Lots of problems with Debian Distributions..

[penguinette]

I must confess I'm still at that stage of Linux where I'm trying out new distros, trying to find the one I like best. This past weekend I was home sick so I decided to take advantage of the time and try a few more out, specifically: Libranet 2.8.1, Xandros OCE, Mepis 3.3.1 (which I'm on now).

My problems have been numerous. In Libranet, I got nothing but errors when I tried doing the updates and upgrades. There were broken packages with dependency issues (straight after install which makes little sense), and I couldn't for the life of me download firefox- I tried time and time again to resolve the "package dependencies" using Synaptec and apt-get. To no avail.

In Xandros, the update had a run-time error. (I also didn't like the distro because it reminded me too much of Windows!)

Now in Mepis, I tried installing a bootloader three different ways- all three that are offered on the live CD: MBR, root, and on floppy. NONE OF THEM WORK. THe only way I can get into my Mepis distro on my hard drive is to use the SuSE linux install CD (Which offers a hard drive boot).

Oh, and it won't let me install Mozilla-Thunderbird, which I desperately want to use. It says package depencencies cannot be resolved.


Grrr. I just want a working distro with no upgrade/update/install/boot problems. What should I do?

[mrbishop]

Why dont you just install Debian instead of looking for a debian-like distro. If all you want is something that works then stop looking for other distros and install it. If you want something that you dont have to work with to get it working the way you want, you may want to try out redhat or suse or mandrake (now known as mandriva).

regards

[jens]

Go for the "netinst CD image" (only 100MB)
http://www.nl.debian.org/releases/sa...ian-installer/

I also like Ubuntu(best hardware detection and security updates)*
On the RPM site, Fedora has very good "apt-get" support as well.

*>As for the nice extra Ubuntu patches and packages, their's now a project to port them back to the main Debian repos:
http://lists.debian.org/debian-proje.../msg00165.html

[penguinette]

I actually love SuSE 9.2- it has been the absolutely most trouble-free distro I've installed yet, save for some booting problems. I can't figure out why some distros boot witih no problem and some I can't boot at all.

Perhaps you are right- I should just install the latest stable Debian release.

As for Fedora, I'm actually on it at this very moment - it's installed on my other computer which is a very old laptop. I'm not much into Redhat and Fedora to be honest. And Mandrake didn't really thrill me. I've tried Ubuntu but it didn't have near enough features and programs. I want something that starts off generally with a wide variety, and then I can add to it if needed.

Anyway, thanks for the advice- I'll give Debian itself a try! (I'm also contemplating Libranet 3.0 because apparently a lot of bugs were ironed out). No harm in trying both.

[Vergil83]

I second the vote for "real" debian. I have never had dependency probelms with stable (and only once with testing)

[ordoni]

Every person has his own unique system and hardware combination. I say try out few distros until you find one that works smoothly on your system and you feel comfortable with.

I am settled down with debian as primary and slack as secondary.

[ThoughtVelocity]

I too have had a few issues with "Debian-flavored", however no big issues with straight-up Debian. I love the fact that I can tailor the system exactly to the way I want it from the very beginning. It seems that some of the others assume to much.

[stokes]

Why dont you just install Debian instead of looking for a debian-like distro. If all you want is something that works then stop looking for other distros and install it.

I do agree - But ..... Debian can be a nightmare to install, compared to a distro like Mepis which pretty much does everything in 3 mouse clicks. With Debian it took me 3 days to work out how to install the nvidia X graphics driver, manually creating the relevant bits of the X conf file, recompiling the kernel, etc .. just to get it to work. I will admit, it was worth it in the end though. Plus those sorts of challenges teach you more about the 'nuts and bolts' of Linux.

btw I had the same problem with you with GRUB and Mepis. I had to manually edit the grub config files to get my primary partition booting into Windows XP again. I found the answers to that problem on the Mepis forum on their homepage.

[penguinette]

Isn't the latest version of Debian (released June 2005) easier to install? Does anybody know?

[oz]

Debian's netinstall is very easy, at least in my opinion. I've installed Debian using it at least 20 times, and never a failure yet.

Just be sure to know what hardware you have onboard, download the netinstall boot image (I like the business-card iso), burn it to disk, and begin your install. If you properly follow the on-screen instructions, you should be up and running Debian Sarge in no time.