A friend got Vista and let me install it on my computer and all that crap, and now I'm freaking hating it, and it totally sucks. I want to totally get rid of it, and because I dont have my XP disk anymore and I dont know anyone who does (I've already asked around) I am wanting to get a new OS. The easiest thing for that would be Linux. I've never used it myself, but from listening to people, it sounds pretty nice. But I was wondering if anyone here knew the best one to get. I would mostly use it for music, playing computer games, getting on the internet, and doing some graphic stuff (obviously, I come here). So does anyone know the best overall one? Please dont just say "Get this one" while providing me a link. Please tell me WHY its good, because I want to know what I'm getting in my new OS instead of just downloading something that someone I dont even know says to. Thanks for any help everybody.
Ubuntu is probably the easiest one to dive into http://www.ubuntu.com/ use automatic(or easy ubuntu) and it effectively installs eerything for you also they have a decent beginners guide http://ubuntuguide.org/wiki/Ubuntu_Edgy linux is not windows though. I personally can't get EVERYTHING to work perfectly. I got photoshop 7 running, but not CS. I'm a retard and couldn't get Steam/counterstrike up. also forget gaming under linux if you have an ATi card, the drivers are too rough.
I tryed Suse 10.2 Got it working and everythin, but I couldnt get my wireless network card to pick anythin up... Judging by the forums Suse have problems with wirless
a lot fo linux distributions have issues with wireless routers, primarily ones which interface via USB though this has in fact gotten somewhat better in the last 3 years or so.
if you really thing about it... everyone recommends 'X' for beginners... essentially everything works. the easiest ones tend to be Ubuntu Suse Fedora I would say debian, but Ubuntu is more or less a dumbed down version of debian(in a good way).
Keep WIndows if you still want to game on the PC. You can dual boot windows and linux with only a bit of partitioning knowhow. (Make sure you install windows first, linux second). I've never used ubuntu myself (the freaky smiling people on their website put me off) but that's probably your best bet. Like Xelink mentioned, it's debian based so you won't have to do anything particularly tricky unless you want to and you'll have access to the biggest library of instantly working software of any distro. You won't get any of the horrid rpm dependecy issues that you get with a redhat distro either. But most distributions are good in their own way. OpenSUSE, Fedora and Ubuntu are all good and so are a lot of the others. Make sure you check for hardware compatibility before you install as well. Linux is good to go on most things but you don't want to get caught out.
I too would recommend Ubuntu or Suse (for the reasons mentioned above). I would also recommend Slax because that's pretty easy to use. Just compare features between the three and get the one which has the features you want most