Best AMD64 Linux user friendlty installation distro?

[wjgollatz]

Can anyone tell me what is a free (that I can preferably) download Linux distribution - that is easy to install? I was looking at Ubunto, but they have crazy instructions - well - for me - crazy because I have to set up partitions, and have a swap partition - and blah blah blah.

What is the best AMD64 Linux vesion - that is the most user freindly to install - and user friendly for selecting hich OS to boot from? I am going to burn a CD bootable version of Knoppix - but I don't think they have a full install version.

Thanks/

 

[n0cmonkey]

Do a quick search. It's been asked before, and Nothinman recommends using regular x86 versions. I'm not sure why though, off the top of my head, so a search would be a heck of a lot better than me misremembering the reasoning. 😛

 

[wjgollatz]

I have learned that x86 versions works for the AMD64's.

I am just concerned about installing the system and don't want to F up my system - I know I can do backup - but I don't want to have to go through that if thigns go wrong - or pay $110 for the retail version from mandrake. - So I am hopign thereis a user friendly install version - that takes away the requirment of me having to know all about partitioning. So far - trying out Knoppix - I like Linux - just want an all english version though!

 

[Dewey]

Fedora Core 3 is available for free for 64 bit.

http://fedora.redhat.com/download/

I have no experience with it.

 

[n0cmonkey]

Originally posted by: wjgollatz
I have learned that x86 versions works for the AMD64's.

I am just concerned about installing the system and don't want to F up my system - I know I can do backup - but I don't want to have to go through that if thigns go wrong - or pay $110 for the retail version from mandrake. - So I am hopign thereis a user friendly install version - that takes away the requirment of me having to know all about partitioning. So far - trying out Knoppix - I like Linux - just want an all english version though!

If you're installing, you won't have any data to backup yet. 😕

 

[Nothinman]

Do a quick search. It's been asked before, and Nothinman recommends using regular x86 versions

Because the benefit of running a 64-bit version is minimal and getting 32-bit apps to run can be a pain. But I'm spoiled by the packages in Debian that "just work" all the time, so I won't be running a 64-bit version of Linux until Debian is released for it and biarch support is in dpkg so that the 32-bit stuff also "just works".

So far - trying out Knoppix - I like Linux - just want an all english version though!

I know the knoppix people are primarily german, but I never noticed anything not in english.

 

[n0cmonkey]

Originally posted by: Nothinman

Do a quick search. It's been asked before, and Nothinman recommends using regular x86 versions

Because the benefit of running a 64-bit version is minimal and getting 32-bit apps to run can be a pain. But I'm spoiled by the packages in Debian that "just work" all the time, so I won't be running a 64-bit version of Linux until Debian is released for it and biarch support is in dpkg so that the 32-bit stuff also "just works".

You'd think with the number of 64bit archs out there (and some have been around forever), that most applications would be fairly 64bit clean... 😕

 

[Nothinman]

You'd think with the number of 64bit archs out there (and some have been around forever), that most applications would be fairly 64bit clean...

Most are, Debian sid for Alpha has >14000 packages in it, but some bigger things like O😵 don't work well and take a long time to get fixed. And then you have non-free things like VMWare and games that we can't do anything about.

 

[n0cmonkey]

Originally posted by: Nothinman

You'd think with the number of 64bit archs out there (and some have been around forever), that most applications would be fairly 64bit clean...

Most are, Debian sid for Alpha has >14000 packages in it, but some bigger things like O😵 don't work well and take a long time to get fixed. And then you have non-free things like VMWare and games that we can't do anything about.

The non-free stuff I understand. OOo and Mozilla/* are pretty nasty over all.

 

[wjgollatz]

Reading the Ubunto instructions - it talked about erasing the entire partition - and right now - I have just one partition I don't want erased. So that is why I am lookign for a nice install-friendly version - I had planned on using Norton Parition Magic - until I saw it was $90. The whole point of using and learning to use Linux - was that it was open source - and making it open wallet defeats the whole purpose! But I don't want to go over the deep end in complicated manuevers just to install the software.

Thanks for all help.

 

[n0cmonkey]

Originally posted by: wjgollatz
Reading the Ubunto instructions - it talked about erasing the entire partition - and right now - I have just one partition I don't want erased. So that is why I am lookign for a nice install-friendly version - I had planned on using Norton Parition Magic - until I saw it was $90. The whole point of using and learning to use Linux - was that it was open source - and making it open wallet defeats the whole purpose! But I don't want to go over the deep end in complicated manuevers just to install the software.

Thanks for all help.

Open source does not mean free ($). Free doesn't necessarily mean free ($). 😉

Fedora, SuSE, and Mandrake are all considered "newbie friendly." Slackware and Debian make you do a bit more work, but I think it's worth it in the end.