Currently running SuSE 9.3 and am looking to upgrade to 10 (on IBM T42). Currently have a dual boot system and with this install I'm blowing the Windows partition away (I use vmware for the Windows apps I can't live without, and I like it that way .

So...I have a few questions:

KDE or GNome? I've been using KDE and like it for the most part - but I want GNome's e-mail system and would like to install as little as possible for one or the other. I'm leaning to GNome but then I say reddazz's desktop and WOW - that is cool! I'm perplexed.

HD Partitioning. Currently I'm running with:
Disk /dev/hda: 60.0 GB, 60011642880 bytes
16 heads, 63 sectors/track, 116280 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 1008 * 512 = 516096 bytes

Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System
/dev/hda1 * 1 24360 12277408+ 7 HPFS/NTFS
Partition 1 does not end on cylinder boundary.
/dev/hda2 24361 85305 30716280 c W95 FAT32 (LBA)
Partition 2 does not end on cylinder boundary.
/dev/hda3 85314 116280 15607147+ f W95 Ext'd (LBA)
Partition 3 does not end on cylinder boundary.
/dev/hda5 85314 87386 1044193+ 82 Linux swap / Solaris
/dev/hda6 87386 116280 14562891 83 Linux

The NTFS and FAT32 partitions are gone after this install. I'm thinking it should be somewhere along the lines of:
boot 100mb
/swap 1.5Gb
/ 10Gb
/Home <rest>

Sound good for SuSE? I have to admit that I've only been running the OS for around 4 months and I'm still not sure how the applications decide to install themselvs, chose a tmp driectory to use, etc..

It's a laptop that i use for everything peronsal (e-mail, and the like) as well as for work (network admin - use many of the various network tools provided only - or best - with Linux) so I guess my major concerns are speed and safety (as in protecting the data). This brings me to the next questions, file system type. I'm currently using reiserfs - stick with that? ext3?

You can install KDE and still run the GNOME/GTK applications that you like without having to install all of GNOME (the same applies if you run GNOME and want to use some KDE apps). GNOME is also a good DE (I use it on FC & Debian which are not my main OSes), but I find it very limited when it comes to configuration so I prefer KDE because I can customise it so that it looks and behaves the way I want instead of what some developer thinks is best for all users. Your partitioning looks fine and for filesystem, I would recommend a journaling filesystem such as reiserfs or ext3 because if your system reboots or shuts down inappropriately, you don't have to check the entire filesystem (which can be time consuming if you have a large hard drive). I use reiserfs for all Linux distros except Fedora Core.

Well, I went with GNome first, hated it, back to KDE - both still installed.

I have a question about your desktop though - is there a way to configure that theme showing e-mail status?

Other than that, everything is running fine - didn't even have much trouble with my wireless card. One problem, though, is that I can't seem to play my sound files. I have sound - which I've verified through the test app in YaST, but when I go to play an MP3 nothing happens - in ANY of the 20 some odd apps I seem to have installed.

Any easy way to prune down what's installed? Seems like when I try to remove anything remotely connected to GNome - or completely GNome based, it wants to install 120 other packages.

I don't think you can remove everything related to GNOME if you use Firefox and a few other GTK2 apps. As for the theme, it can be customised (thats what I did), you just need to edit the *.theme file thats part of the package. I think email comes as default but I didn't want it monitoring my email because I usually have a web browser logged into my email account or an email client running.

On the sound issue have you checked the mixer settings to see that they are not all on 0?

Yeah, on sound, I had done that...and it's working now as a matter of fact. Apparently I needed to install realplayer (or at least a part of it) in order to play MP3s??

As for the theme, thanks. I didn't realize those were directly editable.