I just found out, which probably means that you all know anyway :) but Mandrake 8 has been released to the ftp servers for your downloading pleasure. I found this from http://www.mandrakeforum.com

Will I be downloading? Well this reporter says not for the mo, but I will monitor what comes about from others opinions. Besides, it looks as though all it is is an upgrade of the Kernel, KDE, Gnome and Xfree86 (all of which I have done).

But for those who are new to Linux it sure does look a good bet to get to grips with Linux. If the installer has improved and can detect even more HW then before I think it could be a hugh success. Now, where's that advertising...

I'm using it here, installed fine for me, and even detected my FA311 nic..

I am waiting for the distro to come out in box form. All the FTP servers are at capacity, or the download is way to slow, (I am used to 50-100K /sec). But I have 7.2, and I am very happy with it. If 8.0 is better, then I will keep it. If not, it could not be any worse than 7.2, so I will still recommend it.

I can ftp from ftp.free.fr at about 180Kb/Sec... thats where I always look first.

I've had it running for sometime now. Seems to be much more stable then the 7.x versions. Hardware detection is top notch. All around a nice release.

After jumping at every upgrade as soon as it came out I am going to wait for 8.1, after the little bugs are ironed out.