Slick distro to recommend to friends?

[littlebigman]

Hello

I've tried a number of distros (Ubuntu, gOS, Slax, PCBSD, etc.) but still haven't found one that looks as slick as eg. MacOS and that I could recommend to the poor souls who got their XP/Vista hosed by a virus. The fonts always look ******, the look 'n feel isn't great (Ubuntu's brown...), etc.

Ideally, it should be available as live CD so that they can get started without touching their hard-disk, and only install it later if they wish.

Is there a Linux/BSD distro out there that is really nice to use and look at?

Thank you.

[oz]

Is there a Linux/BSD distro out there that is really nice to use and look at?

People are all different, so what is nice to use and look at for you might be seen completely different by someone else.

Lots of folks like the way Sabayon looks but I've never liked it. Of course I've never liked the way any of the *buntu distros look, either. In the end, you might need several different distros to suggest if you want to have a better chance at impressing/pleasing more of your friends.

[rokytnji]

Put a try to Mepis.

[rokytnji]

Or MoonOS Maybe.

Screenies

[littlebigman]

Thanks for the tips on Mepis and MoonOS. They do look like nice. I was also recommended Main Page - Linux Mint.

Part of the problem, is that, unlike MacOS, Linux apps aren't based on a single, coherent UI architecture.

BTW, why do Linux distros always have fuzzy fonts compared to Windows? Is this due to this "anti-aliasing" feature I hear about?

Thank you.

[saivin]

Fuzzy fonts? I have not had problem with fonts in linux, atleast when using full-featured DEs like GNOME or KDE. You may try mscorefonts if you want Arial, Verdana... on linux.

I would also suggest Linux Mint as it comes with all media codecs pre-installed. Vector Linux put lot of effort on artwork. Its based on solid Slackware. Not sure if all the codecs are preinstalled. Btw, why don't you use OS X themes/iconset? I do...

[computerophil]

Is there a Linux/BSD distro out there that is really nice to use and look at?

Thank you.

Tastes are too different and there are at least 500 Linux distributions and a dozen of graphical user interfaces.
Most of those can also adapted to the taste of the user (much better than it can be made in windows)

I like LXDE as it is in Knoppix others swear for Gnome, Kde, Kluxbox,...
The best way is to try out Live CDs

You can find them via DistoWatch, LinuxLinks, LiveCdList or even on my HomePage (where there is a table tht allows you to see the LiveCDs with it's Guis, mainprograms and languages on one look.

I 'd prefer to try out Sabayon (GNOME or KDE), Mandriva (GNOME or KDE), OpenMamba (KDE), Knoppix (LXDE), Puppy (JWM),...
This will give you an overview about various GUIs and those Distributions that in my opinion do have the best hardware recognition and are beginnerfriendly at the same time.