Hi guys. I have been using linux for about a month now but I would like to start learning more.
Can you guys suggest some possible distros for me to use based on this criteria?

-Must have a moderately easy installer (text based is okay as long as its not too complicated)
-Must have propietary drivers or codecs available through repositories or third party sites.
-Must have okay hardware detection
-Must have some way to handle dependencies
-Must have a GUI


If you guys have any suggestions, just tell me.

what distribution are you using right now? if you let us know that it would be easier to recommend another that may be similar with those capabilities.

regarding learning more, how much is more? or what is it you want to learn? programming, video editing, web development, system administration, scripting, etc. and realize that if you want a distro that does everything for you, there wont be much else left for you to learn!

There are so many distros that can do that. Maybe try some of the popular ones e.g. openSUSE, Mandriva, Fedora, Debian and Ubuntu.

Right now I am using Ubuntu.

I would like to learn more about the structure of linux: the filesystem, the commands, the kernel, ect...


I think that openSUSE, Mandriva, and Fedora hold your hand too much and don't let you learn.

I might want to try Debian but I don't have the time to download three DVD images.

I was thinking about Arch, but it might be too advanced for me.

I have a totally different point of view. The distro you use doesn't really matter. You as an individual have to be willing to dig deeper than the fancy gui. I learned most of what I know about Linux/Unix using Mandrake/Mandriva and then transferred that knowledge to other Linux distros, FreeBSD and Solaris.

Very good point redazz, I think you learn more if you can find out how to get around the GUI and go scratching in the mud for knowledge than getting a OS that puts it in front of you. However, sometimes GUIs interfere with the ability for a user to do much.

As far as Debian, do you have high-speed internet? Check out the netinst CD that Debian has, and that is only one CD that downloads all the files you need from the net for the install.

Then just download the 159MB netinstall.iso, and install using that and a broadband connection. I never download 3 DVD's worth of software that will be outdated by the time the download is completed.. The netinstall will download the current packages for Debian during the install process and will only download packages you are installing. your complete install may be less data downloaded than a single CD iso...

It's quite reasonable..

http://cdimage.debian.org/debian-cd/...86-netinst.iso

that's if you decide to try Debian.

[edit]

and then I re-read the complete post before mine and find that I'm redundant... **sigh**

You can learn linux commands with Ubuntu, and it meets your requirements.

Pretty much any distro meets your criteria (as already stated above). Slackware is a good choice if you want to learn how to manually configure and maintain your system and is very stable. But there's really nothing that you can't do with Ubuntu.

If Ubuntu does everything that you need for your OS to do, keep it and set up a spare partition, perhaps on an external drive if you're tight on space, and use that for playing around with others.

I always keep a couple of spare partitions for distro playing.