The Definitive "WHICH LINUX DISTRO?" Thread

By matrixstylez
in Linux

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What distro do you use?  

609 members have voted

  1. 1. What distro do you use?

    • Mandrake
      111
    • Fedora/Red Hat
      145
    • Knoppix
      26
    • Debian
      44
    • Gentoo
      117
    • SUSE
      69
    • Slackware
      54
    • LindowsOS/Lycoris
      8
    • PCLinuxOS
      3
    • Other
      32

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Grand Master

revvo

Posted
Posted
I think that there were people complaining about about bloat when most distros started making X run by default.

The times, they are a-changin'...

I have to quote this for a second. For anybody who wants to try and use Debian. Keep in mind if you decide to install everything with apt (that means no updates within the installation), remember to configure xdm so it WON'T run by default. If you do

# apt-get install xserver-xfree86 (I think?)

It will get everything necessary to run X but also setup automatically xdm so it runs when you reboot which is something a bit annoying for some.

for in-depth details about xdm, check out http://www.tldp.org/HOWTO/XDM-Xterm/config.html

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Veteran

moeburn

Posted
Posted

On a side note, this is the largest poll i have ever seen on neowin.

On topic, are there any distros that simplify the "download program -> install program" process that I fill up my harddrive with oh so very quickly?

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Community Regular

DaNIsH

Posted
Posted (edited)
On topic, are there any distros that simplify the "download program -> install program" process that I fill up my harddrive with oh so very quickly?

Not sure if this is exactly what you're looking for but:

Gentoo: portage - Downloads, configures, compiles, and installs applications and their depencies with one command.

Debian: apt - Same deal as emerge I think except in binary form (no compilation), havn't used debian since 2.0 and that was just a quick fiddle.

Other distros: Can probably use apt, I've heard about something called "yum" but havn't looked into it. Most distros come with, or have a simple package system available.

Edited by DaNIsH
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Apprentice

ZGamer00

Posted
Posted

i was wondering if someone could link me to a site that has a bittorrent for the latest versions of Debian GNU/Linux and Gentoo GNU/Linux? Much obliged.

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Community Regular

DaNIsH

Posted
Posted
i was wondering if someone could link me to a site that has a bittorrent for the latest versions of Debian GNU/Linux and Gentoo GNU/Linux? Much obliged.

Gentoo: I'd recommend http://packages.gentoo.org/packages/?categ...name=bittornado

To install the testing version (0.3.4):

echo "net-p2p/bittornado ~x86" > /etc/portage/package.keywords

emerge bittornado

To run (console version, GUI I havn't bothered with):

http://sogono.com/carlo/linuxtorrent/

Debian: The above can be run on any linux distro, I'm not sure if it would be in the apt repositories (sp?) though. If not http://www.bittornado.com/

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Community Regular

DaNIsH

Posted
Posted
echo "net-p2p/bittornado ~x86" > /etc/portage/package.keywords

Sorry, that line would overwrite the file (if you have one), this will append to the end:

echo "net-p2p/bittornado ~x86" >> /etc/portage/package.keywords

I'd edit but the Edit button seems to dissapear when a post becomes <however> old :blink:

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  • 1 month later...
Grand Master

+M2Ys4U Subscriber¹

Posted
  • Subscriber¹
Posted

i dived directly into Gentoo with no prior Linux experiance... couldn't quite get it working, so i moved over to mandrake. now i might give Gentoo another go

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Enthusiast

xpehbamxyu

Posted
Posted

I use slackware all the time, as well as FreeBSD, however I have to give Gentoo the thumbs-up because it lets you build everything from the ground up and exactly the way you want. However, since it takes alot of time to build a system from the ground up like that, I have not gotten the chance to install it. BTW, Gentoo portage system is marvelous...not that I have use it too much, but I gave it a try in an old beta version of Gentoo.

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Enthusiast

Scootersing

Posted
Posted

I use Mandrake 10, and is still the most easiest and stable system i have ever tryed.(i am not a Linux wiz, but it works and that is the important thing).

I don`t understand that there is problems with installing new drivers for Nvidia and Ati in Mandrake 10, i installed the latest Ati drivers myself and it worked great.

But i made my Mandrake crash under dual installation with Suse 9.0 pro(no brain, no gain) :blush:

After reinstallation everything is back to buisness, do u now u can remote control Windows xp with mandrake(i Did`nt) :D

How ever Mandrake do got bugs, so i am thinking about upgrading to coocker version!(anyone have better experiences with this before?)

Scootersing

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Neowinian

ed0n

Posted
Posted

I was a gentoo user for more than a year, and I still like it, I prefere it to the ones that like much customizibility and have much time in their hands.

I left gentoo becouse my reiser4 partition (which was the root partition) got completely corrupted (I also thing that I played with some hd geometries). Anyway my gentoo was pretty unstable I used to play with a lot of unstable software and report bugs. So I was lazy to reinstall there gentoo so I borowed fc2 cds from a freind of mine. I liked it and it was pretty easy to install and to use it I played with yum apt and stuff like that I didn't like that resolving dependencies took so much time (it took less then gentoo though ;) ), but I kind of felt that I don't have the customizbility in my hands that I want to have I felt that the ui is doing things that I don't know of so I deceided to give debian a try. I burned debian sarge netinst cd it was easy to install the system I really like all of it and I think that I am going to stick with it .

One thing I understood is that the binary based distros are not a good thing indeed they are better then the source ones in my opinion. I like installing packages in 10 seconds (or less) which work just _a bit_ slower then the ones that I compile for 1 hour or more.

Anyway that's only my opinion and my experience with these things.

I think that everyone should try distros and follow their choice afterall opensource software is all about choices.

I am new to this forum this is my very fist post, I am glad that I found such an active forum.

I first thought that it has to do only with windows but I am glad that here are people that like and love linux and the opensource community.

It was obvios I am a linux user :) .

Cheers.

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Grand Master

aem4162

Posted
Posted
it depends on what stage of your linux puberty your at. i still tell people i don't like girls so im using mandrake.

my big brother has his gf over all the time, he uses slackware

what if you're a very noobie lady?

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Grand Master

+M2Ys4U Subscriber¹

Posted
  • Subscriber¹
Posted
One thing I understood is that the binary based distros are not a good thing indeed they are better then the source ones in my opinion. I like installing packages in 10 seconds (or less) which work just _a bit_ slower then the ones that I compile for 1 hour or more.

portage allows you to install binaries, AFAIK.

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  • 2 weeks later...
Mentor

cyberfrem

Posted
Posted

I've just migrated from Fedora Core 2 to Yoper.

Yoper is a great and very fast free distro - I advise you to check it out!

It's good for all levels of experience; linux geek and noobie alike!

In the words of the developer:

The "fastest out of the box" OS, YOPER Linux V series, continues its global climb with the next stable release of V2 tagged 2.1.0, a powerful OS built upon the proven speed technologies that have made its predecessors famous.

Known to be a commercial strength Desktop Solution at 0 cost, this release provides the power user with many new features, encompassing REISER4 support for the root filesystem, new non-destructive NTFS resizing, graphical partitioning, option to use GRUB or LILO bootloaders, a new clustered control panel, KDE 3.3.0 Final, Linux Kernel 2.6.8.1, default Firewall and the OpenOffice.org Office Suite, all provided on 1 CD. The default "look and feel" has been enhanced and many bugfixes have been applied, including PCMCIA support during install and support for PPPoE.

Hundreds of new optimised software packages have also been added by the Yoper Team. They are all available for free download via the APT/Synaptic Yoper repository. All the attributes of Linux in combination with unparalleled speed, superb security enhancements and international language support, have been integrated under one remarkable Operating System.

Stronger. Better. Faster. It must be Yoper!

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