better desktops?

[thomasstambaugh]

I'm liking Gnome a lot, but I've been trying to find some other things to test out and give a shot too. I REALLY liked the dirrection KDE was going, having different things on desktops(including wallpaper) and neat little effects, but actually using KDE was a pain in the ***. Mainly the start menu is what I didn't like. The way things were organized really bugged me. Are there any desktops similar to KDE?

Also, just another question, is Mint using KDE? It looks like it but it also doesn't look like it.

[oz]

Have you checked out Gnome-look.org to see if they have anything you like?

Eyecandy for your GNOME-Desktop - GNOME-Look.org

...a bit more eyecandy to be had here:

GNOME: The Free Software Desktop Project

[rokytnji]

. Are there any desktops similar to KDE?

Not really. All Desktops are different in how they integrate/operate/and how can I puut this. Be Tweaked/adjusted.

Gnome and KDE and XFCE are the easy to configure heavy hitter Desktops (just my opinion)

You can make Gnome look and work quite attractive as Ozars links will show.

I think E17 is a quite attractive Desktop. But there is a learning curve using it.

Icewm and me fit together like a well worn in set of motorycle gloves.

[oz]

Another DE option that you could consider would be LXDE, but it nor XFCE come close in overall options and polish as compared to Gnome and KDE (at least in my own opinion).

http://lxde.org/

[Bemk]

I personally prefer GNOME, which is the standard for Linuxmint (which I'm using right now). There are KDE, LXDE and XFCE releases though.

[oz]

I REALLY liked the dirrection KDE was going, having different things on desktops(including wallpaper) and neat little effects, but actually using KDE was a pain in the ***. Mainly the start menu is what I didn't like. The way things were organized really bugged me.

I'd certainly agree with you in opinion on KDE4. I've installed it at least 60 or 70 times since it was first released going on 3 years ago, and it seems that it's as buggy and bloated as ever. Each new release includes new ways of doing the same old things along with plenty of new bugs and the almighty plasma doesn't feel much more stable than it did in the first official release. With some releases, desktop effects work fairly well, then the next release they have to be totally disabled. It's just back and forth on everything with actual bug fixes and stability issues apparently being at the bottom of the fix it list. I've tried to be patient with it, but I'm getting close to giving up on it completely, and would have never thought I'd be turning into a default Gnome user. Perhaps it's time to become a DE/WM-hopper once again (similar to distro-hoppers).

Hope you can find something that you like, and do let us know what you end up sticking with if you do.