Thoughts on Peanut Linux

[MSIuser]

I am a sort of newbie to the Linux world, and for my first Linux distro I choose Peanut Linux, because I am on Dial-up and the download is a small one.

When I first tried to install it I ran into loads of problems, with hindsight mostly caused by settings in the BIOS. This just reminds me how much control winders has that hardware is made for it, not linux. Anyway since I was having so many problems installing it on my own PC i decided to try install it on the family PC. It installed without a hitch. I basically took me and Freezinbutt 2 days before we got it working properly on my PC. After trying too millions of things (it seems that way anyway).

Well now I got Peanut up and running, I feel I could have choosen something better for my first distro something like mandrake, but for an introduction to the Linux world Peanut isn't too bad. It's usable and when it works quite stable, although i did manage to crash it with one of the included games. The end result is the best thing to have come out of this experience had been the amount I have learnt about the way Linux operates and ill probably make Mandrake look even better.

PS. Thanks freezinbutt for the help you gave me in trying to get it sorted I would probably have given up otherwise.

[MaXimum SMOKE]

I was glad to read your opinion on this distro, since I was curious about it. (Considering the small size of the ISO) I am stuck with a dial-up connection, also. Usually I wind up trying a distro by getting the GPL disks for it through a place like lsl, or whoever. If it works, then, if there is a purchaseable 'full' distro, I can buy it. The one thing I can say about linux in general, is that it seems to really be gaining features fast. I started with RH 5.2, and when you compare that to the latest offerings.... Difference between night and day. What you can learn about computers in general, just doing a linux install has impressed a lot of my friends.

[MSIuser]

Yeah I have to agree with you there. I have learned so much, but then I had to install it about 50 times (I'm being serious) before I got it to work right. That's basically the one thing I think a little bit of work could be done, the installer. I don't think that it could have been a lot better though considering the size of the download. There's another distro I'm gonna try out here, Vector Linux it's called, it's reasonably small (320mb). I'll probably be installing it 2moro night if all goes to plan. I'll let you know what I think, but I've heard (from freezinbutt) that it's got a GUI installer so it sounds good!

[freezinbutt]

Well, I think I'd like to jump in here with some comments.

First of all, thanks to MSIuser for the kind words. Much appreciated, and welcome to the world of Linux (the good side).

Let me just say that over the past couple of weeks, I have been on a Linux distro binge. I have downloaded (thanks to broadband) and installed about 5 different distros in that time. Mandrake is my distro of choice personally. Easy to install and chalked full of bells and whistles. I have been running it on two machines here for about the past 2 or 3 months and it does everything I want it to do and more.

For those of you out there who are not blessed with broadband, and the thought of downloading 650+ megs of ISO's turns your stomach, I would highly recommend Peanut Linux. While the installer leaves a little bit to be desired for the newbie, once you get it up and running it is a very nice distro for only about 160 megs of downloading. If you are new to Linux and are affraid of the install, I would encourage you to read a bit about the file system and how Linux views hardware on your computer before you attempt installing Peanut. For a basic GUI installer, it is not all that bad. But compared to Mandrake, the difference is night and day. All-in-all though, I believe it is a good distro for it's compact size. The entire install only takes up about 450 megs of hard drive space. If you have enough RAM, there is no need for a SWAP partition.

Give it a try. If you get stuck, post here. MSIuser and I have become master Peanut installers. :)

[MSIuser]

There is nothing I can do but agree with you on that last comment. I've probably installed Peanut Linux more times than anyone, and only recently having solved the problems have I seen the finishing stages. :D I have to say I'm pretty pleased with the outcome of it.

I have decided not to bother installing Vector Linux now, after following the advice of Freezinbutt. He told me there was no point and Peanut was better! So for the time being I'm gonna stick with Peanut until I can afford to buy SuSE 8.0 Professional, I have a feeling it will be my next distro I try.

If you need help installing Peanut Linux, just either email me or PM. :D