I understand MEPIS 8 is in beta testing. How is it so far? I looked for news at mepis.org, but didn't find any.

I'm running it on a lappy and 2 desktops so far. Faster than Ubu, on the same hardware. No issues here. It even set up my broadcom 4318 card with a couple of clicks in the Network Assistant.

newbiesforever,

At the official site http://www.mepis.org/ you will see an announcement:
“SimplyMEPIS 8.0 RC1 is available for the holidays”.

Under Quick Links there is a Download link for mirror sites and Mepis 8.0 RC1
(actually called SimplyMepis-CD_7.9.94-rc1).

There is further information at the colourful MEPIS Community site:
http://www.mepiscommunity.org/

A lot of regular Mepis users have installed M8RC1 and are extremely impressed by it according to their feedback on the MepisLovers Forums:
http://mepislovers.org/forums/index.php

The M8 User Manual is already out and Mepis 8.0 final should follow very soon.
In the meantime you might like to download M8RC1 and give it a trial run just as a Live CD, without actually installing it.

Okay, I'm going there now. If it's as least as good as MEPIS 7, I'll pay for it this time. (People on LQ have assured me I'm not a deadbeat for downloading free, but I do believe in duty.)

EDIT: Found it. But why is it called both 7.9.94 and 8.0? Thats confusing.

When M8 goes final, it will indeed be numbered as 8.0
Until then, the various betas and RCs bear the 7.9.xx tags.

Enjoy.

7.9.94 has been the most recent test release --- and that equates to SimplyMEPIS 8.0 Release Candidate 1.