mini_g

If you are not used to GNU/Linux, I'd personally recommend staying AWAY from Gentoo (and as Grueliustux said, you'll need a TON of time to get it going. I'd recommend having DSL connectivity to the box that you are setting up if you decide to check it out). Other than that, look around and play with the different flavours until you find one that suits you the best. Distrowatch is a good place to look. Just remember this: Gnome, KDE, Fluxbox, Blackbox, Enlightenment, etc are just the environment (DE); 'tis how each distro "acts" underneath the hood that makes the cake. ALSO, when you are playing around with the flavours, I'd recommend having /home/ in its own partition or HDD. It saves having to back up your data (still recommended, but not enforced) each time you switch to a different flavour or doing a clean version upgrade (that is, not letting the previous version update itself to the current, as when one wants to upgrade Windows).

Personally, I've been using Ubuntu, as I'm most familiar with it (as a heads up: many distro's out there right now are basically just sub-flavours of Ubuntu, which in turn is a "child" of Debian). Freespire felt wrong to me with all of the non-FOSS software. I've had little experience with Fedora (Redhat's replacement/flag-bearer for the home I believe). The same for OpenSUSE 10.x, only this time because of the lack of DSL, as I felt a need for connectivity for this distro to operate at its best. Finally, I've been looking in my free time (sorta... <.<;; ) into getting Linux From Scratch working, as I wish to know how my box is operating, and get a thorough generic rundown of the whole GNU/Linux system style in the process.

Tripleboots are easily attained (have heard of accounts of there being upwards of 13+ boot options working). I'm presuming that you are running Windows, so if possible for right now, use a different HDD and/or back up your data while playing around. If you wish to run Windows or GNU/Linux side-by-side, it is possible with either GRUB, MS' MBR (can't remember the name right now), or possibly Lilo in the MBR. Google is your friend in this area, as there are many, many tutorials out there on this (and other) subject(s).


Good point.

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reece146

Thanks for pointing out this front end. I've been messing with it for the last few days. It is pretty decent for what it is and has sufficient "eye-candy" for my purposes. I'll probably use it on the rear passenger displays as it has enough functionality.

As for quickest boot time, all can be heavily tuned. Of the lot Gentoo could potentially have the edge because you can tune everything. Unless your inner anorak wants to spend time playing with this the other options can get you close enough to be barely perceptibly slower. Get your system running first on whatever flavour of Linux you are familiar with then start looking at optimizing the boot cycle.

HTH

adamopel

At home i use slackware but i have try other distro like mandrake, red hat, suse and always have return to slackware.never crash but never! and windows always and i have test a few firewals and antivirus(whit all this the pc is slow).
now i test ubuntu and linux ice, have some problem installing(pc memory and video card).the next distro what i want to test is debian.

I like to put Linux sistem(linuxICE) in my car for many reason. ex. the stability, speed..window is not for car, it need powerful pc to fast boot. on car you will start/stop the pc and whit all start of pc the windows will be slower and slower.Always LINUX

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