.

They make a good pair, one with Xfce as default, the other with KDE: the most sensible and stable of GUIs. They also have similar package management tools, apt-get and slapt-get.

CentOS is not really difficult, if you are content with what's on the DVD. The only problem is setting priorities for extra repositories if you're not (see CentOS website). My trials and errors suggest 1 for CentOS, 2 for EPEL, 3 for RPMforge, and 4 for atrpms.

BSD of any variety is a very different thing to Linux. Don't try to juggle too many things, or you'll start confusing them!

My vote is choose one of these three: Debian, CentOS, and Slackware (I'm not a BSD user so no recommendation there). If you must use a derivative for some reason, Ubuntu and Mint are the two most popular.

It is right to expect a learning curve; Linux has a different definition of "user friendly" than Windows or Mac. Do you have a teacher/mentor to help you learn?

The most popular, but they do not fulfill the OP's requirements:I still think that from the mentioned distros Debian is the one that is the best for beginners that want an easy distribution, may be together with CentOS, while Slackware has a slightly steeper learning curve and with FreeBSD being a totally different thing.

Can you elaborate? I found Ubuntu and Mint to be stable and very easy to use in my experience. If your experience was otherwise then please share.

Obviously I think Debian is a better choice, but the OP seems convinced Debian is "too hard" and desirous of a Debian derivative (such as Ubuntu or Mint) to "get the feet wet." :)

Some people say that Mepis is in fact Debian Stable. But even if it is not pure Debian stable, for me it would be sufficient to know if it is as stable as Debian. I am looking for stable deriatives of Debian, CentOs and Slackware. I have deleted FreeBSD from the list. As it is not Linux. I have also searched for the deriatives for the three distros and come to this conclusion:


1- Debian 6 Squeeze based: Simply Mepis, Saline OS, Solus OS, Snow Linux. Kindly comment on them if you have used them. Regarding Ubuntu and its deriatives, though they are Debian testing based; they are far from stable.


2- Slackware: The best which everyone recommends is Salix OS. Is it as stable as Slackware? Also is there any other like this?


3- CentOs: Though it itself is a deriative of Red Hat Enterprise Linux, it is a not commercial like Red Hat and is freely available for everyone to use. I have read that it is as stable as RHEL and is exactly the same thing. But one thing which discourages is that it is just an OS for enterprises. Its not a general purpose OS like Debian and Slackware and their deriatives. I am very surprised that no one tried to create a user friendly, general purpose deriative of CentOs which works out of the box. Are there some legal problems?


Also since I am here I would definitely use the pure Debian 6, Slackware and CentOs with your help and guidance once I use the deriatives.:)

Of course, I used Ubuntu form 8.04 to 9.10 and have made the experience that every new release was a bit more buggy and less stable than the one before. Also, I came to the conclusion, when looking at bug-reports and forums that the developers were at all times more concentrated to develop the new release than fixing bugs in older releases (I can't blame them for that, with such a short and fixed release cycle i doubt that they had other possibilities). That (and some other things in Canonical's policy) caused me to change to Debian when 10.04 was released buggy. Man, that was a LTS release, which they have intended for business users.
Even Canonical recommends not to upgrade to 12.04 until the first point release, which is basically the same as saying: Wait, we know that we have released an unstable OS, give us time to fix it before you even try to use it.
When even Canonical is not recommending their OS for users that want a stable system then I won't do it either. Since Mint only adds a few packages of their own repositories and otherwise use Ubuntu's software I doubt that it will be much more stable.
To the easy to use part, yes, both are easy to use for a beginner, nothing to complain about here.
For the third part, "do not compromise the stability and all the good aspects", stability is already ruled out, so let's come to all the good aspects. The good aspects of those OSes are that they all are very stable, very well tested, with CentOS being compatible to a de-facto industrial standard (RHEL), are not very demanding when it comes to hardware resources and I think some more that don't come to my mind now.

I still don't know why Debian is said to be hard. In my experience I had to do the same things to get Ubuntu installed as I did Debian. With Ubuntu you still have to mess around getting CODECs working, for example, and adding the Debian multimedia repository is hardly difficult. Smilarly, restricted drivers install is still a manual stwp under Ubuntu even if it is a bit quicker than the ticking boxes and changing packaged under Debian.
Once the install is done, which perhaps takes a couple more steps under Debian, you are left with a system which takes exactly yhe same skills to use and keep up to date as Ubuntu.
Mint is, granted, quicker to install due to the non-free stuff but, again, once installed it takes the same knowledge to ise and keep up to date as Debian.
To my mind if you've a non-techie person who wants or needs to install Linux, and you can't be there to help, then Mint is probably a good way to go. If you've any IT knowledge and you can follow instructions then you may as well use Debian.
The only drawback I can think of selecting Debian Stable over Ubuntu or Mint is you will be stuck with older packages. This is great for stability but if, like me, you like to try new stuff you can end up using Sid.

Interesting comments TobiSGD. To be honest I haven't used Ubuntu much since 9.04, from what you are saying, it sounds like you think the product has gone downhill. Ubuntu was a great introduction to Linux for me back in 2007, I'd be sad if that is no longer the case in 2012. :(

I myself started with Ubuntu, too, was a great experience for me, but I really have seen it going downhill, which for me was the reason to change. In the beginning Ubuntu really was a kind of 'easy beginner distro', but IMHO that has shifted to 'MacOS X/Windows-rival distro' and with that shift they have sadly adopted some of the flaws of their rivals. That is also the reason (besides some other things in Canonical's policy like the tries of vendor lock-in, the weird contributors contract and the astonishing general behavior as have they have invented Linux without even mentioning Linux) why I refrain from recommending Ubuntu to beginners and more likely recommend Mepis or other beginner friendly distros.

Just my conclusion from what I have seen, of course other people will see that totally different.

DavidMcCann,


Kindly clarify why Mepis is not quite Debian stable as everywhere it is mentioned that it is based on Debian stable and some say that Mepis IS Debian stable. I could not understand your above mentioned information for Mepis. :)

After searching I found the best deriative for Red Hat Enterprise Linux and that is Scientific Linux. I would prefer it over CentOs. Anyway, I think I should just begin with Debian 6 Squeeze as some of you have advised. I have downloaded the 8 DVDs for Debian 6. I know that the first one is for installing the system. Kindly inform me about the remaining 7. Are they required to be installed with the first DVD just after the OS installation or they can be kept after installing the OS and used later whenever to install the required apps?

I'm using Scientific Linux since v.5.5. I still use 6.2 but as a VM. You'll get a 'bit' better out of the box things like ntfs support in SL over CentOS right after installation. I must've recommended it.

Regards.

if you are brand new to gnu/Linux meaning do you know basic linux jargon ect if you are then that's another vote for mepis from me. mepis is generally the distro I recommend for new users anyways. If you know a little bit about linux, go plain debian. I'd describe it as the 'easiest' to use out of the listed distros. you asked about the DVDs. only the first DVD is required to get a nice full featured working system, the rest are just more packages for people with low bandwidth, which I doubt you have since you were able to download all 8 (that would take me 8 months) I purchased the set when I first tried debian. you will be asked to scan those extra DVDs during the install but this is only for the purpose of setting up the appropriate repositories. later on once debians running you can use them DVDs to install most things. its recommended to use an online repository though to make sure you get the latest updates.

Debian 'stable' can be considered 2 ways-

1- its 'stable' in the sense that all the packages have been tested, bugfixed and shouldnt have any major software problems.
2- its 'stable' in that the packages/software doesnt change. There are security updates, but its very very rare to see 'new' packages/software for 'stable' debian releases.

So if you take debian stable, and for example change firefox from 3.X to 10.X+, the software hasnt been tested to work with all the other software in debian. So its no longer as tested, bugfixed etc. as 'true' debian stable.

Its also no longer 'stable' as in 'packages dont change' either.

Ubuntu 'normal' (non-LTS) releases are based on debian 'sid', only LTS releases are based on debia 'testing'.

There are a few CentOS and RHEL based distros around. Like the distros they are based on, they tend to be for server/networking use.

Its the same thing as with debian stable, the stablity of Red Hat and CentOS is due to testing. Getting CentOS or Red Hat, then adding a whole boat-load of newer software means you now have a whole system that hasnt been tested to work together.

To compare CentOS 6.2 (released 2011-12-20) and debian 6.0 (released 2011-02-06) as an example, CentOS has older versions of quite a bit of software, even though it was released after debian 6.0.

IMO CentOS and Red Hat are great server releases. While you can beat almost any linux distro into doing whatever you desire, debian is probably a better distro to base a 'general purpose' OS on when you compared to CentOS or Red Hat.

Not that I see much point of 'based on' distros in a lot of cases, quite often its just a different software selection, or a different installer. I'm mainly talking about debian based distros here, there are a few 'based on distros' I've been impressed with, like Salix. I'm not a big slackware user though, I cant really comment on salix vs slackware as far as stablity goes.

If you want to run debian stable, run debian stable. If you want to sod around with tiny distros like SnowLinux, go ahead. I dont think its going to make your life much, if any easier in mosty cases..and gettign help could be a lot harder than if you are running the bigger distro release.

Adding debian multimedia isnt hard at all. I sometimes wonder how much people who are having post-install problems with debian actually use a search engine to get answers.......

%&^$ jockey (ubuntu 'hardware drivers' tool) is a lot of the reason why debian has a reputation for being 'harder' than the *buntus.

1- Some people seem unable to find the debian page on how to get/install closed drivers.
2- Some people just flip out at the idea of modifing sources.list and adding non-free.
3- Some people dont like having to 'use command line to add non-free (and going back to point #1, they dont seem able to search and figure out you dont have to use command line to do that).

Possibly #4 as well- "ubuntu is meant to be easier, I've run it, it works, now I've installed debian and I cant figure it out, therefore everyone was right and debian is harder"

I've even heard people say that debian is harder "because there are 2 passwords, and sudo doesnt work".........

There is also the difference between debian and ubuntu users. Yeah, I'm making a massive generalisation.

Debian users are more likely to want to install only what they need, and if it takes a few more minutes, or they have to go back to command line/synaptic to get gstreamer-plugins-ugly, that is better than loading up all the gstreamer packages. Ubuntu users are less likely to care about 'cruft', unneeded packages, etc.. So they just install the ubuntu-restricted-extras package and that is that.

If you have an internet conenction, you only need CD#1, or even the 'netinst' (a very basic and small image, that just allows booting and then gets the rest of the software from the debian software repository).

DVD#1 to #8 is great for installing offline, you have access to all the debian software on discs. If you've got a decent internet connection, getting more than DVD#1 is a waste, as you can get the same software from the repository. The versions if the repository will be the newest with current security fixes, etc..

Scientific Linux, which is one of them, provides the Icewm because some of the desktops and laptops at CERN are too old to run Gnome or KDE; evidently they don't think its only for servers. And Red Hat offers two versions: server and desktop.

I think you've just explained why some of use don't like Debian! The tone of the clique at the Debian forum...

To return to the questions of the original poster:

1 The difference between Mepis and Debian Stable.
Debian Stable comes out in alternate years. That means that after a year there will be many programs in the Testing repository that are just as well tested as those in the Stable repository, but they can't go in the Stable repository because it's not due to come out yet. Distros like Mepis and SalineOS have a new version every year, so they can add such programs to their repositories.

2 The difference between Salix and Slackware
Salix has a rather simpler installer, probably the best system for installing from USB for those that want it, a graphical package manager by default, Xfce by default, and more software. They also use a package manager that sorts out the dependencies for you, while Slackware leaves you to do it yourself. But where a program is in both distros, it's identical. If fact, it's not physically present in the Salix repository at all. All they have is the dependency information, and the files are actually downloaded from Slackware.

You don't need to guess; Debian has excellent documentation! :)

http://www.debian.org/releases/stable/installmanual

Assuming you have an internet connection, you only need CD1/DVD1, to install the base system, then you install additional packages from the internet using aptitude/apt-get.

If you don't have an internet connection, then it may be helpful to have a complete CD/DVD set to use as a local repository. The CD/DVD's are divided by popularity of packages, so the most frequently-installed stuff is on DVD1.

With the help of this forum, (This forum is a great place to get advise and has some very good and cooperative members indeed!)I have somehow received the answer to my first question regarding stable distros based on, as below:




1- Debian 6 Squeeze: Simply Mepis, Saline OS, Solus OS, Snow Linux. (Though they are not pure Debian stable but usually quite stable distros)


2- Slackware: Salix OS. (Quite stable)


3- Red Hat Enterprise Linux: Scientific Linux (As stable as RHEL and a general purpose OS; not just based on Enterprise). Dropped CentOS!



I would begin with Debian 6 squeeze. I have found two installation instructions on google. The first is about how to install Debian with Windows 7 dual boot which I intend to follow. There is another guide just for reference.


http://www.linuxbsdos.com/2011/02/17...and-windows-7/


http://www.howtoforge.com/perfect-se...ze-ispconfig-2



I downloaded all the 8 DVDs in my office PC where the internet is very fast. At home where I wish to install Debian on my own PC, I have a slow internet connection. So I would request you to kindly inform how to properly use these DVDs. I intend to use the first DVD just for installing the OS and the remaining 7 to keep them with me for apps installation later. So during installation the installer would require the 7 DVDs for scanning. And would it just scan the DVDs or install some apps too. I would like it to just scan and allow me to keep the DVDs for later use. Kindly throw some light of this process. How it all would be done? Inform kindly.:)

as I said in my previous reply, during the install it will request you scan any additional discs. once your system is up and running you just open the terminal su to root, and aptitude install Foo and it will do some calculations and then it will tell you to insert one of the discs and it will tell you which one too. you insert it and it will install Foo package, that simple.

Thanks Knightron. :)

If you want a Stable Debian that is easy to use get DebianLive. Give it a run before you install it and then just click the install icon. Others have mentioned about adding repositories, it's easy and it is Stable.

I wanted to switch to Linux this year. I'm tired of Windows and I want something new. Since I'm complete noob for anything other than M$, I look around to find the "best" distros (for noobs like me), and downloaded few of them for a test drive. And here is my experience for Linux Mint 12, Linux Mint 12 KDE, Ubuntu (latest) and Zorin.

They are all fast, nice looking, absolutely great when run from USB. Installed .... Oh my God ... Cannot install drivers for my ATI card. The one that they recommend (Jockey I think) doesn't work ("Unsupported model" notice on the screen with extremely high flickering. Unusable). I managed to download official ATI driver, but it cannot be installed before old one is uninstalled. But Jockey says that old driver is not "Active", and yet it is installed if someone can guess from the message on the screen and ATI installer. After one hour of learning linux basic principles, I finally managed to manually uninstall old one, and install official driver. But there is no HD acceleration so watching 720p videos is really painful (on Windows there is HD Acceleration for this card).

On the straight 12 version (Gnome?) shell is restarting on almost every mouse click. KDE on the other hand, did not have problems with restarting shell, but as soon I installed Skype - everything goes to pieces. On both versions.

Maybe it is on Mint only. Let's try Ubuntu ... Crap. Same thing, absolutely same thing on all distros. So either I'm professional Linux OS destroyer, or something is wrong here.

Zorin is the example how Linux should look for all the noobs like me. However, it has the same problems as previous three mentioned. For some reason, Skype successfully kills every distro after few hours of work.

Gnome, on all distros is restarting all the time and freezes from time to time. Absolutely unusable. And BTW, It's UI/UX in the latest iteration is absolute nonsense.

All versions had problems with waking up after lid close. They will not wake up, no matter what button you press, so hard restart is the only solution. That god damned skype doesn't work until you tweak it with pulseaudio volume control - left mic 100%, right mic 0%. WTF?

My conclusion? Unbelievable unusable and unstable systems. UNBELIEVABLE! On my previous netbook I had Ubuntu, I think version 10, and I cant remember that I had this type of the problems. To test if my notebook is a problem, I've installed Zorin on my wife eMachines netbook (Intel Atom / 2GB DDRAM). Completely same thing but without GPU driver problems. Freeze, restart, crash ...


And what about my machine? Acer Aspire One 722, AMD C60 processor with integrated graphics and 2GB of DDRAM. All systems are installed as ONLY ONE, so no dual boot, plain and clean.

Conclusion - If you need Skype and stable system for everyday work - avoid Ubuntu, Mint and Zorin. Pitty, 'cause I really like Zorin :(

Waow! You are either an M$ troll, truly jinked or just have no idea about how to install anything but W$.

I am using Kubuntu 12.04 with Skype and I have no problems whatsoever. I have used Skype on Mepis, Suze, Antix, etc... with no issues either. I would not be surprised thought if Skype started to become a problem on account that it is now owned by M$!

If you are truly interested in Linux start by picking a distro, Zorin, if you like it so much. The distro should be the latest one so that it will be based on a recent Kernel that would support the latest hardware. Join the distro forum and share your issues there to learn how to resolve them, Linux forums are helpful and welcoming.

Linux is way more stable than W$ by any account. Yes there are issues with some drivers like ATI. But even those vendors that are complete M$ poodles are finally coming around and supporting Linux.

Michel

11 months after the previous post you join and decide to call someone a troll! Aren't you off to a great start.

I was browsing the thread and I did join to call the spade a spade. Just could not help myself.

The OP started the thread to get an honest answer for his query and that guy (who also happen to have just one post!) jumps in and posts his biased and scare mongering post (If you want to use Skype DON'T even think about Linux!).

I just felt I had to set the record straight for anyone who would happen to read this thread in the future. It's a great thread with a lot of useful info.

Michel

I totally understand setting the record straight but calling someone a troll who hasn't even logged in for 10 months is a little strong. Anyway welcome to LQ.

One that hasn't been mentioned that might be considered is Stella (CentOS derived):

http://li.nux.ro/stella/

As for the others, Salix for Slackware, Crunchbang for Debian, PC-BSD for FreeBSD (I know you said you dropped FreeBSD, but worth considering).

Note: Crunchbang is Debian testing, but pretty stable in my experience.

Good luck! (But I say, just throw yourself headlong into Slackware, you won't regret it!)

Sorry if I was out of line.

Michel

How stable is slackware compared to Debian Stable, RHL or BSD?

Thanks,

Michel

I would say Slackware and BSD are comparable in terms of stability. Debian and RHL, which do more patching of upstream software, perhaps a bit less so, although they are both considered very stable in their own right.

There's a thread about stability of Slackware vs Debian Stable and the consensus seems to be that Slackware can be marginally more stable when updating because the lack of dependency resolution doesn't result in situations where the update of one package breaks or removes another.

Kubuntu 12.04, Xubuntu 12.04 or Mint 13 - all based on LTS Ubuntu release which was good (and stable), IMHO much better than Ubuntu itself, very good repositories and newbie friendly.

If slackware is that stable, why is it not considered an enterprise distro? Separately how difficult is it to use slackware vs Debian?

thanks,

Michel

I'm not sure what you mean by being considered an "enterprise distro"* but I suspect it is because Slackware is produced by a small team and there is no official paid-for support channel. This contrasts with Red Hat (who term their product Enterprise Linux) who are a large corporation with support contracts you pay for. What this means practically, I suppose, is that you're a little more "on your own" with Slackware. Also the small development team means that some people have anxiety about using it because they fear it "may disappear" -- though in reality this is not that likely.
As to which is easiest I'll stick my head above the parapet and say that, in general, for a new user to set up and use Debian is a little quicker and easier as you have to know very little to do so. However, if you follow the install instructions for Slackware and are willing to learn you may find it easier as it is more flexible in some ways.
They often say if you learn to use Debian you're learning Debian but if you learn to use Slackware you're learning to use Linux. I'd say that's a slight exaggeration but it's broadly true enough to repeat.

*I think I know roughly what you mean but is Debian considered "enterprise"? I'd say reliability and size-wise perhaps but the fact you can't pay for it means some enterprises won't touch it. For some enterprises they have to pay for software practically by law for liability reasons.

Sorry to keep on dwelling but I want to benefit from your knowledge of slackware :-)

Is Salix as stable as slackware and as easy to use as Debian?

Is networking using samba straightforward? Can it be done through Webmin?

I need to use the following applications can I find them in the slackware repos?:

- KDE
- Libreoffice
- Chromium
- Hplip
- Webmin
- Dropbox
- Inkscape
- TrueCrypt
- Gimp
- Skype
- Avidemux

Separately is PCBSD easier to setup and use? Is it being developed by a "larger" team than slackware?

Thanks,

Michel

I don't really have anything to add to 273's answer, he pretty much nailed it there.

In my experience Salix is solid, probably at least as much as Slackware itself. Easier to get up and running quicker than Slackware-proper, and therefore about as easy as Debian. I network with samba on my Slackware box here at work just fine; not familiar with Webmin.

As for the apps you call out for Slackware: KDE is there on the installation, as is hplip and Gimp. Everything else is probably available at SlackBuilds.org.

I don't really have any experience with PC-BSD, but I hear it sets up pretty easy, nice GUI installer.

It's only a slight exaggeration. When I started with Slackware I started evolving my own "Slackware Administration" document. After a while I realised most of it was not specific to Slackware so I split it into two documents -- "Slackware Administration" and "Linux Administration". The first is ~20% the size of the second.

@ michelm, if you haven't already, try Slackware. I personally am not a fan of Ubuntu, but it was the first Linux distro i successfully got running on my first computer. I was impressed with the guis (Gnome2 and kde), but not the system its self. I found it unreliable and unstable, and considered moving back to Windows 7. The next distro i seriously tried (still a complete noob mind you, unaware even of what a text editor was) was Slackware. Slackware is what got me hooked on Linux. I'm using it now, and consider it my equal favorite distro with Debian stable, and Opensuse. I learned a lot from it, and it is not hard at all. Download the podcast 'Linux Reality'. It's a great podcast by Slackware enthusiast and contributor Chess Griffin. Download the 'special episode 1, Slackware' episode. It helped me heaps when i starte; and read the documentation. I never used to, but since learning a little about how to Slack, i read a little more. Slackware is awesome, all you need to do is give it a go.
What about Salix you ask. I don't like Salix a real lot. That is my opinion though. I like the idea though. Slackware comes with a lot of programs installed (on a full install, which is recommended). This annoys me and is one thing i particularly enjoy about Debian and Opensuse. Salix goes by the 'one program for one job' motto which i really like. Slackware doesn't have a repository comparable to Debians, or Opensuses, or most other distros. What you get on the full install is it. Because of this, third party repos are often used by Slackers, particularly slackbuilds,org, which is a fantastic resauce by other Slackers. Salix has a repo, but it is still pretty limited. Slackwares package manager, pkgtool, does not manage dependencies, so on slackbuild, any dependencies not installed on a full install, are clearly labeled. Unfortunately for Salix, their installs have made a lot of cuts in programs (deliberately) and this can cause a few issues with Slackbuilds. Salix have their own tools to try to resolve this issue and others caused by the same thing, but in my experience, their tools don't work well.

In summery, i like the idea of Salix, but i don't think it works well.
Try Slackware, you'll probably have less trouble than with Salix; and you won't regret it.

Thank you all for your insights.

I think I will give Slackware a try. I need to get a non production machine to play on.

I agree regarding Ubuntu. I tried using it on many occasions and always had issues, I also do not like Gnome that much.

Kubuntu on the other hand is a very good distro. I am using 12.04 lts and I have to admit that it has a very nice balance between ease of use, features, repos and stability. I screwed my install by installing some backports and I just did a clean vanilla reinstall that I will leave as is for now.

I find that Linux is sort of loosing its purpose a bit as I have a feeling that people who turn to Linux are not finding what they are looking for.

I left W$ because I was fed up with using one lousy OS after the other and I looked for Linux as a solution for that lack of stability / bloated software / and the need to keep on upgrading OS and hardware. My first couple of years using Linux were great, then I started realizing the core issues at play. Stick to old / outdated and stable or seek uptodate and forgo stability + reinstall every 6 month!

It seems to me that we need a 3 to 4 years stable OS with a thorough backport support to get the best of both worlds.

Michel

Use an LTS.

Regarding Ubuntu vs Kubuntu, the same issues of instability are in both because the only difference is the Desktop Environment. The fact that Kubuntu does not really have official support anymore compared to Ubuntu tells me that in the long run Ubuntu will be more stable with its DE.

12.04 is an lts but by backporting KDE 4.10 and Gimp the system became unstable, that's why I am calling for a stable lts but with a more comprehensive backporting that is well tested and well supported to keep applications uptodate without breaking the system.

Michel

Have you tried Mepis? It is a very good distro based on Debian stable. I've used the Mepis repos with Debian stable on many occasions. Not everything can be backported due to incompatibility issues, such as upgrading gtk to get upgraded Gimp, but many other upgraded packages are available.

That would be an LTS with an optional rolling release backport system, which will lead to all kinds of problems, especially when the backports need newer core components than the LTS has in its repositories. That is the reason why you don't see such a thing with distros with a large repository (like Debian or Ubuntu). For some applications you may have at least a part of updated software, like Slackware in combination with AlienBobs KTown repository for new KDE versions.

Yes Mepis was my first distro. I started with 8.5 and them moved to 11. The new release was taking forever and the various backports broke the system so it ended up being too old and unstable.

Michel

Why is it possible for W$ and Mac OSX to keep their applications uptodate with the same OS?

Michel

I can't speak for W$, but with Mac OSX, it's only Apple's apps that stay up-to-date with the OS. Third party apps, not necessarily so. There's newer third-party software that I can't run because I won't update past Mac OSX 10.6.8. And Apple has a very vested interest, for the most part, in keeping older versions of OSX updated with their proprietary apps. Also, being based on BSD, things are handled differently than with Linux — app packaging is much like it is with PC-BSD. And, Mac OSX software updates only update Mac OSX/Apple apps, not third party apps. Linux is (mostly) awesome in that aspect — everything is updated.