2 distros down need a 3rd

[murph1083]

I am looking into Arch and MEPIS. Would Fedore Core seem too much like SuSE. I didnt like SuSE. Felt like it came with too much preinstalled. And am scared of the gentoo install. Just from looking at the install doc, I dont believe im ready

[Dapper Dan]

From what you've just said, I think you should give Slackware a serious look too.

[oz]

Arch is much easier to install than Gentoo, in my opinion. At the very least, it's about 50 times quicker.

However, Gentoo isn't that hard to install if you'll print out the installation handbook in advance and then follow it correctly, step-by-step. Gentoo has a ton of packages, but it takes me a full weekend to install the base system and a working KDE or Gnome desktop environment, and that's on a fast computer.

I could do it faster if I chose not to sleep during the weekend.

[murph1083]

Ill give slackware a look too/


[QUOTE=ozar]Arch is much easier to install than Gentoo, in my opinion. At the very least, it's about 50 times quicker.
[QUOTE]


How does arch and gentoo compare...do they both complie on the computer? Are they basically the same without all the packages that gentoo has?

[oz]

Arch uses binary packages whereas Gentoo compiles from source so it takes much, much longer. Like I said in my earlier post, Arch has plenty of packages in my opinion but if you use some obscure packages you can always create your own from ABS under Arch.

[murph1083]

or Gentoo stage 3 route (stage 1 and 2 are imho overkill and imho quite often pretty useless).

What is the difference between Stage 1, Stage 2 and Stage 3?

[TomX]

I also say go for Arch.

It's a lot like Slackware (the only reason I left Slackware was because I found package management too time-consuming with pkgtool, slackpkg & checkinstall) but with a more preferrable package management system.

All the main packages are in either the current or extra repository. Users then submit their own packages to AUR (Arch User Repository), then, if enough people use it, a trusted user (someone who is trusted to responsibly create packages, there's about 10 I think) can adopt it and take it to the community repository (which is more accessible than AUR).

Finally there is ABS, this is for compiling apps to what you like (have that Gentoo! ).

[Dapper Dan]

Maybe consider Bintoo as well. Most of the benefits of running Gentoo but without the very long compile times.

[navsan]

check out http://www.distrowatch.com. Thats a nice place to see what you might like. I suggest ubuntu though

[Kojak]

What is the difference between stage 1, 2 and 3? I'll try to explain:

Stage one: Everything is built from scratch. You define all the flags that your system will use and thus can tweak it tremendously =complete control and optimization done by user). If you do it well, you can get a very responsive, fast booting system. If you do it badly, then your system won't be faster than any other prepackaged box and in a worst case scenario, it might break or react strangely. An installation will last several days, depending on the amount of packages you install.

Stage two: More things are predetermined for you (predetermined bootstrap), the flag usage is reduced. While stage one compiles everything from source with your own settings, you compile in stage two with predetermined settings, made by gentoo. Still: a very, very long installation.

Stage three: Fastest installation due to use of ebuild packages (prepacked with predetermined flags). Still a fast system to run although no optimization of the base system is possible. Stage three installations last less than a day, sometimes even only some one or two hours.