[stathisx]

i think gentoo is more difficult distro to install than the other ones...what's your opinion?

[kkubasik]

With the handbook, gentoo really isnt all that dificult, I actualy learned a ton when i installed it, like fdisk and how to compile my own kernel. But LFS (Linux From Scratch) has to be the most difficult to install, namly as you dont get to emerge system. Instead you compile and install every program manualy to quote some linux user whos sn i cannot rememeber 'its the ultimate for a linux geek'. I would love to try it, i think it sounds quite cool, but above my capabilities at the moment, but its a great goal for all of you entering the linux world without much aim besides 'learn linux' (that was mine for a while).

[stathisx]

i have heard about LFS(Linux from scratch) and i was managing to do it with a friend of mine..i think doing it you can really learn a lot!

[dan@george]

I've never tried installing LFS, but I installed Debian and it was pretty difficult, so I'm going with that. The Sarge installer is supposed to be easier, but I couldn't get it to work at all; I had to use the Woody installer instead.

[RobMcNeil]

i found slackware to be hardest, it would usually go halfway through, but then crap out on me, to this day i never could get it to install correctly.
debian would be second on my list of harder os's to install of all theother installs but i figured that one out eventually, and im still using it today

[monkey8]

Originally Posted by RobMcNeil

i found slackware to be hardest, it would usually go halfway through, but then crap out on me, to this day i never could get it to install correctly

I just installed slack10 and windowsXP, windowsXP was harder to install. It first didn't even detect my card, (slack did) and I installed the official driver, and it is creating "crackles". It works perfectly on slack...

So far I've found if you can format, and you can use a command line, the "harder" distro's are really not that bad. Unless you have some really wierd hardware :P

[solman66]

My answer is:
Your first one.

Doesn't matter what distro it is, your first one is almost always the hardest because you have no idea what to expect.

3/4 people i know that have tried linux fudged up on their first install (myself included)

I used mandrake (8?) on my first install and it took me 2 or 3 tries to get it right.

With mandrake 10, i was up and running in 15 minutes (unfortunately i took the basic install and i ended up spending another 2 hours finding/installing packages i normally use)
So i think they may have come a good way with just keep clicking "next" to get it installed... but still i gotta say that first install is the toughest.
I ran through my slackware install pretty quickly actually (but i knew what i was doing by then)


P.S. i'm installing "yoper" on my laptop in a few minutes... anyone know how different/hard it is to install?

[kkubasik]

OO, let me know about yoper, i've heard that it is wicked fast, look under the gaming forum, and whitch distro? please offer me a hand in defending that (hopefuly)!

[big_k105]

well i picked gentoo but now that i actually think about it i have had more trouble getting debian working as i have gotten everything working in gentoo but never with debian and always end up goin back to good old trusty slackare. which my first time installing i messed up but my first 2 distros before that where mandrake and redhat and they installed like a breaze but i would probably think LFS would be the hardest install of them all

[solman66]

well i must correct myself....
the most difficult distro to install is one that refuses to install heh heh.

Yoper kicked off an error about:

isolinux disk error 02


Don't know what that means and don't care.... It boots fine and wants to install if i use the same CD on my desktop.
My laptop is pretty dated so i want something relatively lite and fast. I have slack on it now and like it, but i thought i'd give something else a try.

I guess i'll try yope on my desktop when i get the hard drives and partitions cleaned up a little bit more and get everything re-organized.

Also... who's bright idea was it to default Knoppix to KDE???

After yoper died on me, i decided a live cd might be ok, i went with knoppix because i had it downloaded to give to a friend who wanted to try linux.

I popped in the cd in my dated laptop and waited.... and waited... and waited....
half hour rolls by and the thing is still trying to load....
come on guys.... whats the point of having a live distro if its resource hungry???
Either do fluxbox like other live distro's or give the command line and let the user choose.

Oh well i guess i should be glad that the operating systems are out there.

Well enough of my ranting for one night....
i'm off to find a lite distro with vim, apache, php, and mysql....