Ditro for Newbies

jerry_popperq · 08-24-2005, 06:59 AM

Rate the following in order of preference for newbies who want to learn linux(and is ofcourse comparitively easy).

1)CentOS 4
2)Fedora 3/4
3)Suse 9.3
4)Mandrake
5)Ubuntu
6)Gentoo
7Other(Specify)

Thanx in advance.......

Ghost_runner · 08-24-2005, 07:15 AM

1) other yoper, ease of setup, good support, extremely powerfull
2) mandrake (mandriva) superbly easy setup, downside, forget about compiling anyting
3) suse again, easy setup, and novell backed, but poor support unless you look here or pay for it
4) fedora
5) slackware, easy setup, and the 'purest' form of linux, compile away, and most configurable
6)gentoo, not for noobs, but you can roll your own more or less

cuiq · 08-24-2005, 07:23 AM

1. Mandrake
2. SuSE
3. Fedora
4. Ubuntu
5. Mepis
6. CentOS
7. Debian

Gentoo while it is easy to use (considering emerge) the setup is quite tedious and very detailed. For someone installing a system for the first time (especially someone who has never even installed windows) Gentoo would be to much to handle the first time out installing linux.

peace V

BTW: These findings are based on my mothers opinion of each install. Her only experience with installation was windows which I taught her how to do. She was willing to learn beginning with windows now I'm teaching her linux.

jonaskoelker · 08-24-2005, 11:02 AM

you may also want to take the tests I mention in http://www.linuxquestions.org/questi...hreadid=355215

hth --Jonas

craigevil · 08-24-2005, 11:57 AM

1) Xandros
2) PCLinuxOS
3) SuSE
4) Mandrake
5) MEPIS
6) Ubuntu
7) Fedora ( I skipped Fedora, not a big fan of RH)
8) Debian
9) Gentoo
10) Slackware
And finally to be a master of Linux try something like Sorcerer or LFS.

Pretty much that order was the path I used. Still using Debian and playing around with OpenSUSE. One of these days I am going to get up the courage to try Slackware( I downloaded the book and have been reading it). I don't think I have the ram or processor speed to use Gentoo. My play system only has 256mb ram and a P3 750. Emerge would take days.

Cinematography · 08-24-2005, 12:20 PM

1) Xandros
2) Mepis
3) Suse
4) Mandrake

You have to do too much to the others to get them going.

cuiq · 08-24-2005, 12:35 PM

craigevil

Quote:

My play system only has 256mb ram and a P3 750. Emerge would take days.

Actually If you don't install gnome or kde but use a lighter desktop it should take maybe one day. I did the Gentoo install on a similar system, xfce took very little time whereas when I installed kde it took almost a week.

peace V

jerry_popperq · 08-26-2005, 12:35 AM

Well Nice guys .......How about
CentOS 4.1 .....i have heared alot about it....... ut not on this forum......
Anyone wanna share about that.........

P.S: Being a Newbie i am definitely gonna give a shot to Xandros OR MePis.....(Thanx)

(Also i have heared Mandrake is easy but is alot buggy)

craigevil · 08-26-2005, 12:54 AM

DistroWatch.com: CentOS,

Quote:

CentOS as a group is a community of open source contributors and users. Typical CentOS users are organisations and individuals that do not need strong commercial support in order to achieve successful operation. CentOS is 100% compatible rebuild of the Red Hat Enterprise Linux, in full compliance with Red Hat's redistribution requirements. CentOS is for people who need an enterprise class operating system stability without the cost of certification and support.

Doesn't sound like a desktop distro to me, but I may be wrong.

davecs · 08-27-2005, 06:34 PM

The best Newbie distro is PCLinuxOS. period.