I am debating on useing one of the three distros: Mandriva, Ubuntu or SuSe. Im not that familiar with any Linux distro or anything about them. Iv heard that these are some of the 'easier' and less complicated ones for the noob like myself. The only info I can give to help you is that I HAVE to use one of these distros along with windows (DUAL BOOT). Do you recommend any of these? Has anyone had any problems with them at all? Do you prefer any other distro for me and can you provide additional info on them?


Thanks,
Kravur

Have been looking into Ubuntu a little. Using slackware now. Ubuntu seems to be the best for dualbooting with windows. Ubuntu is also fairly easy to install, just make sure to backup documents and files on the pc to install on.

I have tried installing som SuSe distro, hung up several times and made my pc go all crazy afterwards.

This post has been edited by frenz: Mar 31 2006, 08:45 AM

I've been recommending Mandrake (now Mandriva) for a few years, but not anymore.

Get Ubuntu, it's easy to install (even though you don't have a pretty-witty installation, good enough to get you there) and it works for most people with a regular installation, no extra user interaction needed.

Plus, Ubuntu is very intuitive when it comes to install new stuff, just unpackage .deb packages, or apt-get stuff through console, or even use Synaptic (a graphical interface for apt-get). It'll even install whatever is needed for the software you want to run.

Really good!

Ubuntu seems to be making good grounds for new comers, so I'd tend to push you that way.

I have only played around on Ubuntu, but my preferred distribution is Red Hat/Fedora Core which I've used for many many years. I hope there's many helpful Ubuntu users around who could help with your problems but usually Linux problems can be solved no matter what distribution (unless of course it's specifically a problem with that distribution/kernel).

Go with Ubuntu, you can test the live CD out before you install it to see if you like it, you can also order the CDs from Ubuntu's website for free and they'll ship them to you at no cost. Just remember, Linux is not a replacement for Windows but an Alternative though some people, including me, have made it a replacement.

Cheers,


MC

I also reccomend Ubuntu. I used it at home for a good year or so (about 50/50 time spent between it and windows) and use it at work currently as my sole OS. I use a dif distro of linux at home now, but only because I wanted one that was a little deeper to learn some things with. For a beginning, I've never seen one I liked as much as Ubuntu.

When I started out with linux I tried Redhat, Mandrake, Suse, etc and they all were solid but none felt like an easy to jump into solution. My main problem was always either hardware detection or installation problems (dependencies hate me). Ubuntu solves both of these as it has some of the best auto-hardware detection so most if not all hardware works perfectly as soon as you install the OS, as well as it uses a system called 'apt' to obtain and install most software. This allowed you to search and select software and just hit "install" and it does everything else. Simple.

Finally, the community. http://ubuntuforums.org/ is an awesome place with great people. A search will find the answers to your problems 9/10 times. If not, make a topic and you'll find helpful epople ready to get you through your tought spot. People at that forum even created the now well known "atuomatix". Basically it lets you run a script that takes a fresh install of ubuntu and installs alot fo the things that would simply take time to hunt down for new users (installs media players, firefox plugins, etc).

So yes, I reccomend getting ubuntu. Install it, run automatix if it seems like you would want any of the software it installs (the new version lets you pick and choose what to install) and finally explore the forums as there is alot of information there to help a budding ubuntu-er. GOod luck, and enjoy linux.

I would say go with Mandriva. That was my first distro (well it was Mandrake 9.0, but close enough) and it was VERY user friendly. After you get your feet wet with Mandriva, you'll most definately want to grow out of it since it isn't exactly getting to the true essense of Linux. Then after that I would recommend SUSE, FC4, or Slackware.

This is my own two cents, here is a link to read the different reviews about the distros out there. But for a newbie to Linux, Mandriva is a great start to make sure you don't get scared off.
http://www.linuxquestions.org/reviews/

I also say Mandriva for a first trial.
Also, before installing Mandriva, create a FAT32 partition on your Microsoft Windows system, this will be automatically handled as writable by Mandriva, which will help you with Linux/Windows interoperability.
Leave the other distros, like RedHat and Ubunto, for further, when Mandriva will have shown that installing Linux is very easy and using it is obvious.
Of course, Madrake is slightly better than Mandriva, but right now you don't need the differences.
Regards
Yordan

I used to really like Gentoo, but as it is hard to install for a non experienced user, a lot of whom do not choose it, but when my hdd broke and I did not want to install it (Gentoo), I thought to try something else. So I did, Arch Linux - it is really great, but you need to know how to use the command line, you are able to emerge and choose binary stuff. It is quite easy to install and as for all the software, try to read the docs. It works and is optimized for i686 processor machines, well just read about it on the net.

More about Arch Linux: http://archlinux.org

Or you just want Opinons on Suse, Ubuntu and Mandriva ? Well..

This post has been edited by Quatrux: Mar 31 2006, 07:20 PM

Everyone usually will tell you different things. I always recommend SuSE especially for gamers since you can use advanced commands that is not supported in Debian based distribution (aka Ubuntu). Furthermore, SuSE is easy to use and administrate. The ease for the newbie, the power for a guru. That's what SuSE really is.

xboxrulz

Thanks everyone for the response. I have decided to try out Ubuntu and SuSe first.
Do any of you think it would be a good idea to move to Redhat or anything else more advanced, when im not such a noob at this?