Distrohoppers, assemble! DE experiences on different distros

[excollier]

Debian 9, MX17 and Mint 18.2 (triple boot) - all XFCE and for different uses

[Crimsonsky76]

People that have been around Linux and new users might have something in common: going from one distribution to another, either out of curiosity, looking for a better experience, better support, a niche or a bigger community, etc. 

There are many reasons to distrohop, but there's something everyone notices:  A DE have a different feel depending on the distro you use.

So, assuming you have a preference on DE, what distro has the best experience for you? Why? What is different about other distros.

An example would be KDE on Debian, Ubuntu, Fedora, Manjaro and OpenSUSE. If I have to use KDE, I'll go with OpenSUSE every time, having Fedora KDE and Kubuntu as a backup. I don't like KDE on Debian. KDE on Manjaro is nice, but it doesn't fit my personal taste.

Obviously, since you can customize any distro as you like,  I'm talking about the out-of-the-box experience. What's the closes one to your liking as default?

Yeah - I'm with you - KDE on OpenSuSE is without a doubt my favourite. I've never tried KDE on Debian, but I've done it on Manjaro, Fedora, Kubuntu and even Neon and had a quick run with KaOS. I think for me it's because I've been using KDE on SuSE for as long as SuSE (in whatever form) as been around so it just feels like a comfy old shoe for me.

---

OpenSuSE is one of the oldest distros - probably as old as Red Hat/Fedora. I started using it when it was just SuSE Linux back in the 90's. They've always focused primarily on KDE which is the DE although you can choose GNOME during installation. Green has always been their color probably because their mascot is a lizard!

Thanks for the info! I'll try that out when I get back into virtual machines (trying to conserve space on main drive since I need to be able to store videos I'm editing, which can sometimes add up to multiple hours of footage, as well as other things; also, I knew why they chose green).

On a separate note, impressive track record, running Linux distros since the early beginnings! I wonder where I can get a copy of the oldest distros out there running GNOME(1) and KDE (1).

Hee hee. I've used Linux since the pre-1.0 kernel days. Distros like Caldera OpenLinux, Corel Linux, Linspire (and Lindows before it became Linspire), Madriva (and Linux Madrake before it became Madriva) and other's I totally don't recall. The irony is that Linux has never been (and still isn't) my primary OS, but I love playing around with Linux distros and always have.

I latched on on KDE from the beginning (KDE was around before Gnome) and have never developed a real liking for Gnome. KDE just seems more "complete" to me.

I suspect that if you poke around on the Internet you can find copies of those older OSes. I don't even know if they'd be able to run on modern hardware, so you'd probably need to run in a VM. If nothing else, you'll be able to see how far Linux as come. It's quite impressive.

[sc1120]

I too am a huge KDE fan.  I've only used it on Kubuntu, Manjaro, and Neon.  I find that as the system gets older though I have to move off of it. Manjaro just isn't for me at this time, although i do like it.  I found neon to be buggy and missing certain preconfigured options that I don't feel I should have to setup myself (this could have just been my milage however).  I just got a new computer so I'm back on Kubuntu. 

All my other machines run Ubuntu mate. Those are used by the rest of the family and I think Mate is less intimadating than KDE.

[elsandosgrande]

People that have been around Linux and new users might have something in common: going from one distribution to another, either out of curiosity, looking for a better experience, better support, a niche or a bigger community, etc. 

There are many reasons to distrohop, but there's something everyone notices:  A DE have a different feel depending on the distro you use.

So, assuming you have a preference on DE, what distro has the best experience for you? Why? What is different about other distros.

An example would be KDE on Debian, Ubuntu, Fedora, Manjaro and OpenSUSE. If I have to use KDE, I'll go with OpenSUSE every time, having Fedora KDE and Kubuntu as a backup. I don't like KDE on Debian. KDE on Manjaro is nice, but it doesn't fit my personal taste.

Obviously, since you can customize any distro as you like,  I'm talking about the out-of-the-box experience. What's the closes one to your liking as default?

Yeah - I'm with you - KDE on OpenSuSE is without a doubt my favourite. I've never tried KDE on Debian, but I've done it on Manjaro, Fedora, Kubuntu and even Neon and had a quick run with KaOS. I think for me it's because I've been using KDE on SuSE for as long as SuSE (in whatever form) as been around so it just feels like a comfy old shoe for me.

---

OpenSuSE is one of the oldest distros - probably as old as Red Hat/Fedora. I started using it when it was just SuSE Linux back in the 90's. They've always focused primarily on KDE which is the DE although you can choose GNOME during installation. Green has always been their color probably because their mascot is a lizard!

Thanks for the info! I'll try that out when I get back into virtual machines (trying to conserve space on main drive since I need to be able to store videos I'm editing, which can sometimes add up to multiple hours of footage, as well as other things; also, I knew why they chose green).

On a separate note, impressive track record, running Linux distros since the early beginnings! I wonder where I can get a copy of the oldest distros out there running GNOME(1) and KDE (1).

Hee hee. I've used Linux since the pre-1.0 kernel days. Distros like Caldera OpenLinux, Corel Linux, Linspire (and Lindows before it became Linspire), Madriva (and Linux Madrake before it became Madriva) and other's I totally don't recall. The irony is that Linux has never been (and still isn't) my primary OS, but I love playing around with Linux distros and always have.

I latched on on KDE from the beginning (KDE was around before Gnome) and have never developed a real liking for Gnome. KDE just seems more "complete" to me.

I suspect that if you poke around on the Internet you can find copies of those older OSes. I don't even know if they'd be able to run on modern hardware, so you'd probably need to run in a VM. If nothing else, you'll be able to see how far Linux as come. It's quite impressive.

First, I now understand what alejandro meant by "a different feel" after switching to Antergos GNOME (I was trying to force Ubuntu to be rolling, so I thought: "Why not just switch to an actual rolling distro?" and I tried to install Arch in a VMware VM twice and another time in a QEMU VM, all three were failures, but at least I got comfortable with pacman) and I must say that I prefer GNOME on Antergos, not to mention that it's legitimately faster than Ubuntu's spin, but, to be fair, vanilla GNOME was faster on the same installation of Ubuntu as well (I was actually thinking of switching to Arch for a long time now, but the tipping point was that I couldn't get Plymouth and GDM to go back to Ubuntu proper, so I thought to try out Antergos in a VM, since Matt Hartley said that it's just Arch with an extra repo and it looked good in his review of it, and then I went all-in on Friday, 14th, since I was impatient).

Second, WOW THAT'S SOOO COOL!!!!  I wonder if you still have your original old computers that ran pre-1.0 Linux distros! More power to ya!

Third, off to change my signature to reflect my system changes!

Have a nice day everyone!

[wheel]

For me Mint Xfce is the choice. I have used Xfce on other distos (Xubuntu, MX Linux, Linux Lite) but always came back to Mint. Mint always worked the best with less effort put into the installation of the programs I use. For instance, when I wanted to install CYA (system backup/recovery program provided by Jeremy) Mint install went smooth, but MX linux had problems and I didn't have the experience to solve it. Jeremy came through with the solution but it took the better part of the day. All I can say is THANK YOU JEREMY! YOU DA MAN!!

Another program I like to use is Synergy, and with Mint I have no issues. Due to my experience I believe the Mint team puts more thought into what the average DESKTOP user needs, advanced and not so advance user, than other distros. Either that or I have unique hardware. :o)

I'm in for Linux Mint with Xfce.
Xfce offers good performance even on weaker hardware and still has all the nice features that you need. I hate it when "nice effects" eat up important resources. Really lightweight desktops like LXDE make me feel like something is missing on the other hand.
If it came to choosing one distro that has to be good out of the box, Linux Mint would be my choice since it probably has all the stuff you need for your all-day usage. Even tough Xubuntu is pretty similar, it doesn't come with built-in Snapshots or let's say... Shockwave Player.
The repositories of Mint are really nice since you won't be missing anything you're used to from Ubuntu.
That's something that makes the desktop experience in Manjaro with the Xfce totally different. Since they only use pure open source software, you might sometimes be missing something in all-day usage. (Even though the whole idea behind Majaro/Arch is really cool.)

Regardless to say, choosing a distro should also depend on system-specific needs and hardware. For example, I would probably most-likely use Raspbian on a Raspberry Pi.

[savantskie]

I when I first started out, like many, started with Linux in the 90's. My first foray was with a computer that was bought for me by my uncle. It had Red Hat Linux on it. I used it for maybe 6 weeks. He helped me get the programs I could on it but it didn't suit me. But I kept an eye on Linux since then. My second foray into Linux was with Ubuntu 14.04. I believe, when Ubuntu came out with Unity. I LOVED it. But it didn't have alot of the programs I wanted, so that only lasted a week. Then came Ubuntu 16.04. That was my FIRST full time experience with Linux. I haven't been back to Windows SINCE cept for gaming. Otherwise I do EVERYTHING else on Linux. Until 18.04 and Steam Play. Now I'm ONLY on Linux.

I used to be ENAMORED with Unity. It was a great DE for me. It fit my workflow, and I liked the look of it. It helped with my mind the bigger icons, and they all being on the left side dock. I loved the dash.

But what has been the kicker for me, is the new Ubuntu. And their version of Gnome 3. It's enough like Unity that strikes my aesthetics, yet so much more functional. How I get to the apps list, the activities button that will bring up a search. The way you click to other desktops. It's WONDERFUL. I hope they don't ever change it. It works so PERFECTLY for me!

I tried going back to Unity, and while it is great aesthetic wise for me, I just can't work in it. I'm spoiled with the new stock version of Ubuntu.

I've tried other DE. KDE, Mate, Cinnamon, Unity, LXDE. None of them work for me. I'll be staying on Gnome for a long time, and I'm very happy with it.

[charliebrownau]

I like

XFCE
LXDE+LXQT
Mate

I don't like Cinnamon, reminds me of Windows 8

I HATE
Gnome 3
Pop OS UI
ElementryOS UI

All those 3 come across as an TOUCH UI on a proper computer with keyboard and mouse
and out of touch with what most people want (XFCE/MATE)

[elsandosgrande]

Well, now I've switched over to KDE Plasma.

I liked GNOME a lot and I still do, but the theming in Antergos started to grow old on me, so I started to look at Plasma in a Kubuntu Bionic VM. Later one day, I was going through a lot of files and the half-Japanese half-English dates were really grinding my gears at that point, but that's only an amplification of what I felt since installing Antergos. On Ubuntu, it would display the full Japanese date and time, as set in locale.conf by me, but GNOME just wouldn't listen. After fighting with it for several hours, it had ground my gears to the point where I dropped everything and started the switch process. Since I didn't know what to do exactly and what to keep in mind, it took longer that it would have otherwise. Anyway, at the end of the tunnel, I was greeted with the Plasma desktop and I put the panel up top right away and made it narrower than the length of the screen ( https://imgur.com/a/YpAaJLN ) and continued fine-tuning all settings.

Well then, all that's left is to figure out how to get mozc and chewing to register with Plasma's keyboard layouts.

P.S. Wayland is king!

[msfullroller]

XFCE on Mint and now Debian 9 on all of my machines, because I do not run new hardware and I like for my hardware's resources to be used for what I want to do with the computer. I can pretty it up with different wallpaper which is enough for me.

I have used Mate and Cinnamon on Mint but that was before I knew about XFCE and before that, a few versions of Puppy Linux, Unity on Ubuntu and LXDE on Lubuntu. I'm not that fond of LXDE. I have also used LXLE 16.04 which has LXDE.

[spudnuts]

People that have been around Linux and new users might have something in common: going from one distribution to another, either out of curiosity, looking for a better experience, better support, a niche or a bigger community, etc. 

There are many reasons to distrohop, but there's something everyone notices:  A DE have a different feel depending on the distro you use.

So, assuming you have a preference on DE, what distro has the best experience for you? Why? What is different about other distros.

An example would be KDE on Debian, Ubuntu, Fedora, Manjaro and OpenSUSE. If I have to use KDE, I'll go with OpenSUSE every time, having Fedora KDE and Kubuntu as a backup. I don't like KDE on Debian. KDE on Manjaro is nice, but it doesn't fit my personal taste.

Obviously, since you can customize any distro as you like,  I'm talking about the out-of-the-box experience. What's the closes one to your liking as default?

Yeah - I'm with you - KDE on OpenSuSE is without a doubt my favourite. I've never tried KDE on Debian, but I've done it on Manjaro, Fedora, Kubuntu and even Neon and had a quick run with KaOS. I think for me it's because I've been using KDE on SuSE for as long as SuSE (in whatever form) as been around so it just feels like a comfy old shoe for me.

---

OpenSuSE is one of the oldest distros - probably as old as Red Hat/Fedora. I started using it when it was just SuSE Linux back in the 90's. They've always focused primarily on KDE which is the DE although you can choose GNOME during installation. Green has always been their color probably because their mascot is a lizard!

Thanks for the info! I'll try that out when I get back into virtual machines (trying to conserve space on main drive since I need to be able to store videos I'm editing, which can sometimes add up to multiple hours of footage, as well as other things; also, I knew why they chose green).

On a separate note, impressive track record, running Linux distros since the early beginnings! I wonder where I can get a copy of the oldest distros out there running GNOME(1) and KDE (1).

Hee hee. I've used Linux since the pre-1.0 kernel days. Distros like Caldera OpenLinux, Corel Linux, Linspire (and Lindows before it became Linspire), Madriva (and Linux Madrake before it became Madriva) and other's I totally don't recall. The irony is that Linux has never been (and still isn't) my primary OS, but I love playing around with Linux distros and always have.

I latched on on KDE from the beginning (KDE was around before Gnome) and have never developed a real liking for Gnome. KDE just seems more "complete" to me.

I suspect that if you poke around on the Internet you can find copies of those older OSes. I don't even know if they'd be able to run on modern hardware, so you'd probably need to run in a VM. If nothing else, you'll be able to see how far Linux as come. It's quite impressive.

First, I now understand what alejandro meant by "a different feel" after switching to Antergos GNOME (I was trying to force Ubuntu to be rolling, so I thought: "Why not just switch to an actual rolling distro?" and I tried to install Arch in a VMware VM twice and another time in a QEMU VM, all three were failures, but at least I got comfortable with pacman) and I must say that I prefer GNOME on Antergos, not to mention that it's legitimately faster than Ubuntu's spin, but, to be fair, vanilla GNOME was faster on the same installation of Ubuntu as well (I was actually thinking of switching to Arch for a long time now, but the tipping point was that I couldn't get Plymouth and GDM to go back to Ubuntu proper, so I thought to try out Antergos in a VM, since Matt Hartley said that it's just Arch with an extra repo and it looked good in his review of it, and then I went all-in on Friday, 14th, since I was impatient).

Second, WOW THAT'S SOOO COOL!!!!  I wonder if you still have your original old computers that ran pre-1.0 Linux distros! More power to ya!

Third, off to change my signature to reflect my system changes!

Have a nice day everyone!

I still have cds of things like caldera,lindows, and mandrake but if you want to try older distros you can find nearly all of them just using a search engine and if you can't get it there you can use the internet archive for instance I have mint from version 1 to 19 on a hdd as iso files.