linux distribution choice

[Lamylar]

hi,

I want to make linux my main OS now(so it must be able to run WoW), and i'm looking for a fast and stable linux distribution which has a helpfull community to help me with my problems
I currently am using ubuntu and had a course at school on how to use the terminal in ubuntu. in my opinion ubuntu is kinda slow, so i'm looking for a faster distribution.

I did some reading and it appears that slackware and gentoo are the fastest distributions. is that correct?
Are there other distributions i should give a look at(and why)?

hope you can help me making my choice

dono if it matters but here i my laptop specs:
Dell inspiron 1520
# Intel Core 2 Duo T7300 (2.0GHz, 800MHz FSB, 4MB Cache)
# 2GB RAM at 667MHz
# 160GB 7200 RPM HD
# 256MB Nvidia Geforce 8600M GT
# 8X DVD+/-RW Dual Layer Drive
# Dell Wireless 1390 802.11g Mini Card

[techieMoe]

hi,
I currently am using ubuntu and had a course at school on how to use the terminal in ubuntu. in my opinion ubuntu is kinda slow, so i'm looking for a faster distribution.

What do you consider slow about it? I have roughly the same laptop as you and I don't have any issues running Ubuntu. Have you considered using a different desktop environment perhaps? Ubuntu comes with GNOME, but it will also work with Xfce, Fluxbox, LXDE, or KDE (though that last one isn't going to be any faster).

I did some reading and it appears that slackware and gentoo are the fastest distributions. is that correct?

That depends entirely on who you ask. It's true that Gentoo and Slackware can be optimized to run very fast on just about any system, but they both require a great deal of work to get set up in the first place. I very highly recommend you not try Gentoo until you're a lot more familiar with Linux as a whole. It assumes a level of knowledge you simply won't have in the beginning.

Are there other distributions i should give a look at(and why)?

See our thread on this topic and good luck.

# Dell Wireless 1390 802.11g Mini Card

That card is likely to give you grief. The Inspiron 1520 had the option for an Intel wireless card instead, and had you chosen that you'd have internet out of the box. As it is, that Dell card uses a Broadcom chipset so you'll need to install special drivers for it using either ndiswrapper or b43-fwcutter.

[saivin]

I agree with Moe.

The minimum 'user' requirement for both Slackware and Gentoo is too high for newbies like us. I spent good two working days (weekends ) installing gentoo, only to be frustrated at not being able to use GUI. (Have recently posted a thread asking for help!) Same goes with slackware. There are really good, highly customizable, fast and stable distros but may be not for us.

I agree with Moe even on Ubuntu. I too have almost same specs as you have and don't think Ubuntu is slow. May be you can try Fedora 11 (yet to release) and Mandriva 2009 Spring.

[jmadero]

I'll add my little bit as well. As for Ubuntu being slow....all linux distros can be altered to make them faster and more efficient. Ubuntu IS a LITTLE bloated so that it works for most people out of the box....this is vs Gentoo which honestly, unless you have 50+ hours of experimenting time and a very patient personality you'll just get angry and think that Linux sucks (it's a GREAT distro but it is for very advanced users)

I currently run ubuntu and it's faster than any Windows machine I've ever been on (and in terms of WoW a lot of people post that they get much faster frame rates in Ubuntu than in Windows...I wouldn't know as I think that game sucks and is just a drug )

As for other distros, you could check out OpenSuse (probably will be slower than Ubuntu..from my experience at least), Fedora Core (might be as fast or a little faster), or as Moe said, try another desktop interface. I've tried them all and I was willing to sacrifice a little speed in order to stick with Gnome, I find it to be much more intuitive for myself

If you do have the hours to spend over the summer (still in school maybe you're in summer break or soemthing) try out Gentoo and see what you think, you'll be compiling a ton of things from source so if you've never done that....you'll be in for a very long ride

[Lamylar]

kej so no gentoo or slackware, don't have the patient personality

so guess i will try some "noob" and easy distributions to learn more about linux.

and for the slow thing of ubuntu, maybe it's me being to demanding

thx all for the quick replies and your help

[jmadero]

well google "how to make Ubuntu faster" you can turn off some services and also go through synaptic to uninstall anything you don't like. I actually run a script when I do a new install that automates the install/uninstall process to get rid of a lot of the bulk

[saivin]

I actually run a script when I do a new install that automates the install/uninstall process to get rid of a lot of the bulk

If you don't mind, you may share that script.

[jmadero]

I'm still actually altering it quite a bit but here it is (I got help from one of the moderators on the site for this...works like a charm)

#!/bin/bash

echo " Editing up sources.list file "
echo
sudo echo "deb http://download.skype.com/linux/repos/debian/ stable" non-free >> /etc/apt/sources.list
sudo echo "deb http://dl.google.com/linux/deb/ testing" non-free >> /etc/apt/sources.list
sudo wget http://www.medibuntu.org/sources.list.d/hardy.list -O /etc/apt/sources.list.d/medibuntu.list

sudo apt-get update && sudo apt-get install medibuntu-keyring && sudo apt-get update

sudo apt-get upgrade

echo "Installing Restricted drivers and other stuff"
echo

sudo apt-get install compizconfig-settings-manager emerald skype cairo-dock ubuntu-restricted-extras vlc conky thunderbird gparted libdvdcss2 kmymoney2 bittornado-gui wine acidrip alsamixergui cryptkeeper syslinux build-essential drapes screenlets amarok sbackup picasa scribus

sudo bash /home/user/Documents/Computer/Scripts/VMware-Player-2.5.2-156735.i386.bundle

sudo apt-get remove brasero brltty brltty-x11 ekiga espeak espeak-data evolution evolution-common evolution-webcal example-content f-spot gnome-cards-data gnome-user-guide tomboy transmission-common transmission-gtk

[computerophil]

I am very convinced by openmamba:
and Mandriva

but also Puppy worked always fine.

[saivin]

Thanks jmadero, thats a lot of help. I can alter it here and there to suite to my needs.

Btw, what does the '-O' in the below code do? Hope its 'O' of Oscar.

sudo wget http://www.medibuntu.org/sources.list.d/hardy.list -O /etc/apt/sources.list.d/medibuntu.list

Also, I thought 'libdvdcss2' will be installed automatically if we install 'ubuntu-restriceted-extra'.