I'm new to Linux and this is my first post on this forum, so if I make any n00b mistakes, bear with me everyone. My question is: what's the difference between Mandriva-Linux-2005-Limited-Edition and Mandrake 10.1 Official? Anything new? Expanded driver support? Security patches? etc. Would be cool to know. Thanks.

LE 2005 has a newer kernel, better hardware support, better usb support, it is more secure and looks better than 10.1!!!

It is basically Mandrake 10.2. They are revamping naming convensions, and I don't think we'll see the last change in naming. For some reason, I don't think mandriva will stick for long.

Also, does anyone know what the new config tools are now named? drivaconf/drivawizard??? Should have changed name to Condrake or Connectdrake, just to keep tools named the same.

Yes! LE2005 perform more wonderfully!!
And it is special for our China Users,because 2005 first improe her Chinese fonts display,so we are out of the trouble of beautify the fonts display.

The config tools are still the same and are likely to stay that way for a while. I don't think they will change the name again, it would be a bit foolish to do so from a corporate point of view. I think by the time they release another version of their distro more people will have been used to the new name.

I think the merger and hence the name change was carried out only during the last stages of development of LE 2005. Everything is still Mandrake. The debate on the name was probably going on when they were designing the bootscreen and the splash screens, hence we see no name only Limited Edition 2005 and LINUX!!!

Why is it "Limited Edition?" What's so special about it in order for the entire OS to be called limited? Is there a Mandrake 10.2 normal edition?

Mandriva is changing the nomenclature of their products. I heard Mandriva 2006 is expected in Q4, so this is intermediate and hence is probably called ¨Limited¨!
There is nothing ¨special¨ this is just 10.2(even the bootup says so!!!).
And, no there is no ¨normal¨ version, only the usual community and download versions.

Because 10.2 was well-down the beta-test road when they made the decision to change their delivery schedule and naming convention, they went ahead and released it. Since the first official release under the new system will come late this year and be named "2006", they quickly renamed 10.2 to "2005". I assume the "Limited Edition" part came because it is the last release on the old 6-month cycle, and they are devoting their attentions on merging Conectiva stuff with the Mandrake stuff. It's only "Limited Edition" in the sense that it's a *special* release; a cross between the old system and the new system.

So the limited edition unlike 10.2 isn't a beta? I have 10.1 on CD. Being the Lazy bastard that I am, I feel like it's a huge task to burn 3 new CDs... so I pose another question: will I notice any huge difference between these two versions, or are they pretty much the same? Is Firefox pre-installed in LE?

It depends on what you are looking for, 10.1 must do just fine, but it is better to have
THE latest(i´m so desperate to have the latest!!).I dont think there is a huge difference. Firefox is not 'pre-installed' but is included in the packages(1.0.2). You can choose to install it if you want in LE, it is not included in 10.1

Yeah, I noticed. Although I can't browse without Firefox. I'm completely in love with Mozilla and their products What about Thunderbird? I think I'll buy myself a few new CD-R disks today.

You can easily download firefox and thunderbird from the mozilla site and set it up for 10.1, but i think you better buy those cds, burn them and enjoy LE 2005!!!!

Cheers

I've bought the CDs now, will burn them very soon. My last question: is VLC Media Player istallable from the CDs?