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    Best Linux Distribution for Thinkpad?

    Discussion in 'Lenovo' started by irex, Jun 16, 2009.

  1. irex

    irex Notebook Enthusiast

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    1. Fedora?

    2. CentOS?

    3. Ubuntu?

    4. Debian?

    Who is the ideal Linux distribution for our thinkpad, T61/T60/T500/T400, X61/X60/X200/X301?
     
  2. The Fire Snake

    The Fire Snake Notebook Virtuoso

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    Once again this is a very vague question. Best in what regard? I have used Debian Lenny x64 and Ubuntu 9.04 x64 and they both work great with my T61p laptop. Most if all my hardware is detected automatically and works well. Check out Think Wiki for information relating to Linux on Thinkpads. The site is very helpful.
     
  3. gforce23

    gforce23 Notebook Enthusiast

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    There's no such thing as an ideal distro since what you use depends on your capabilities and familiarity with Linux rather than your machine's specification. The distros mentioned in the poll cater to different classes of users. Of course, Ubuntu is the most popular distro around but some the others are definitely worth a whirl.

    How comfortable are you with Linux and the command line/terminal? If you haven't had much exposure, I suggest starting off with Ubuntu (Gnome) or, if you want something that's a bit more Window-ish, Mandriva (KDE).

    If you don't want to deal with the bi/tri-annual upgrade schedule of Ubuntu and other Ubuntu-related distros, try something like Arch linux. It does take a while to set it up to your liking but once you've installed it, you'll never have to reinstall the OS again since it's a rolling release model.

    For a more hands-on approach where you're free to customize the entire setup down to the last line of code, try LFS or Gentoo.