Linux distros: which one to try out?

I'm thinking of installing Linux on my system. Many reasons lead me into this, but let's cut it short:

- I don't want to take a whole day to install the OS
- I don't mind if the distro is 1 CD big or 4 gigs, as long as it's functionnal
- I want all the multimedia, 3D, sound support that Linux can give
- I' m a big fan of graphical fancy desktop interfaces
- I need GIMP, some music software

I heard of Ubuntu, but is it good for me? The install seems rather small for a Linux distro (600 megs) ! Is RedHat out of the ballgame for Linux or what?Which one would you suggest me?

I've only used Ubuntu, and its quite good.

EDIT: You will probably have problems with you gfx card if you install it on a laptop, though.

I'm actually split between these three:
- Ubuntu 8.04
- OpenSUSE 10.3
- Fedora 9

There doesn't seem to have a DVD release of Ubuntu, as opposed to SUSE and Fedora.

Ubuntu is good because it creates a partition and installs itself with no problems, very simple to install

In your case, I'm going to recommend Ubuntu because it'll pretty much fill all the bits you mentioned above. If you would like something slightly closer to Windows, Kubuntu (KDE) ['slightly closer to Windows' is not praising Kubuntu, 'cause KDE is horrible]. If you want hardcore minimal, Xubuntu (XFCE; my preference next to using just the awesome [that's its name] window manager). However, unless you know what the others include, go with the default desktop version of Ubuntu.

Graphics support on laptops is improved these days, but you still may not be able to get all the pretty effects that, for example, I get (I run it under Wubi, so I'm cheating). However, all those really pretty effects are really annoying, so you'd probably turn them off after five minutes of going 'ooo, neat.'

Hmmm... I'm not impressed by the Ubuntu install. Not at all. I downloaded the 8.04 distro, burn it on a 48x CD, data verified. Rebooted and up the CD unit as 1ST boot device from the BIOS. Fine. I reboot, the Ubuntu distro starts, then a language selection screen shows up with a 30 second countdown. The cursor is already set a English and it's waiting for me to see if I will change it. I try to change the language with the keyboard as there is no mouse support from the boot menu. The keyboard doesn't respond! My keyboard is an USB, so I suppose Ubuntu's boot manager can't handle USB keyboard?.. Anyhow the 30 seconds went, and the disk was loading with a Ubuntu logo and progress bar, showing *loading Linux Kernel*... I tought, ok, maybe the Linux kernel will detect my USB keyboard! Well, after 20 seconds loading from the disk, the system went for a reboot! Damn, I tought, let's remove the disk. I didn't have a clue WHY it decided to reboot. Anyhow, I remove the disk, and it rebooted my windows...

Great...

EDIT: The reboot could be a bad CD burn, I don't like those RIDATA disks. I just burned a new copie see if it still does it.

Depending on your hardware, you may need to enable Legacy USB support in the BIOS.

(Not just a Linux problem -- I've also seen Windows being unable to use the keyboard to select 'safe mode' after hitting the F8 on bootup without that feature being enabled)

If you are running Ubuntu Hardy (8.04), you could also run the Wubi installer via Windows. It's a nice way to try it out without committing a real partition; just pop the installer CD in while inside Windows and you will see.

Ubuntu is the "easiest" to get into IMO (although not always the "nicest/best" depending on what you want to do with it, but for most stuff its great)
+yes it does work with USB keyboards (be a bit stoopid if it dint) You had either plugged it in AFTER bios had initialised or you have an old one and dont have legacy enabled like xlsior said

the only problem I have ever had with Ubuntu (that wasn't related to running it on a system that had a badly written bios) was booting.

I tried Wubi, just for the sake of it, with 8.04 a couple weeks ago. It installs fine, I reboot, can't find the boot image.

So I shrug it off- Wubi didn't work for me last year so I just figured Wubi wasn't good, this time I install to my reserved partitions for Ubuntu, again, installs fine. reboot? Nope!

I then find out that in order to boot ubuntu, I have to:
1) Select Windows loader frmo the first grub menu
2 )Select "Ubuntu" from the Windows boot menu
3) select "Ubuntu" from the second Grub menu,

And Then I get the Wubi install!?

The best way to install Ubuntu is on your primary drive, it flawlessly installs then, and it *is* worth it.

Yeah, Ubunty should be the primary/default partition with grub or whatever you're using. I would install Windows then Partition Magic it, then install Ubunty. The only thing I don't like about Ubunty is when I disconnected I had to always reboot to reconnect.

I have been using a lot of Linux distros over the years and my current favourite is OpenSuse. Did a nice job partitioning up the harddrive, so I didn't have to do it form the windows side, and found all my hardware without a problem. Even got my old ATI card going, and I usually have a lot of problems with ATI in linux.
WiFi works fine too. And my External Hard drive. (but was a bit tricky to get going)

Something odd in my system, the windows boot drive (my new Samsung Spinpoint F1) is named the H: drive. The C: drive (which isn't the boot drive) is my RAID0 setup.


Yes I remember that option in the bios, I'll check it out see if it's enabled or not. Yet, LEGACY is an odd term because my keyboard is a brand new Logitech Access 600.

I still don't understand why Ubuntu reboots after it loads itself up in memory. I burned 2 CDs of Ubuntu 8.04, thinking it might be a bad burn, but they both have the same behaviour at the exact same moment. It's the Ubuntu AMD X64 distro, which I think it appropriate since I have an AMD Opteron 165.

Primary drive != C: drive.

What it means by "legacy" is it will run the keyboard as if it was a "legacy" keyboard, I believe. That's how I always took it anyway hehe.

2 things I forgot:
- The USB keyboard option in the bios was set as DISABLED !!! I rapidly changed this and Ubuntu's menu finally worked with the keyboard.
- All my drives are SATA (could be an issue)

Right now I'm installing a 30 GB Ubuntu partition from Windows, hopefully it should work.

It's "Legacy" as in "pretend that it's a PS/2 keyboard" -- but good to hear that worked.

good point with SATA- that could be my issue too. Explains why it wont boot unless I use a mixture of drive install and wubi install lol.

Sooo... I got the installation, the boot manager show 2 options, I select Ubuntu.... It starts booting up with the Ubuntu logo, then reboots the machine at the same area (from what I see on the progress bar) that what happened with the CD. So I'm sort of back to square one. But I'll check what options I may be able to change form the loader menu.

Mr 33, I would really recommend you poke this issue over at ubuntuforums.org.

I believe Ctrl+Alt+F1 will give you text mode while booting, though I don't remember for sure and don't want to restart my computer quite yet... (or is there an option at the startup prompt for this install CD?). There are probably enough heads there to resolve this issue quite quickly.

Picklesworth, you're right :)

But it goes to show, that little old me can't get through an install of Ubuntu, while installing Windows XP and the service packs is a non issue! I'll check with the Ubuntu boys. Cheers.

DONE: http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?p=4994742#post4994742

@darkheart

Prob. more accurate too considering some of those distros are not even debian. :P)


Currently installing Fedora 9 on my new PC. DVD's burning at the mo. Ill tell you how it goes :)

Am using ubuntu 8.04 and kubuntu 8.04 here.

Just an update, just installed fed 9 (non-live DVD installation version).
So far it has been much more fun than V8.

- Wireless Proxim(orinoco) worked straight away, tried netgear(athros) too. Same. (Never expected Belkin one to work.. i was right)
- Tablet activated and works great after turning it on in xorg.conf
- Webcams working first time (first time thats happened!)
- ATI Video at optimum res and 3d accelerated without poking (no messy mesa or vesa to get rid of)
- Sound, in stereo with mic etc.
- Seems a tiny bit more responsive than ubuntu so far too.
- All my software/data in and loaded from repositories and usbstick with no probs.
- Digital camera and videocamera working
- Time taken about 2 hours :D

Im rapidly changing my mind about windows being better for hardware support after the most recent releases of Ubu and Fed. A recent install of vista had me installing drivers for everything.
Same PC no 'external' drivers needed (yet)

Im certainly impressed so far.

Righty then.. (cracks fingers) Now for samba and nfs..

If you have an NVIDIA card then graphics support should be pretty flawless on nvidia binary drivers. I have 8400M GS, and I have no glitches at all with ET:Quake Wars for example.

@_33 Have you tried using the alternative-Ubuntu install disk? If you are using the live CD press F6 and remove 'quite splash --' bit from the boot options.
If you managed to install Ubuntu, when the boot menu shows up press 'e' and select the option kernel, press 'e' again and edit the boot options to remove the 'quite splash --' bit.

I should warn you that getting BlitzMax to work correctly in the Ubuntu 64bit environment is tricky as I had to make a chroot directory and set up a limited 32bit environment.

The wubi Windows Ubuntu Installer checks the processor to see what version of Ubuntu to down load from the server ( All 64bit capable processors get the 64bit version if you want the 32bit version, download the 32bit ISO make a directory in drive C: Named Unbuntu-backup (I think) and place the 32bit ISO there and run wubi.

@D4NM$N Is Fedora 9 fast as in the past I have found both SUSE 10.3 and Fedora 8 to be slow (Ubuntu is slick).

@dawlane, it seems to be much better than 8. As for speed it 'feels' more responsive than ubuntu, but i would say negligeable.

Ubuntu, Xubuntu and Kubuntu are good - however, with the latter, dont go for the one with KDE 4 - its very unstable (even with the latest service pack for it). That applies to both the 32 and 64-bit versions.

In addition, Fendora 9 is good too...

As is Mandrake 2008...

Ah, the choices...

I think Ubuntu/Kbuntu is still the best for total noobs. Although suse and fedora 9 are worth a look too.

Stay away from gentoo etc. unless you really know what you are doing! I downloaded it to try before choosing Fedora. It appears to be for aliens. Didnt find it intuitive or friendly at all.

Its amazing to see how far Linux has come - and could now be considered a replacement to Windows & Mac OS. Plus, of course, its free.

I would say its a good replacement for categories 1 & 2 and especially 4 & 5 below (I reckon i am in category 4):

People who fall into the (quite large) category 3 probably wont like linux (at least not yet)..


eg:

1, 2,<----3----> 4, 5.


1)
-People who know absolutely nothing but use computers for web, music, photos/videos, email and officey stuff and are unlikely to do much else. Who download a distro and everything just works for them. For these people a fully working mainstream linux installation is actually easier than windows.

2)
-Similar to above who have difficulties in setup but know someone who knows how if they get problems setting up (or if they want to expand it).

3)
-People with hardware thats a "dead loss" and is completely unsupported, who either cannot or dont want to replace it. (ie because its intergrated, or feel they shouldn't have to for some reason)
-People who are dependent because of 1 or 2 apps (Aside from the genuine cases, most have simply not looked hard enough for an alternative or know that wine may run it)
-People who are satisfied with windows and think its "as good as it gets".
-People who are total windows experts but hate to be in a totally different environment where even the most basic of tasks is alien, causing frustraton that is offputing.
-People who consider themselves "expert" users & hate the idea of being a total noob again.
-People who like to change their computing habits like underpants, messing with every possible setting (simply because its there) and like installing every peice of crapware on the net.
-People who are only interested in games (not an issue for dual booters tho).
-People who have tried one unsuitable distro, hated it and figured they are all like that.
-People who think free must mean bad or substandard and are not open to discussion on it.


4)
-People who simply know windows is crap, want something better and have the patience to learn something totally new.
-People who know windows almost inside out and are bored/fed up with it.

5)
-People with a natural gift for learning & adapting to all things technical (the natural 'experts')
-Aliens

I find type 3 a little to condescending. I think an OS can change a person. But if the OS has a hard time getting installed because it is incompatible with the hardware or the boot loader of the install is seldom limited or lacks support for some configs, you end up like me: Removing Ubuntu 8.04 after a failed install, and loading the Windows CD in the recovery console mode to type "fixboot C:".

http://pcsupport.about.com/od/termsf/p/fixboot.htm

Nah, free OSes will always have trouble with the masses. But I will install Linux, but Ubuntu's install system seems iffy on some system configurations (like mine). Fedora 9 is next.

Its not meant to be condecending or insulting, but it is for the most part true. There are many exceptions & possibilities, but in my experience category 3 lists the main hurdles/reasons/excuses for most people who "cant" use a linux distro (but probably could if they REALLY tried and would quite possibly like it better if they can get past the initial "ugh!").

I forgot about the hardware though, which was dumb because it should be top of the list! Have added it :)

Hardware support could certainly be improved. However, the latest Ubuntu variations seem to have solved the biggest problem - graphics drivers.


Should have installed in Windows, and then you could have removed it in Add/Remove Programs. The only downside is you can only install one Ubuntu variation at a time...

Dont forget major "just-works" oriented distros usually have BETTER hardware resolution than windows, if you compared the two with no extra drivers than those that come with it. Next time you install windows try it for a day or two with no extra drivers whatsoever, its not much fun, and you can usually guarantee problems with wireless, graphics or some other bit of hardware.

However the main problem is that windows gets priority driver support from the manufacturers (in the form of un-included drivers) simply because its the dominating platform.

Hm, that Ubuntu Forums thread was like a big redundant circle of questions. Sorry about that :O
(I hate to say it since I love Ubuntu Forums to bits, but I will probably start nudging people over to Launchpad Answers instead).

It does sound to me like the installer just plain doesn't like your system, which is a bit of a shame. (If you decide to try Ubuntu again, though, the alternate installer CD could also prove useful).
Fedora uses a different installer system, so it should give different results. It's also not a bad little distro, albeit rather bleeding edge.

Picklesworth, absolutely! I did learn a few tricks here and there, but the major point I found is "don't install Linux from a Wibu type application from Windows". Everyone seemed to blame Wibu, which is one of the options that worked best, yet the outcome was the same regarding booting the system. SATA HDDs have been around for quite a few years already, I don't understand why I'm getting such trouble! MY motherboard dates back to 2005 (DFI Lanparty UT NF4 Ultra) Ah, but also, on the same SATA controller I have a RAID0 partition. In Windows, I need an Nforce4 RAID driver to make it work properly. Otherwise the actual Windows installation and boot drive is not part of the RAID0 but still a SATA drive on the same controller. It may sound odd, but look at it this way:

SATA1 (empty)
SATA2 Samsung Spinpoint F1
SATA3 Western Digital Caviar SE (in raid 0)
SATA4 Western Digital Caviar SE (in raid 0)

Like I said, Windows is absolutely transparent to my configuration, but has a specific RAID driver for the Nforce4 motherboard.

Since it hasn't been mentioned here, CentOS might be worth a look. It's basically a distro made from the RedHat source code with different colors and graphics, but it's free. :)

It's not as bleeding edge as Fedora 9, but it's more solid and stable. Plus, RedHat, and thus by extension CentOS, have a longer life to each release than is normal for Ubuntu/Fedora and many others.

That said, Ubuntu is fine too. That's what I run at home. :)

For window managers there are quite a few options. I was never a big fan of KDE, but have been quite happy with GNOME and XFCE. XFCE is more lightweight than GNOME, yet still has most of the same functionality. Another one I've used is Fluxbox. It's a minimal windowing environment (comes in at under 1mb) that uses very simple config files that you can easily customize. It's all based on a right click menu on the desktop.

As a side note, if you choose either Fluxbox or XFCE, you'll find that a lot of the software you can get for Linux, actually has dependcies on a whole bunch of either KDE or GNOME packages. So, if you install these, you've almost installed half of GNOME or KDE along with it. For instance, Krita is KDE based and depends on quite a few KDE packages, while GIMP is GTK based, and will need neither GNOME or KDE packages, so would be a better choice for a XFCE/Fluxbox system. You can see all the dependencies before you install the packages, (with synaptic, yumex, yum or apt-get).

CentOS is an enterprise OS, and is basically an unsupported RedHat. For most people who don't care what distro they're running, Ubuntu or Xandros are probably the best bets.

As not beeing mentioned so far:
Give Mandriva One 2008 a go as well.
It combines what you like from other distros with the benefit of a fully company backed up support for drivers and up to date repositories.
This means long term stability through stable upgrades instead of "hacky up to date distros" and only one version every few years thats beeing considered long time stable and the like.