help choosing linux distro

[inf1nity]

Ubuntu is the only linux distro i have ever tried.. the first one i tried was 11.10 and i was pretty impressed by it.. but then i lost that disk and downloaded 12.04 LTS.. and i must say it has been the worst computing experience i've ever had in my life.. My USB modem Reliance Netconnect which worked perfectly in 11.10 doesn't work in 12.04 and it is the only means i hav of connecting to the internet.. Also 12.04 is badly broken for me.. I have weird display problems.. resolution keeps changing automatically.. sometimes the screen shifts out of the monitor frame.. One day i had 12 or 13 consecutive crashes .. every application i ran.. crashed without any reason.. Compiz, nautilus, gedit, even the report crash utility crashed..

i then purged compiz from my PC and went back to using the the Unity 2D interface.. that fixed a lot of stuff.. but since there was no internet connectivity.. i couldn't download anything, and since ubuntu doesn't ship with media codecs.. i couldn't play any of my music or videos.. i dunno why these guys don't ship with vlc installed.

So basically after installing ubuntu i had a PC taht couldn't connect to the internet, couldn't play my music, my videos.. and kept crashing every 5 minutes.. So i went to back to using Windows.. old faithfull.. now everything works fine.. although i must add that i miss the 5 second boot time and 2 second shut down time that ubuntu had..

I wanna try linux once more. What distro do you guys recommend.
1. MUST have good support for wireless cards (mines a ZTE)
2. Must play all popular media formats out of the box
3. Low on resources

 

[Jodell88]

Xubuntu. Btw, most linux distros can play all media with a simple download of certain packages.

 

[inf1nity]

most linux distros can play all media with a simple download of certain packages.

yes, i know. Problem is, my USB modem dosen't work and i don't have ethernet.

 

[meloz]

Xubuntu. :thumbsup:

 

[nemesismk2]

I had lots of problems with my USB modem so gave up a few times and the only 100% reliable ubuntu has been ubuntu 12.04 LTS.

 

[FrankRamiro]

If it is an old PC i suggest also Xubuntu,i run an old Pentium M and it runs fantastic.

 

[Cerb]

1. MUST have good support for wireless cards (mines a ZTE)

http://askubuntu.com/questions/167113/not-able-to-use-reliance-netconnect-modem-zte-ac2737

http://www.advicehow.com/reliance-netconnect-issues-with-linux-fix/

You might have to do a little legwork, there.

2. Must play all popular media formats out of the box

Most distros that will will say so, as it's more common not to have those than to have them. However, once you get the networking sorted out, it's just matter of a few metapackages, usually.

3. Low on resources

Look for distros with an LXDE or E17 option. Avoid KDE like the plague.

 

[inf1nity]

Hey guys out of xubuntu and lubuntu, which one is lighter?
also are they same in all other aspects except the desktop environment?

 

[lxskllr]

Lubuntu is nice, but doesn't have as many features as Xubuntu, though it is a bit lighter. Try both to see which you prefer.

 

[desura]

I was a fan of Fuduntu, but it looks like they decided to pull the plug.

 

[Cerb]

Hey guys out of xubuntu and lubuntu, which one is lighter?

Lubuntu, mainly just due to LXDE.

also are they same in all other aspects except the desktop environment?

No, but they can be made the same. Lubuntu is much more customized out of the gate. Once you get internet going, though, you can add any Ubuntu packages you want, and change it to your heart's content.

 

[anthero]

mint xfce or lxde. Manjaro with either of those two DE's should do the trick. Mint 15 with cinnamon is still reasonably functional on low resources like my netbook and looks good too. I recommend trying manjaro regardless if you have a min to download a tiling window manager like awesome or dwm and dont mind using the command line / a keyboard-centric os

 

[jaydee]

Mint 15 with MATE. I just installed it last night on my wife's 2008 AMD laptop and I am loving it. Recognized the wireless card right away, and touts the best media compatibility out of the box. Also it seems the most "windows-like" out of all the distribs I've tried (which is many).

 

[jsalpha2]

SolydX http://solydxk.com/
1. MUST have good support for wireless cards (mines a ZTE).........?
2. Must play all popular media formats out of the box...................YES
3. Low on resources ................................................................YES
The Xfce desktop is low on resources and if you want can be customized with Conky.
Even though it's based on Debian it does not force you to chase down firmware and codecs.
The people at the forum are super nice and quick to answer questions.

 

[Vic Vega]

...

 

[Savatar]

I vote for Mint as well. Nice default UI (XUbuntu is also good in that respect) and support for dvd playback out of the box. However, I would say stick with Mint 13, the LTS version, until Mint 16 comes out. I had problems with both Mint 14 and Mint 15 and nouveau, it didn't work with my graphics card at all... and it seemed pretty difficult to get nouveau's tentacles out of the system.

 

[FrankRamiro]

I vote for Mint as well. Nice default UI (XUbuntu is also good in that respect) and support for dvd playback out of the box. However, I would say stick with Mint 13, the LTS version, until Mint 16 comes out. I had problems with both Mint 14 and Mint 15 and nouveau, it didn't work with my graphics card at all... and it seemed pretty difficult to get nouveau's tentacles out of the system.

Xubuntu is a great Distro but for old computer,i have it on my old vaio and it works great,i tried it also on my newer pc and i could never get it to work on my tv with DVI i could get 1920x1080 60hz on the vga but couls not get it to mirror to the HD tv 1920X1080 30hz so i turned back to Ubuntu since i had mint 14KDE but it started to have vga video problems

 

[Rio Rebel]

Another vote for Mint.

I just upgraded to 15 from 14.1. I like Cinnamon but the others are good too.

Mint is was brought me back to Linux and it is by far the best and most refined desktop Linux experience I've had.

My sentiments exactly. Mint 15 is just sweet - *almost* makes me abandon Windows completely (The day anydvdhd works on Linux, Microsoft is a memory for me).

 

[bbhaag]

My sentiments exactly. Mint 15 is just sweet - *almost* makes me abandon Windows completely (The day anydvdhd works on Linux, Microsoft is a memory for me).

You should give Makemkv a try on your Linux machine and see if you like it vs Anydvdhd.
They have a Linux package available on the forums found here with step by step instructions on what you need.

I'm not to familiar with Anydvdhd but Makemkv is a great product and the price is right as long as you use the beta.

 

[Rio Rebel]

You should give Makemkv a try on your Linux machine and see if you like it vs Anydvdhd.
They have a Linux package available on the forums found here with step by step instructions on what you need.

I'm not to familiar with Anydvdhd but Makemkv is a great product and the price is right as long as you use the beta.

I do use Makemkv with Linux. I prefer to store movies in .iso format, but have been making more mkv's since getting a Raspberry pi. You have to really tweak it, but once you do, it's pretty impressive. Some blu-rays choke it, though, so I have to transcode - which means mkv and Plex.

AnydvdHD lets me drop in a blu-ray, copy it to .iso and be done. Quickest and most convenient way to rip, if you're willing to accept the storage space hit.

 

[bbhaag]

I do use Makemkv with Linux. I prefer to store movies in .iso format, but have been making more mkv's since getting a Raspberry pi. You have to really tweak it, but once you do, it's pretty impressive. Some blu-rays choke it, though, so I have to transcode - which means mkv and Plex.

AnydvdHD lets me drop in a blu-ray, copy it to .iso and be done. Quickest and most convenient way to rip, if you're willing to accept the storage space hit.

Anydvdhd makes sense if you're ripping your content to an ISO format but damn man that takes up a crap load of space. What's the deal with a need for ISO rips? Is it a quality issue?

 

[ashetos]

I would avoid anything with LXDE, it's been the same for a couple of years now, no support or development whatsoever.

 

[lxskllr]

I would avoid anything with LXDE, it's been the same for a couple of years now, no support or development whatsoever.

What makes you say that? It's under active development, and is being ported to Qt. Just because it isn't making radical changes based on dubious "interface guidelines", doesn't mean it isn't being developed.

 

[ashetos]

What makes you say that? It's under active development, and is being ported to Qt. Just because it isn't making radical changes based on dubious "interface guidelines", doesn't mean it isn't being developed.

I haven't been able to copy paste without inserting a Ctrl-C since Fedora 16. This is unacceptable. The latest codebases for lxterminal are like 2011 or something. Most components have a latest stable date around 2011. The porting to Qt is experimental as far as I know and the official remains gtk.

 

[Rio Rebel]

Anydvdhd makes sense if you're ripping your content to an ISO format but damn man that takes up a crap load of space. What's the deal with a need for ISO rips? Is it a quality issue?

Quality and convenience. Ripping straight to iso is fastest and full quality. If I were trying to save space, I'd make mkv's, but since converting to full quality mkv doesn't save much space and takes a lot longer than iso, I just rip to iso. And mounted iso's let me fast forward in anything I use to play them.