That's for iso's. If you bought your cd's (like me) then it's a moot point. I just prefer to have the GUI up and running on install. I can live in the command line but like having the gui if I can.

Long time Debian user? I doubt it. Otherwise you would know that Debian is not traditionally a desktop operating system and installs a minimal package set for people to customize. I like it that way and so do many others.

If you wish for a more complete/polished experience, Ubuntu or many other fill this role. However, I favour Debian for its stability, reliability and package selection and clients expect this as well. I've ran into too many embarrassing hurdles with Ubuntu. That's why all my clients are now running or have upgraded to etch.

Yes, you may have to invest time configuring. That's a given when hardware vendors don't support a platform, though most Intel based Dells, even laptops, work out of the box. I have more success with etch live CDs than Knoppix. And once etch is up and running, it will just work. I have very few follow-ups other than hardware failures. Mind you, my clients tend to use their boxes for work, not play. Stability and a long release cycle are desireable here not to mention selection of packages. There's very little tolerance here for buggy software and Debian delivers.

Iceweasel was Mozilla's fault. Why haven't they picked on other distributions? Probably because others don't care about waiting for security patches. I'll take Iceweasel because it's more secure.

Your continuing rail just gets pointless because Debian is not Ubuntu and hopefully never will be. But if you insist on using Debian and it does not meet your superficial needs, file some bugs or create yet another meta-distribution. For me, Debian works.

You bought the wrong CD, you refuse to not install anything and add software afterwards even though you can live in the command line and it is Debians fault you *have* to monkey with gnome?

You should have most everything needed for a KDE cd. So use jigdo to create you a KDE cd and have it scan and use what is on the ones you bought.

Never tried it myself but
install tasks=kde-desktop

moisttowlette: on page 13 of the thread HOWTO: Debian Configuration Post-install, there is a Debian Installation with the Business Card ISO (32 MB) post. It should be of great help to you.

Download the iso (it's only 32 MB, solving your DVD problem), it's a step by step howto describing a minimal installation (you only install what you want, no more useless apps), skip the packages installation, choose Sid (that way you only install the latest and greatest), at the end, do an update/dist-upgrade, and then install whatever you like:

# apt-get install xorg KDE or Gnome or whatever

$ startx

and you're thru.

heh, I wish I could do that, I just installed kde kdm xorg and synaptic then added things bit by bit when I wanted them. (and I use apt) its not quite as minimal as kdebase but I use quite a bit of that stuff, I don't think it wastes anything expect disk space either.

Btw I notice parts of the debian multimedia repositories in that list, anyone copying his command should make sure to add one of the debain multimedia repositories to their apt sources

No I didn't buy the wrong CD. I bought the available cd's. I just prefered the old install that loaded a base system adn then you could add what you wanted after, like Tortanick. And All I do is apt-get install kde, kdm and openoffice or just run aptitude. And I didn't say I refuse to install anything. It's just my preferences for my system. You don't have to make it sound like it's something wrong. It's just what I want for MY system. I mean that's what it's all about anyhow, isn't it? Choice? WHo's to say what is wrong or right. It's just what I want.

I love Debian Etch-its the Linux I've been looking for! I haven't found any bugs so far.

Love it. I'm a newbie, very little experience with any kind of Linux, but I found it amazingly easy to upgrade to Etch. (Ok, I had some problems, but they were all the sort originating between the keyboard and the chair, and easily solved once I read the instructions).

Here's a question--if Debian had dropped Firefox altogether rather than renaming it, what would have happened to my Firefox when I upgraded? Would it have just stayed as the old sarge version? Would it still upgrade during my regular apt-get upgrades, or would it just keep getting more and more out of date unless I did manual upgrades, like I had to in the bad old windows days?

This past week I've been able to really run it in on 4 systems. And I haven't found anything that could be considered a bug, glitch or error. Just preferences. Except for one thing. I had this happen when doing my first test installs and it came up again. I've had the 3 main home machines configured since Friday. (big box, living room box, laptop) but Friday night the hard drive on the machine in the kid's room died. I pulled one of my old spares and prepared for a full clean install.

Got WIn98 in. Setup Etch to install. Got all the way through the install (installed WIn98 on 1 4 gig partition which is all of hda and split Etch in the 6 gigs of hdb.) well got all the way down to isntalling LILO. WHen it asked where to load it the installer asked to load it to either the mbr of hdb (useless) or to the first partition. Neither would have rendered Etch bootable. I had to manually set the install point to hda by remembering the device naming schemes in linux. For me just a minor head scratcher. For a novice this would have been a major headache.

What exactly IS the problem? You CAN install the base system but that does not include a GUI. You CAN install stuff after the base system. What exactly is/are your complaint(s)?

I think that would be grub not lilo. Actually I think it would mark hdb as bootable and install grub there and then chainload windows. SO I think it would of worked fine. Whatever it does for my systems seems to work fine.

the problem is if they are giving you the option to load a desktop you should have the option of WHAT desktop you want. For those of us that like KDE it's annoying. And there are those in other forums that have expressed this very same gripe. I thought that was clear.

Also, no I do not use grub. Never have. That WAS lilo. And it's a reproducable problem for me. Loading either lilo or grub to the mbr of hdb is useless either way since the system boots from the mbr of hda.

Performance wise it's wonderful. I've got it all tweaked good on the big box and finished tweaking the laptop. But these setup issues are a stinker. Not a pain just annoying. Of course nothing like the headaches Mandriva gave me, which is why I came back.

I installed Etch just yesterday, and am pleased with it even though there are a few wrinkles. My machine is nothing exotic, but before the new releases this season, neither Debian nor any distro in its family would see my network. But Debian Etch and the new Kubuntu live CD work fine.

The biggest problem is Etch doesn't see all of my RAM. I recently installed 1 GB and Fedora 6 sees it and gives the RAM as 1.4 GiB. Etch says 885.5 MiB.

A couple of other hardware issues: No sound, and at most Etch will recognize my camera but not d/l photos from it. Sometimes it doesn't recognize it at all.

I have confidence these issues can be corrected in time.

If you don't tell the Debian team, you can wait looong time if nobody has the exact same hardware.

When the screen comes up that says "Desktop", if you don't want Gnome ... Deselect "Desktop." When the other stuff finishes, reboot, log in as root, and ... # aptitude install xserver-xorg-core xserver-xorg xorg kde-core kdm

Do you have gtkam or something similar installed? If it only works as root, that's another issue.

Sound should not be an issue ...
# aptitude install alsa-base alsa-utils
# alsaconf