Linux distro recs?

[blnchflr]

I've been using Ubuntu as my primary OS since May last year, and while I'm extremely happy with it, I would like to become more Linux-savvy.

I'm looking for another newbie-friendly/newbie-semi-friendly distro to dual-boot with Ubuntu, to see what the differences are, etc. - any recs?

(P.S. I've been giving OpenSolaris - I know it's not Linux - a couple of goes over the last weeks, but in the end, I just could not get it to play nice with Ubuntu, so I gave it up. Very shiny OS, though!)

Comments

[seekingferret]

I've run OpenSuse since Intrepid broke KDE. I'm told it's gotten better in Jaunty, but I think OpenSuse is still the gold standard if you want to play with KDE 4. And KDE 4 is really cool, with Plasma offering a completely modular desktop that is insanely customizable and lots of other neat ideas.

[blnchflr]

I should try something with KDE eventually, shouldn't I - thank you for the rec!

[seekingferret]

Even 6 months ago, I wouldn't have recommended KDE to anyone. It's been a bit of a wander in the wilderness, having to switch distros to keep using it and enduring a good deal of initial bugginess in the move from KDE 3.5 to KDE 4. But with KDE 4.2 they've finally got something usable, and KDE 4.3, due out fairly soon, promises to be something which is actually fairly amazing.

I like the KDE ideology of "Put the ability in the hands of the users to customize their desktop easily however they want." Nobody's KDE desktop looks the same.