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 Posted: Fri Sep 24, 2004 12:53 am
Gentoo: What I currently run on 50+ systems, ranging from desktops to servers to routers to embedded devices. Gentoo is the best distro I've ever used by far, and I look forward to it's continued growth and development...
Red Hat: 5.x was great, 6.x was good, 7.x was ok, anything later is IMO a joke. That includes Fedora, which I haven't used, but won't due to Red Hat's history, and the stories I've heard from others who have. Red Hat as far as I'm concerned is the Windows of the linux world.
Debian: Nice layout, nice ambitions, feels too dated though. I want a fresh, modern distro. Gentoo is in. Debian doesn't seem to fit the bill any more. I'm just not apt to it any longer...
Slackware: First, and still one of the best. But they're resistant to change. So many better ideas for doing things have passed them by...
Mandrake: Based on Red Hat, it's a horrible server, and a pig of a desktop. I hated it. But a lot of novices seem to like it. It's Windows XP to Red Hat's Windows 2000.
Corel: Debian based, which was nice, with a commercial backing. Wasn't my thing, but didn't have many complaints from my limited use of it. More desktop oriented.
Lycoris: Very nice system, and one of the ones I recommend for office workstations. I can't stand using it personally, but it's a very well-laid out distro with a lot of nice features. Too limited for my liking though.
TurboLinux: Eww
Thiz Linux: Eww x 2
Knoppix: Nice. KDE, though - blah...
Gnoppix: Very nice. Gnome version of Knoppix. Too many bugs compared to Knoppix though...
SuSE: The perfect balance of linuxes for the novice. Debian like, Red Hat like, Slackware like, and yet in it's own class. This is the first distro I recommend to people usually who can't get Gentoo up and running...
And then there's the BSDs...
OpenBSD: Ever since Theo went no-show at defcon one year, and I was sitting next to where he was supposed to be, waiting to argue over pfsync with him, I've lost respect for it. Between the recent security problems and the no-show there because their FTP server got rooted, I've kinda been dissapointed. Older OpenBSD was great. The new turn they're taking, however, concerns me.
NetBSD: It runs on anything, including the toaster. Unless you need it on the toaster, use something else though.
FreeBSD: I don't like the direction these guys have taken either. 4.x is awesome. 5.x I won't touch with a 10 foot cat5 cable.
DragonflyBSD: This is a fork of FreeBSD 4.x and is working on merging it with old school OpenBSD... I'm very much happy for these guys, and love their preview releases so far... Can't wait for this to mature a bit more...
Other things Unixy...
Solaris: 8 was nice. 9 was nicer. 10 has some mild issues. Either way, Sparc hardware + gentoo > solaris any day.
QNX: Very interesting OS. I'm not sure if I like it or hate it just yet though...
BeOS: I miss Be...
MacOS X: Nice... Unixy... Commercially supported. User Friendly. I still like my gentoo over it, but, it has potential... now if we could only get an x86 version with a 3 button mouse, and GTK instead of Cocoa/Carbon...
These are of course my impressions... Feel free to write your own opinions and the like as well. Anybody who wants to write a full review is more than welcome to do so... I'll prolly start at the top of the list, myself...
The only thing to keep in mind is that everybody is entitled to their opinion, so unless you have facts to back up yours, don't attack anybody else's. I encourage debates. Flames and personal attacks will not be tolerated. Further more, take things with a very large grain of salt as necessary. Remember: Opinions are like assholes. Everybody has one, and it usually stinks...
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Posted: Fri Sep 24, 2004 4:11 am
I miss Be too.... crying
As for Knoppix, you cite that you dislike the KDE interface of it. Might I recommend that you try Knoppix-STD (Security Tools Distrobution). Its default window manager is Fluxbox.
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Posted: Fri Sep 24, 2004 1:36 pm
Why when Gnoppix is Gnome-based? smile
If I need a tools/security auditing distro, I just use my gentoo livecd...
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Posted: Fri Sep 24, 2004 4:16 pm
Don't forget Ubuntu Linux and Damn Small Linux. I think believe there is a way to change your environment/window manager in Knoppix. It's one of the boot options.
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Posted: Fri Sep 24, 2004 8:03 pm
i do want to say somehting about fedora. its a n00by linux, but a HUGE step up from mandrake. better than red hat by far. and what i recomend to newbs.(ither that or red hat 9, easier to use)
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Posted: Sat Sep 25, 2004 6:31 pm
Ok, I want to get some opinions on what you'd recommend.
Situation
User: Girlfriend
Objective: Outfit her computer with Linux
Needs: Basic word processing, possible intenet connectivity (she still has her family's Windows computer she uses most often), some arcade games, decent interface
Hardware: 8 or 16mb video card, 400mhz PII, 128mb ram, 2-4gb hdd (don't exactly know), 17" monitor
I'm sure I could fix her up with any distro as she won't be getting into the underlying power of it for a while: all she needs is a good GUI to get her using it. Now, the question: what is the best GUI for the above situation? I know KDE is a resource hog, WindowMaker is "different" as is fluxbox. Gnome might be an option, but what version would be best for that hardware?
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Posted: Sat Sep 25, 2004 9:46 pm
hexdragon Ok, I want to get some opinions on what you'd recommend. SituationUser: Girlfriend Objective: Outfit her computer with Linux Needs: Basic word processing, possible intenet connectivity (she still has her family's Windows computer she uses most often), some arcade games, decent interface Hardware: 8 or 16mb video card, 400mhz PII, 128mb ram, 2-4gb hdd (don't exactly know), 17" monitor I'm sure I could fix her up with any distro as she won't be getting into the underlying power of it for a while: all she needs is a good GUI to get her using it. Now, the question: what is the best GUI for the above situation? I know KDE is a resource hog, WindowMaker is "different" as is fluxbox. Gnome might be an option, but what version would be best for that hardware? ooo. i feel i might be of some help here (as my computer is a dell pII with a 16mb ati 3d rage pro and a 4gb hard drive with 128mb of ram). I have run red hat and fedora on KDE with no aparent problems. fedora core 2 rund like a fast charm, but under a stressful workload it lags (like when playing a CD from XMMS). Id say try to go with a lightweight distro, you wont get much speed.if shes a linux newbie than i would recomend red 9, as its a very stable easy to use (moreso than windows to me) distro. If shes more advanced on the other hand, i suggest buying some fans, cutting some nice holes, and running overclockix with fluxbox domokun
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Posted: Thu Sep 30, 2004 2:59 pm
hexdragon Ok, I want to get some opinions on what you'd recommend. SituationUser: Girlfriend Objective: Outfit her computer with Linux Needs: Basic word processing, possible intenet connectivity (she still has her family's Windows computer she uses most often), some arcade games, decent interface Hardware: 8 or 16mb video card, 400mhz PII, 128mb ram, 2-4gb hdd (don't exactly know), 17" monitor I'm sure I could fix her up with any distro as she won't be getting into the underlying power of it for a while: all she needs is a good GUI to get her using it. Now, the question: what is the best GUI for the above situation? I know KDE is a resource hog, WindowMaker is "different" as is fluxbox. Gnome might be an option, but what version would be best for that hardware? I'd probably use a lightweight GUI like IceWM for those low specs.
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Reply
