I dont really care about security or anything, I just want to get used to Linux a little bit. So I'm wondering which edition of it would be the most userfriendly thing that I can find? I'm currently using Mandrake 8.2

In my opinion Mandrake is the most user/newbie friendly. Ofcourse others could argue differently. I'd say just stick to what you've got and play around with it till you learn it inside out and them you might decide to switch to something else. Basically they are all the same except the differences of gui apps you get along with it and the install programs.

I heard that SUSE is easier to use than any other...but I've never tried it. I used slackware and debian before, and they are in comparason less user friendly, and now I use Redhat which I think is in the middle of userfriendly. But is does come with many many user friendly features. Maybe you ought to try Redhat.

zlinuxz

SUSE. I use it, I find it easy, eveyone else who's tried it says its easy. The books you get with it are good, i'ts just a cool distro!

All distributions are user friendly. Some are just more picky on who they choose as friends!

I started out buying Mandy 7.2 from Linux Central. Then from there I d/l Mandy 7.3, RH 7.2, Mandy 8.0, Debian (not sure which), and Corel. I installed each one, and continually went back to the Mandy 7.2 I got from Linux Central. It was the user friendliest one I had used, and it also was the one that consistently installed. Now I use 8.2 and have been for quite some time, I believe it is as user friendly as 7.2 was, but with the possibility of being more advanced as well. Redhat was ok, not too bad, but I didn't like that it seemed to RULE the world of Linux, I wanted something a little less known, but not so unknown that I wouldn't be able to find good help. I don't remember Debian that well, and may give it another whirl soon. Corel was a GUI dream, but, to me, seemed too unconfigurable. Almost like a Winbloze ripoff, only cheesier.

So the short and sweet of my recommendation is:
Mandy 8.2

Out of the distros I have tried so far, Suse is pretty good, the retail packs actually have some pretty good manuals with them and in use most things are pretty easy, but I have had problems getting my Nvidia card working correctly on it. Suse has the easiest, no fuss auto update tool that I have tried so far.

Mandrake is excellent for people familiar with windows, but they have KDE set up so that it is similar to XP, all cartoon colours and massive fonts everywhere, but once you calm it down a bit the rest of it is pretty good, it still has the best "Control Panel" app for us linux idiots to set our hardware up in.

Redhat isnt too bad, but I'd rather be using Suse or Mandrake as a desktop OS to be perfectly honest its not that its especially "unfriendly" as such, I just think that SuSe or Mandrake are that little bit more geared up to easing a new user into the world of Linux.

If you are reasonably familiar with your computer, SuSe is excellent, if you are not too sure what is going on at the best of times then Mandrake is that little bit more helpful on the install and with subsequent handholding (and they dont half like sending out newsletters).

Well I am totally new to all this stuff but I want to give my opinion also......I installed Red Hat 7 and 7.1 and then now Mandrake...Both are fine but Mandrake 8.2 is very good.....YOu dont have to do anything but only insert disc and install it....!
About using it....I dont know myself too...cuz I am still a learner

hmmm...
I admit to ignorance about the latest Suse and Mandrake distros, but Red Hat 7.3 is very cool. The install is super easy and the OS detected all of my hardware including Zip and USB stuff; I'm typing this in RH 7.3 on a Apple USB keyboard.

Also HOT is Red Hat Network, which works in an analogous fashion to OSX's Software Update or Windows Update. This gives me automated access to all the errata for my system; RH even emailed me that a patch was available for the recent Apache hole. Very, very sweet.

Hi,

I too am a newbie,I've tried Suse, RL, and Suse 8.0.
My advice is stick with Mandrake 8.2. After installing Suse three times, and each time getting a different system, no sound card recognition, unable to find my usb scanner, and frequent boots into runlevel 3,
I was about ready to stay with Windows XP. Then I tried Lycoris.
Nice installation, very quick, but I was unable to get it to change the resolution
to suit my monitor, so I shall wait for the next distro from Redmond before I try again.

www.lycoris.com (and .org) is the easiest Linux distro hands down. But, it does have a few limitations if your hardware is not recognized properly. Version 46 will be available soon. Give it a try for pure desktop use.

www.suse.com is probably the next easy distro. It includes KDE 3.0 and online updates are a snap. They have a great email list for for help (thousands of users). It is stable and provides many server apps. See www.distrowatch.com for a recent review.

www.mandrake.com would be 3rd easiest to use. It's a nice distro but seems to suffer a few more bugs than the others. Updates are pretty simple, but KDE 3.0 is not included as a simple update rpm (like suse). Good forum support.

Red Hat 7.3 (and the new limbo beta) are middle of the road easy. Very configurable, stable and provide server apps. I expect good things from RH in the future for desktop users.

You could also try a debian based distro (www.distrowatch.com). Soon Xandros will be out for public consumption. I beta test it...and it's very good. Keep an eye out for this one.

Hope that helps...

Well as someone once said "Unix is user friendy, is just pickey about who it make friends with."

Hi there!

Well, if you are serious about 'getting used to linux', then using a user-friendly distro is actually a step back. The only real way of getting used to it is to 'get your hands dirty'.

If you only want to be able to say to your friends that "I use linux", just for the l33tnes factor of it, and never having to learn to much, you could try the following distro's.

Mandrake
Lycoris (That thing is so user-friendly, my granny would be able to install it)
Suse (Its quite nice actually, its a powerful distro thats user-friendly, but its harder to use than Lycoris for example).
RedHat (You'd have to be prepared to get your hands a bit dirty if you use it, but not as much as for example Debian or Slackware).

If, OTOH, you want to *learn* linux, *STAY AWAY* from user-friendly distros. It would take you weeks to learn something in Mandrake, that you'd learn in the first few hours on Slackware for example. Thats the main reason that I use Slackware now. Maybe in a year or two's time, when I feel sufficiently comfortable that I understand why linux ticks, I'll get something more user-friendly.

Just my 2c.
Good Luck!
Have Fun!
RefriedBean

It depends what graphic card you have. For example I had to
change from Suse 7.3 which I liked, to Mandrake 8.2, because
my Ati Radeon 7500 did'nt work with 3D support in Suse.

Ol' Refried, really hit the nail on head.
Although if you really, really want to get you hands dirty
then use OpenBSD