I've been using linux for a while now and I've tried many distributions but always find myself sticking with Kubuntu for one reason or another. I know that you guys answer questions like this all day long, but all the advice I've found is either outdated or uninformative. My question is: is there a linux distribution that would suit me better than Kubuntu?

Let me warn you I'm a very picky person. The one thing I dislike about Kubuntu is it's sluggishness even on my 2GHz Core Duo, 1GB RAM, 256MB Radeon X1600 custom Asus laptop. I get good CPU usage and the memory usage is not too bad either, it just takes a little bit longer to open basic applications than the fraction-of-a-second I'd like it to take. Right now Firefox is starting in about a second, Konqueror a tiny bit less than that (but o course it is preloaded in memory), KMail about 4 seconds, and Amarok close to 6 seconds. I can live with that, but I'd say on average I run a bit slower (more like 2-3 seconds for Firefox).

Other than the speed I am loving Kubuntu. I've tried many distributions and can't seem to find one better. I don't like GNOME and need more features than the lighter DE/WMs can offer, so I've only been trying out KDE-based distros. Mandriva is slow and too Windows-like, PCLOS is too much like Mandriva and didn't seem to be as fast as everyone made it out to be, and I haven't liked any distros that use YUM, like Fedora. I liked SLAX a lot, what an amazingly fast OS, but it is mainly just a live CD and I want a traditional install-to-your-HDD OS. I also really like Slackware, the only thing that turned me off of that is the lack of a package management system like APT. I don't really want to have to deal with locating and installing all my dependencies manually.

Anyways, is there an distribution out there that is KDE-based, but very fast and preferably uses APT. I don't need a lot of ready-to-run software, I find myself deleting half the stuff that comes with most distributions anyways, but I do like my hardware to automatically be configured (Kubuntu was amazing in this respect).

Thanks for any advice.

I like Kubuntu, too, but for me, I have found SimplyMEPIS to be about as good as it gets. It is trivial to install, Debian based, and it runs KDE about as good as anything else I've seen. Only plain Debian and Slackware rival it for speed, at least on my box, but it also has a very good choice of applications.

arch linux would probably be faster than kubuntu. as far as being "kde-based," you can install a base system and then just add the packages you want, i.e., kde instead of gnome. apt is pretty full featured, but pacman is also an awesome package manager. in the end, no one can tell you what distro you should use, so you just have to try it out to see if it's for you. gl

Thanks for the replies. I've been trying to get SimplyMEPIS to try, but I can't find a healthy torrent or decent mirror. Also, I tried to install Arch on an old desktop of mine multiple times, but always ended up having it hang at GRUB after the install. I might give it a try on my laptop or another desktop I've got although I don't think it's a hardware problem. Probably just an error on my part. Thanks again, and more comments are welcome.

P.S. I should also add that I am not afraid of the command-line, so more advanced OSs are fine by me as long as I don't have to compile everything from source and/or deal with dependency hell.

Debian and Slackware do require a little more to setup. Usually what you need is not that difficult to install for either, although if a package manager is a must have debian would be the one i recommend.

I actually prefer slackware, once you figure out how to set it up like you want, its superfast and so far awesomely stable.

There are many good arguments for debian as well, it can be configured from a base install and package manager to quickly build only the system you want fairly easily. Its almost as fast as slackware on my system and it is also incredibly stable.

An extra boon for you would be that you are already at least have a little experience with a debian based distro and that should make the transition a little smoother.

A last option is that I have heard that xubuntu is faster than kubuntu, I have not verified this but it might be worth checking out.

Whatever you choose, the main reason I would recommend slackware and debian both is because of the large support base. Most problems with either can be solved pretty easily by posting on the forum .

Hmmm... the only versions of Debian available (besides the network install) are either 3 DVDs or like 9 trillian CDs, correct? I might give it a shot, it's just that that is a lot of bandwidth. I also was not under the impression that Debian was a very fast distro.

Net-install worked ok for me. I did a base install and included the package manager and build tools and setup what i wanted from there. I am using xdm and KDE with it. I tried gdm and gnome but it was too slow (Think its the nature or gnome because it runs slow in slackware too).

Might also check, I'm not sure if the cd's are setup with install cd's and repository cd's. They probably are though. I know in slackware you only need the first 2 cd's, debian might be the same dunno.

Edit: Debian is not as fast as slackware with almost identical setups on my system but it is definately fast enough for comfortable use. Just have to remember to minimize system services and keep it at what you need. Its package manager is nice and its stable on my system as I haven't had any trouble with it.

Hey everybody, thanks for all the advice. I gave archlinux a shot on my laptop and had no trouble installing and configuring it for my system. Now I think that it was a hardware problem on the desktop I tried it on. Anyways, arch blazing fast (makes Kubuntu look like a joke), pacman seems to be a great package manager, and I'm really liking KDEmod. I think I'm done hunting down the perfect distro for now. Thanks again!