Hi,
Gentoo is not listed in this list...
http://distrowatch.com/dwres.php?resource=major

That is because Gentoo is not one of the major distros. Gentoo will not be interesting for you if you don't have the time to learn the commandline. You have to install and setup it from scratch, with compiling everything except the minimal system from source.

To get back to the question posed by mandrivaFan in his/her original post:

There is no perfect/best/ultimate Linux distribution. Everyone has (very!) different preferences and different goals for their computer systems. I find Xubuntu to be a good fit with my preferences, yet there are others who swear by Ubuntu, Debian, Slackware, Arch, Gentoo, Salix, PCLinuxOS, ...

If you are hoping for a recommendation of what Linux distribution might be a good choice for you, I would suggest trying a Linux distribution chooser (there are many) or posting a list of your preferences and goals here at LQ and asking for help. Alternatively, download several distributions and try them out on a spare computer; keep downloading, burning and installing/LiveCDing until you find something you like.

Good luck!

If you're looking for a user friendly distro, I would say Mint is what you might be looking for, although it's been said many times in this thread that there is no "Best Distro," and I agree. Linux UE (Ultimate Edition) is also user friendly, and comes with a lot of pre-installed "fancy" features, but be warned, it's still in it's early stages. Right now, I currently have mine dual booting to Ultimate Edition and LuninuX OS. It runs gnome, but (as you can probably concur from the name) looks and acts similar to Mac OS X. It even fools some people at a first glance. It comes with docky pre-installed, as well as a lot of other programs you would want it to have. This does have the downside of making it a little heavier than most distros, but I really like it. But if you're looking for user friendly, I would still say Mint or UE. Both are clean and user-friendly.

Debian stable is great because it never crashes, and you know that if you have to upgrade anything, then it's always for security reasons only.

I used Ubuntu briefly but when the Update Manager told me to, for example, upgrade the kernel 3 times a week or rip out all of OpenOffice to replace it with LibreOffice, it felt like I should do backups. I never worry on Debian.

The only drawback is that you don't get the newfangled software that more up-to-date distributions offer. You do get it eventually, but only after it has been tested for about 3 years, and I like that.

It's not unlike why the Volvo 740 is better than those new cars where everything is electronic. The 740 -- although the window lifts use a crank -- can easily roll over 50 000 (metric) miles, while modern cars break down before 10 000. The old stuff is better and more reliable.

For example, I bet your sound will work out of the box on Debian.

Slackware is also an excellent choice (which gives you more freedom and up-to-date software), but Debian is more convenient.

What's a 'metric mile'?
How does that differ from a non-metric (aka Imperial) one?

After trying several distributions starting from Fedora,Slackware,Ubuntu,Debian,SolusOS,OpenSuse and PCLinuxOS, I am much comfortable using the Linux Mint 13 XFCE edition. Linux Mint XFCE is really seems like pretty solid and stable with good collection of software along with multimedia codecs installed. It's has been so far running great on my 3 year old HP Compaq Laptop with AMD dual core machine with NVIDIA 8200MG graphic card.

For me atleast for now, Linux MINT XFCE is working better.

It's 2 miles on leap years.

I see now on Wikipedia that I was thinking of the Scandinavian mile, which is 10 km.

Moved: This thread is more suitable in <Linux-Distribution> and has been moved accordingly to help your thread/question get the exposure it deserves.

To the OP, i've read every reply, (granted i'm drunk right now, i think i can give you an intelligent response). I have three favorite distributions; in no order, Slackware Opensuse and Debian. You like gnome 2.32. In case you have not kept up to date with linux dev stuff, Gnome have moved on to gnome3 which is much different to gnome2, and many previous gnome2 users are not happy, and you may not be too. If you are certain you want to stick with your current desktop environment, gnome2, you need to look for a distribution that supports mate, or one that supports gnome2 for a long time. Mate is a fork of gnome 2.32 to continue the development of gnome2 where the previous developers left off.
You list three distributions you're interested in, Fedora, Opensuse and Slackware. I have not had a real lot to do with Fedora as they're aiming for the complete opposite of what i'm looking for, but here's my twp cents.
All you want to do is type and compile code? why would you need bleeding edge? you've no need to go to Fedora. Opensuse currently only have a development branch for Mate, so i personally wouldn't recommend it, (but that's not to say it's not usable; some people use it on there desktops): Slackware hasn't supported gnome for a long time, and thus never supported Mate; but Salix, a fork of Slakware does support mate, with packages 100% compatible with Slack. I've used the Salix Mate packages on Slackware and they worked great. I like to use the kwin window manager though even on mate, which is not standard behavior and it made the cpu go right up under mate (opposed to native kde) which drained the battery fast unfortunately. But that's only under kwin; if you use metacity like most people do i'm sure you'll be fine.
So out of Fedora, Opensuse, and Slackware, i think Slackware is you're best option. I don't think Slackware is your best option out of all distros though. Lets face it, I love Slackware, but it takes a little longer than other distros to get set up, and if you don't care about that, and just want your programs to work as soon as possible, then i can understand that, and that's one of the reasons why i use Opensuse on my secondary computer.
I think that's you. you've made it clear you don't know a lot about Gnu/Linux and just want to code software with the gnome 2.32 desktop environment, and have sound work.
Because of this, my ultimate suggestion is try Linux Mint Mate edition; or Debian Wheezy, and install Mate with the third party repo.
Debian Wheezy will take a little more learning than mandriva and Mint, but if you follow Wheezy From Testing and through stable, i honestly think it will be your best option despite the little bit of a learning curve at the beginning, but at least it'll be nothing compared to Slackware.

Please feel welcome to post any more questions.

Knightron

Hello,
So I installed openSUSE a while now, at first installation it was freeze while booting, so I burned a new DVD, and reinstalled it, it worked perfectly for several times and now it freezes sometimes while booting, so I am afraid that it will freeze for all of the boots, and then I'll lost my data and my configuration, Mandriva Powerpack 2011 has damaged sound.

So either I go back to windows or try another distro, I search for distro with reputation, and thought about Debian 6, but I want to know where I am going to before, does it have graphical package manager? it's kernel is old, will this cause problems in sound/video for example, or other things? does it have a gui network manager? does it come with emacs,gcc,g++,mplayer,codecs,libreoffice... .

What do you think ?

can some one give me the link to the DVD 64bit iso for intel, the link in this site is for amd .?
p.s. I am the same as mandrivaFan !
Thanks,

amd64 is the correct architecture choice for 64-bit intel chips as well.

Why not test-drive a Live CD, which will answer many of your questions? All of the applications on your list can be installed in Debian, using either a GUI package manager or the terminal, whichever is your preference. You might also check out Wheezy/7 which is very close to Stable (probably in the next few months) and has about 2 years newer kernel and software than Squeeze/6.

Why is it called DVD-1??
I checked in www.distrowatch.com and Debian in not among the Distros to be released in coming months!
Also I read that the latest stable version is 6.0.4, where can I find it? what advantages does it have compared to 6?

Thanks

6.0.4 is nothing fancier than the current maintenance update of 6, it is the default download at: http://www.debian.org/distrib/

Debian does not speculate/predict release dates. Debian 7 will be released when it's ready.

I agree that there is no such thing that a "best distro". So, I will only tell you where I am now Since I've been paying with linux, I've tried different distro's: Mandrake, opneSuSe, Fedora, Fuduntu, Pear, Mint, PCLinux, etc. I think I've stayed with Fedora the longest as I liked the GUI and the support. I've lately changed over to Ubuntu for the following reaons:
1. I didn't like the desktop and GUI of Fedora 16 and later
2. I did like Ubuntu's GUI
(yeah, I know its silly, but if you interact 8 hours a day with a PC, you want it to correspond to youas a person)
3. The community support is great
4. Its user-friendly. With Ubuntu, I'm busy with a project of converting Win 7 users to Linux as a cost saving exercise (license costs) and it works.

So, I would really recommend trying Ubuntu. You can revert back to previous Gnome versions, if that's the main concern.