Hey I am a new linux user and I am just atarting to get linux because I want to learn about it. What destro do you suggest I use? Oh I thought about SUSE and Ubuntu but what do you think.
If an administator sees this if I’'m in the wrong forum please move it thank you
If you are new to Linux, start with Ubuntu. After you get familiar with it you will probably have learned enough to experiment with other distros to see if any others are better suited for what you need.
I use Gentoo.
I use Kubuntu 64bit (although thinking of going back to 32bit), Kubuntu uses KDE as the default rather than Gnome which i find too basic, but i do like Gnome better visually.
Over the last 6yrs i’ve used Redhat (Definite), Fedora 4 & 5, Suse, opensuse, gentoo (3yrs), Debian (Sid), SimplyMephis (for about 30secs) but have found K / Ubuntu the best all rounder.
Nothing yet compares to Gentoo in my opinion for speed, responsiveness and edge though, i’m just afraid to go back for the reasons i finally dumped it two years ago.
Good Luck, its all a great learning experience and gives a break from the ‘Windows’ comfort blanket and way of doing things.
And probably no distro beats Debian in stability
If it’s your priority, install the “old” 3.1 Sarge
Care to share? I use Ubuntu now (Edgy/6.10) but was considering going to Gentoo. I used it a couple of years ago and just never stayed with Linux. Now with the release of the Vista Virus/Assumed Guilty Software Pirate crap, I’m moving to Linux permanently.
Starting out, Suse, Mandriva, or (K)Ubuntu, would all be good choices. They’re all easy to install, have good package repositories, and giant user communities.
I use 64 bit Arch Linux. It’s not exactly a new user distro, but it’s not anywhere near as difficult as some would like to make it out to be. I highly recommend it for Gentoo users who need a fast, modern system that have stopped believing that spending half of their lives compiling software is cool :D.
Sorry I’ve crashed my computer trying to boot PClInux OSX but it was my fault because I made a mistake. Anyway I have a real high end computer and I’m new to Linux and I don’t know enough about operating systems. So I need some help. (Windows in annoying I had to reformat my computer 4 times).
Now the type of computer I have is an XPS 700 with a 2Core proccessor and 2 hardrives (Raid). What RAID does is that it puts 2 hardrives together and makes there memory as one (faster proccessing speed). Now is there a distro that can handle my computer and take full advantage of it’s features?
have you tried a live cd on it yet. And i hope you have the linux driver for your raid controller.
JF
What RAID does is that it puts 2 hardrives together and makes there memory as one (faster proccessing speed).
RAID doesn’t do anything for your memory. It increases the bandwidth for harddrive reads and writes. A lot also depends on what type of RAID your are using. There are about a dozen different types of RAID. There is also a difference between RAID that is run by a hardware controller and RAID that is run from software drivers. It really doesn’t matter though, Linux can handle all of these provided that the proper kernel modules are built for it.
The XPS 200 isn’t really that radical of a computer, so Linux should handle it just fine.
If you want something with that’s high end, get one of the Tyan mobos with 4 of the 8200 series Opteron sockets. 
Yeah thanks so my best bet for now is to go with Ubuntu right. So does Linux make my computer run better than if it was on Windows (like make faster renders and my programs run faster)?
Yeah thanks so my best bet for now is to go with Ubuntu right. So does Linux make my computer run better than if it was on Windows (like make faster renders and my programs run faster)?
On the whole i think yes or certainly not slower, once you’ve got the proprietary graphics card drivers giving you hardware acceleration sorted out etc, otherwise you’ll find your desktop sluggish.
You say ‘Ubuntu’, have you checked out the difference between KDE & Gnome? Ubuntu will give you Gnome ‘out of the box’, Kubuntu obviously KDE instead. Sure you can use Synaptic, apt or Adept to add stuff later. I added Gnome to Kubuntu via Adept and had real problems getting Gnome to work right.
I use 64 bit Arch Linux. It’s not exactly a new user distro, but it’s not anywhere near as difficult as some would like to make it out to be. I highly recommend it for Gentoo users who need a fast, modern system that have stopped believing that spending half of their lives compiling software is cool :D.
Well personally i didn’t stop using Gentoo because of the time it spent compiling, i didn’t spend half my life doing it, the machines did it.
Overnight, when i was down the pub etc, sure if your going to glue yourself to your machine, then it might become an issue, but it was also no issue to leave something compiling in the background and continue working. But ultimately it was the time wasted fixing things when they broke, loosing valuable free time trying to fix them which was very unproductive, however fast the distro might have been.
IMO gentoo came unstuck because of poor quality control and repeated changes to portage, dodgy ebuilds, etc as it developed, but so what, it may be different now.
It is interesting though that the only distro that seems to get put up against Gentoo as a contender for ‘modern’ and ‘speed’ is Arch Linux, i’m going to check it out. As for 64bit i’ve just gone back to Ubuntu 32bit for compatibility with blender, which is what i do most of.
IMO gentoo came unstuck because of poor quality control and repeated changes to portage, dodgy ebuilds, etc as it developed, but so what, it may be different now.
I think it was mostly due to 2 things: old ebuilds for packages that nobody really used and new packages that were still too experimental to be included into portage.
I think it’s improved a lot latey since the “Treecleaners” group was formed to go through and remove old junk, and most of the experimental stuff has been moved to portage overlays, where they can be developed without screwing things up for normal users.
FishBB:
Might well give Gentoo another go then, on a new machine I’m building.
Yeah the reason why I’m going to transfer to Linux is because I can make it my own. I really want to learn this stuff because it will help me in the future.:yes:
I use 64 bit Arch Linux
Ah interesting… I’ve been looking at Arch myself lately. Does Blender work well under Arch and the i686 instruction set? On the features page only i386 is listed for linux. Also is there any timeline for the prolems with 64bit Blender to be worked out?
Blender works with with any x86 arch >= 386. But you will have problems if you plan to compile a 64bit version of blender. Blender is not 64 bit safe, and the .blend files saved from 64bit blender can be corrupted. You can use the 32bit version of blender on 64 bit systems though.
Thanks. 
Yeah, I’ve heard of the issues with 64bit compiles. Is there a plan to fix these soon or is it on the back burner? Also, while I’m at it, is it possible to download a binary specifically optimized for i686?
@Shaw, there are a few distros I believe, but one popular one would be Arch Linux (www.archlinux.org). I’m going to give it a go at home and if I like it I’ll put it on my laptop in place of Ubuntu Edgy Eft.
If you use (k)Ubuntu, use the dapper drake version, not edgy. Just from personal experience, but my system is a lot more unstable than it was before I upgraded.
Ian