I already posted the link for the Fedora. DOH! (tired i am... my precious, my precious..)
Anyway, I just noticed that you will be running a 64bit proc. Thats a story in itself because of the lack of 64bit rpm repositories.
I'd say if the Linux o/s you choose will run on your 64bit system and there are enough applications that are ready made 64bit rpm's then that's the Linux o/s you should go for.
ubuntu is very smooth. Dunno about 64bit though.
You can start from
http://www.Linux.org and then check out either the iso's here (
http://iso.linuxquestions.org/) or
http://www.linuxiso.org
As a note my first Linux o/s was slackware after Linux on floppy disks. Then came Mandrake and RedHat at the same time. Both are nice for newbies because that's what they are marketed for. Nice graphical installation thingies, etc. FreeBSD was in there before Slack, but that aint Linux and I found out about FreeBSD from running BSD a long time ago .
IF you have lots of time and bandwidth download as many distro's that support 64bit and then experiment. Thats what I've done or rather what I had someone do for me. All those distro's in my profile.... I use 'em all. OpenSource is fun and one day you will say goodbye to Microsoft Windows forever just like me and the many satisfied and now wealthier Open Source users worldwide!
EDIT:
Code:
SUSE Linux
Developer: SuSE/Novell
Website: http://www.suse.com/
Languages: English, Spanish, French, German, Italian, Portuguese
Categories: Mainstream/General Public
Platforms: Intel compatible, 64 bit, PPC, Alpha, Sparc, Itanium, Mainframe, Other
Description: SUSE, now a subsidiary of Novell, produces one of the most popular
mainstream Linux distrbutions.
Book: SuSE Linux Unleashed
Fedora Core
Developer: RedHat Software
Website: http://fedora.redhat.com/
Languages: English, Spanish, French, Italian, Portuguese
Categories: Mainstream/General Public, Red Hat based, Fedora Core based
Platforms: Intel compatible, 64 bit
Description: Fedora Core is RedHat's plan to develop a complete, general purpose
operating system exclusively from free software. The distribution was
created to replace low-end, comsumer versions of RedHat Linux.
PLD Linux Distribution
Developer: The PLD Team
Website: http://www.pld-linux.org/
Languages: English, Polish
Categories: Power user
Platforms: Intel compatible, 64 bit, PPC, Alpha, Sparc
Description: PLD is a free distribution that provides a vast selection of over 9000
packages with virtually every program that's available to the Linux
community, from servers and programming tools to multimedia and desktop
software. It's meant to be developer-friendly, meaning that it's easy both
to customize PLD to one's own needs and to participate in its constant
improvement, visible day by day.
Ubuntu Linux
Developer: Canonical Ltd.
Website: http://www.ubuntulinux.org/
Languages: English
Categories: Mainstream/General Public, Debian based
Platforms: Intel compatible, 64 bit, PPC
Description: Mainstream distribution based on Debian that includes the latest version
of all major software packages. The developers aim to make it accessible
in many languages.