Which ROLLING DISTRIBUTION based on Debian is right for me?

[zerozero]

zorin is gnome or lxde based, although the gnome v. at least is heavily customized

What are the minimum system requirements that I need to install Zorin OS?

For the GNOME based versions (non Lite):
700 MHz x86 processor
3GB of Hard Drive space
376 MB of system memory (RAM)
Graphics card capable of 640x480 resolution
Sound card

For the LXDE based versions (Lite):
266 MHz x86 processor
2GB of Hard Drive space
128 MB of system memory (RAM)
Graphics card capable of 640x480 resolution
Sound card

[craig10x]

Zorin 5 is like pinguy also...not a rolling release but like LinuxMint, ready out of the box (the only codec they don't include is libdvdcss for encrypted dvd but you can get the "deb file" from the medibuntu website for that in like two minutes...It is very attractive and nicely packaged...

Next to Mint, It is my other favorite (non-rolling) distro....

zorin looks nice too. it uses kde. pinguy uses gnome.

Actually, Zorin is Gnome...it doesn't have a kde version...but it looks about as nice as kde does because of it's heavy customization (as zerozero pointed out)...

[AlbertP]

sure. but 64-bit compiled software improves speed and performance, especially for demanding applications. i don't know how much linux apps progressed in this direction. 64-bit is the current trend in computing for windows.

Almost all Linux apps are already working 64-bit, but Google Earth for example is not (running 32-bit on 64-bit processor).
And I agree that it improves speed and performance, but the regular user that does not need to get the most out of his computer often doesn't feel any difference.

[linuxuser159]

sure. but 64-bit compiled software improves speed and performance, especially for demanding applications. i don't know how much linux apps progressed in this direction. 64-bit is the current trend in computing for windows.

Almost all Linux apps are already working 64-bit, but Google Earth for example is not (running 32-bit on 64-bit processor).
And I agree that it improves speed and performance, but the regular user that does not need to get the most out of his computer often doesn't feel any difference.

i think it is not enought to just recompile apps in 64-bit. they have to be redesigned.

[AlbertP]

No, only kernels need some more work.

Re-designing is not needed, recompiling is enough to get the most out of the 64-bit extensions.

[linuxuser159]

Zorin 5 is like pinguy also...not a rolling release but like LinuxMint, ready out of the box (the only codec they don't include is libdvdcss for encrypted dvd but you can get the "deb file" from the medibuntu website for that in like two minutes...It is very attractive and nicely packaged...

Next to Mint, It is my other favorite (non-rolling) distro....

zorin looks nice too. it uses kde. pinguy uses gnome.

Actually, Zorin is Gnome...it doesn't have a kde version...but it looks about as nice as kde does because of it's heavy customization (as zerozero pointed out)...

i see. it looked like kde. my first impression.

[craig10x]

easy to make that assumption...it is very attractive isn't it?

[linuxuser159]

No, only kernels need some more work.

Re-designing is not needed, recompiling is enough to get the most out of the 64-bit extensions.

i agree. this makes more sense.

[linuxuser159]

easy to make that assumption...it is very attractive isn't it?

it looks great. suitable for demonstration in order to convince people to switch.

[laptopray]

Hi.

Strange as it may seem, I find that Debian Squeeze (yes, really!) turns out to be the best rolling distro for me. It's much more stable on my laptop; for instance it never freezes, something that LMDE did regularly.

Now, I know that many of you will protest that Squeeze is not a rolling distro, but I wonder. Backports from Testing our now available, thoroughly tested for Squeeze, and the software source contains 'Squeeze Backports' in its address. For example, it is by this route that I now have Libre Office on my laptop; I do not have any source which contains the word 'Testing' listed in Software Sources. This is what makes me think that this is a way of having a stable distro, which has a, perhaps limited, rolling aspect to it.

Perhaps Clem could look into the possibility of moving LMDE over to the Squeeze code base, and adding Squeeze Backports to Software Sources. I, for one, would be very happy to see this development as I really like Mint, I do not like the 6-monthly cycle of new releases caused by the main release's tie to Ubuntu, and I greatly appreciate the stability of Debian Squeeze. What does anyone else think?

[brencameron]

I'm not sure if anyone actually mentioned this earlier, but PCLinuxOS is NOT a Debian-based distribution.

It's a great distro, and it's running now on my mother-in-law's 6 year old laptop, but it uses rpms. They have added apt-get and Synaptic to an rpm-based distro which only has one disadvantage over many others: a smaller set of packages than most other distributions.

MEPIS (SimplyMEPIS) is, I believe, a rolling distribution based direcly on Debian. You might want to check their live CD to see what you think. I used it about 6 years ago, but haven't checked out how they are now.

[Uewd]

I tried PCLinuxOS KDE and I found it to be great! Very stable and easy to use. It's based on Mandriva.

[AlbertP]

It used to be based on Mandriva in the past but today it's more or less an independent distro.