Hello. Best distribuition
 

Hello,

I´m newbie to linux. Can anybody help-me to select the best linux distribuition for newbies?

Best Regards
David

Hey there! Welcome to LQ.

This is a question that is asked extremely often, and the answers you get can be subjective at times.

it really depends what your knowledge level is, how easy you want the distro to be to set up and for what purpose, and on personal preferences.

Very often, Ubuntu and Mint are two that are recommended for beginners. However, neither may suit you. Have a look at distrowatch.com and browse the long list of "top page hits" on the right hand side. Have a look at any number of the top 10 or 15 distros, and choose a few that interest you. Download some LiveCD's and try them out. :)

Cheers.

Well your question you ask is kinda of like getting a webhost. There is not such thing as the best distro. You have to chose the distro thats best for you. I am going to list some distros that may work for you.

Things you need to know on how to pick a distro

Do you want lots of prebuilt software?
Do you want a package manager that resolves dependacies?
Do you wnat a distro that has lots of support?
Do you want a distro that release updates faster but less stable or slower but more stable?

Just to add
If you are anything like me you will find that you like a little bit of each distro. So if have a little bit of knowledge on the command line then you can consider http://linuxfromscratch.org. They will walk to through step by step to build a bare linux system and then their next book will help you get starting on your needs.

These are some questions you may want to ask your self.

Google keyword "linux distro choser" and take the survey it should help you.

Here...
 

I think it was answered before... never mind...
No one should choose distros for you. Today's Linuxes are easy to install so try few and see which one, best fits your preferences and your computer. Take a look on Linux Jazz collection, they may be precisely what you need, or you can find plenty on UnixAcademy.com

Hope it helps.

Not all "newbies to Linux" want or like the same thing.

Do you want one where you do everything from a nice GUI, or do you want one that's more UNIX like (working from the command-line and editing configuration files)?

GUI: Mint
Unix-like: Slackware

Most distros offer an option for a Live CD. You can boot to the CD and play around a bit. Remember that running any OS from a CD will be substantially slower than running it from the HDD.

I recommend Slackware if you want to understand Linux. Go with Ubuntu, Mint, or CentOS if you just want to install and use it. (Yeah, I know that CentOS has a rep as a server distro, but it's also easy to set up and use.)

Slackware does not offer a live CD, but the Slax Live CD based on Slackware.

In the long run, it doesn't matter. It costs nothing but some time to try a new distro.

About dot com has a good intro to Linux. It's oriented towards Ubuntu, but it's worth a read.

Hi,
Everyone will tell you that a distribution it uses is the best. Try yourself several of them. Main diffrence is large versus small distribution, next Live versus hard disk installed. Moreover most of Linux users use two, three or even more distros. I am using Slackware, Ubuntu but also I like much LiveCD Linux based on GnuStep.

I recommend Linux Mint. Many of my friends liked it. They are all new to linux but are using it comfortably.

Linux Mint !!!

Linux Mint is good for newbies. Don't try Mandriva. I'm serious. Just don't. :)
For those of you who will ask "why": Mandriva is unstable and harldy configurable.

Yes CentOS is a great server distro. But I don't think they worry to much about keeping up the latest desktop environment. I believe fedora is much better for desktop and its pretty close to CentOS. But thats my opinion.

Have a look at
http://polishlinux.org/choose/quiz/

After using 22 distros, I'd advise
Mint for the average home user
Puppy for old computers with less than 512MB of memory
CentOS for business

Sharp comment to certain people: recommending Linux from Scratch (or even Slackware) to someone who has never used Linux before is either a hostile act, a manifestation of an odd sense of humour, or proof that you never read past the title of the post :rolleyes:

My experience says that any distro will cause trouble if will be used sufficiently long. My truth is: if you want install Linux you will have to learn Linux. This will benefit. For me there is no doubt that the future belongs to Linux - or it succesors. I think even windowze developers know that.

I can only say about my own experiences, maybe it will help: Debian - appreciate it much but don't like really, Ubuntu - easy to install, but after several updates can be unstable, Arch Linux - I tried twice and never succeded with an installation, Slackware ...hm...very difficult for me to express an opinion - it is some kind of a marriage - you know <joke> till death </joke>. Gentoo - I always was curious about it but never tried. Now notice that many distribution are build on a base of those I mentioned. Say Sabayon is Gentoo based, etc. Linux Mint is Ubuntu based? Maybe but I am not sure.

Most posters advice to try Linux Mint. As you have to start at some point (in the future you can change a distro) it may be a good idea to begin with Linux Mint.

@DavidMcCann
It is like saying 'let other people decide'.

one newbie to another...

I've had good luck with Fedora so far. It has been very easy to install packages with yum. You can also run fedora off of a USB flash drive to test it out. Then just click on the "Install to Hard Disk" icon when you want to take the plunge.

I'd say Ubuntu (>= 10.10) is more suited to newbies than Mint is, but I'm sure Mint 10 will be more up to par with Ubuntu 10.10 once it's released.

The Ubuntu installer now makes it extremely easy (as easy as clicking one checkbox) to install Ubuntu Restricted Extras and the installer will do it all for you. Then you can use plenty of Flash content and media codecs to your heart's content once the system is installed.

I agree that Mint does have an easy-to-use interface that's easy for WinDoze users. But especially for O$ X users (who would like the Ambiance/Radiance themes more) Ubuntu is definitely a good way to go.

And of course the GNOME desktop environment takes its design from both Windows and O$ X and essentially looks like a combination of the two, a compromise between WinDoze's bottom-of-screen oriented design and Mac O$ X's top-of-screen oriented design. Mint does have GNOME too, but it's been modified to look more like WinDoze, which I consider a complete turn-off to people who hate WinDoze anyway.