[SOLVED] Need help choosing linux...

[igneshto]

Hi,
I'm new here... So hi everyone for starters....
The question is this, I just got a laptop to my hands, it's not new, and not very strong... C2D T9300, 3GB or ram and Nvidia 8400, so eh.... So I decided gaming ain't really going to work here....
Now I want to uninstall the windows I have on, and install some linux....
The problem I don't know which one...
I do want it to have a nice GUI(Tried mint, liked it...).
It's going to be used mostly for Surfing and watching HD movies, that's probaby it....
I downloaded Mint8, Mandriva and Ubuntu.... Just don't know which one to install... Or should I download some other dist. ???
Help????
Thanks!!!

[impert]

Any of the three would be good - as would many other distributions. The biggest difference, from a new user's viewpoint, is between GUIs, rather than between distributions. Hope you like using linux!

[nujinini]

Welcome to the forums igneshto,

I suggest you try to multiboot your machine and play around a little bit with your top 3 or 4 choices. I'm pretty sure you can make a better choice once you actually get to use em.

[impert]

Welcome to the forums igneshto,

I suggest you try to multiboot your machine and play around a little bit with your top 3 or 4 choices. I'm pretty sure you can make a better choice once you actually get to use em.

+1 to that!

[oz]

I downloaded Mint8, Mandriva and Ubuntu.... Just don't know which one to install... Or should I download some other dist. ???

Hello and welcome!

You should install each of them one at a time and decide which one you like best. If none of them suit your personal tastes and computer hardware all that well, it's time to try another. That said, any of the top 5 or so distros at DistroWatch.com should be a good place to start, but you can check the link in my signature for a couple of quizzes that will help you in choosing a distribution. Let us know what you wind up sticking with when that time comes.

[igneshto]

Hmmmm.... all these quizzes showed a common ground on openSuse, so I guess I'll download/install that too...
Installed Ubuntu and Mint, At a glance, Mint seems umm... Sleeker and a bit more friendy, Am I wrong!? I'll try suse too, see what I like...
BTW, that software "market" program.... AMAZING! So easy and fast...
One more question, I really really like winamp -is XMMS2 the closest thing to it???

[techieMoe]

One more question, I really really like winamp -is XMMS2 the closest thing to it???

Visually, yeah. XMMS or Beep Media Player (I don't think XMMS is still an active project, but I could be wrong) will look and act quite similar to WinAmp.

[markious]

As every one has said definitely give each of them a try. Cant say I'm a massive fan of mandriva myself, however the new Ubuntu release is very nice indeed.

I use to use openSuse, before I changed to Ubuntu, and I never had a problem with it so yeh try a dual boot and see which one you prefer

[igneshto]

Why'd you change from suse to ubuntu?

[markious]

I've always liked Ubuntu, however I didn't like Ubuntu 9.10 (failure IMHO)

Which made me go on the hunt for a new distro and I was recommended openSuse, which I did like and there is nothing wrong with it at all.

Then when Ubuntu 10.04 came out I tried it on a live cd and I was immediately impressed which lead me to doing fresh install of it.

Thats all really, both really good disto's so it is worth checking out the two of them.