Puppy 5 - believe it or not - is based on Ubuntu 10.04. Which means it comes with all of Ubuntu's strengths minus some of it's weaknesses while inventing a few of it's own - the Puppy interface is way too weird and cluttered for me. Puppy also comes with flash and the codecs needed to play most things 'out the box'. SliTaz does not. The price SliTaz pays for being ultra slim is that it leaves out a lot, meaning in some areas of support it misses out.

From what I've read about this on this forums to get wireless to work sometimes requires a few additional steps to work. You can read this guide for more info on that ---> http://doc.slitaz.org/en:guides:wifi-easy

I'll agree with you. The Graphical Package manager of SliTaz is SLOW... This coming from a guy that has experienced Ubuntu's software manager on an old PIII. Like with Ubuntu, I learned to use the command line package manager instead. It's way faster, especially if you have broadband line. Normally I look up packages by desc @ http://pkgs.slitaz.org then download them with tazpkg get-install package-name after I su to root. Here is the relevent pages on it ---> http://doc.slitaz.org/en:handbook:packages & http://doc.slitaz.org/en:handbook:security?s[]=su

Btw, if you want a nice player that can play mp4 files properly - I would suggest the mplayer and mplayer-codecs package or even xine with all the gstreamer and gst- codecs installed.

Now back to talking about distros. First thing you need to decide is what you want in it. It's one of those funny things about Linux that if you can imagine it that there is probably a distro like it already. For example, say you wanted a distro that looked, acted and worked out the box like Windows XP codecs et al then look no further than ylmf linux - it even includes WINE so you can run (some of) your windows applications - it's also an Ubuntu spin off with access to all it's packages. The downside? The package repositories aren't turned on by default and some of the translations are a little weird.

The easiest Ubuntu out there to use with is truely an GNOME (and Linux) experience is called Mint Linux however. Unlike it's mother, Mint also works out the box codecs and flash wise. Your wireless should work without problems in both because they are built on the Ubuntu core just like Puppy 5. The downside? It's missing a little bit of polish around the edges. I also had compatibilty issues with it.

Now to move away from Ubuntu a bit - there are other easy to use and out the box functionality type of distros out there like PCLinuxOS which is a Mandriva spin off, but way easier to use. I have many friends that are a fan of of it. It's also beautiful and uses. Flash and codecs are included by default. Wireless works perfectly. The downside? It's installer is kind of weird and a pain to use.

Finally we come to my favorite out of the box and user friendly distro - Pardus Linux - which was developed for the Turkish government no less. Everything in it just works and it's configurable like hell. If I wanted to give my Windows friends a proper intro into Linux - this is the distro I would give them.

Now you're probably asking me why I use SliTaz instead of any of the above. I guess it's because I like a challenge. SliTaz is still in development and it's fun being on the cutting edge. It's fun (to me atleast) to solve my own problems and compile the stuff it need be. I use SliTaz because it's fun to me, it's super fast and unlike with Ubuntu, I can decide what I want in it. Do I recommend it? Hell yes, but you have to be willing to put in the effort to learn it and in the process learn how to use Linux too.

Hi Trixar_za

thank you for your reply.
yes, i know what i want, or else i wont be here on SliTaz.
i want to have fast system, small, and i will be able to add on those i required,
eventually i want to be able to help people to give second life to their old system.
and someday, convert one of my old self built desktop to become a fast server.
i did that for two old laptop with puppylinux and they are happily using now.

now my laptop, using intel 2200 wireless, does not connect.

since i can have wired connection, i used it to download ipw2200, following procedure you linked to, download, install all went fine.
after i set up the wireless SSID , password and the wext in /etc/network.conf file
i start connection, however, too bad, there is no wireless connection.
try several times, but just could not get it work.

i m not sure how to proceed.
other distros using various type of network manager, such as wicd, have no trouble, can scan all network, pick mine, add SSID/password and connect quickily.

help appreciated

You can install Wicd from the repos. Rebooting and running it through a Terminal may give some useful error messages.
=> http://doc.slitaz.org/en:guides:wicd

Here is a thread to a SliTaz flavor that comes with Network Manager (amongst other things) that they use in Ubuntu/Debian ---> http://forum.slitaz.org/index.php/discussion/comment/6053/#Comment_6053

But first try it with wicd first before switching SliTaz flavours because this flavor comes with other surprises.

@trixar:
Interesting description of available "good" distributions.
I would ad Crunchbang that i really like, light on resources. The "stable" version is based on ubuntu 9.04, which you may consider as a plus or a minus (really, it means is uses older versions of the software)
I have had problems installing the lastest slatter version (based on debian)

I also installed lxde mint, which i really love. Works very very well, i can have it work the way i would like to see slitaz work .... :(. Everything just works for me.
i guess version 4 of slitaz will be as good as that.

I will try pardus, that you advertised. Sounds really good.

I probably should have added lubuntu to that list to - the lxde based Ubuntu. I never knew there was a Mint version of it - so I'll give it a look :P

Also recently going through arch's repository I found that it actually has the latest svn builds of pcmanfm and lxpanel - not to mention LXAppearance2 - which actually has the ability to set the theme's colours! The next versions of the LXDE stuff will be amazing. PCManFM will also be able to run completely udev only without the need for HAL - hopefully SliTaz 4 will adapt the standard practice and drop HAL for good - all the other major distros are doing it - which is why mint and puppy 5 just work!

I have been playing with lubuntu for a while but did not like it:
- the all blue color is a very very poor choice (i like blue but all blue makes it very slow to select icons, which means, impossible to work with it !)
- it does not recognise my wifi out of the box (to the contrary of any other ubuntu based distro...)
[and i should add that when I forgot a pcmcia wifi card in my laptop, crunchbang automatically downloaded the appropriate driver and made it work, which no other distribution has been able to do]
- the pcmanfm in lubuntu has problem and did not detect any other partition of my disk.... except once !
- the performance meter went to a 100% while top and htop where showing the machine as mostly idle
- and, worst that any other thing, no real way to report a bug !

Slitaz is way better than lubuntu

LXDE mint is very recent, but it has the latest pcmanfm and the amazing ubuntu hw and sw support ! The best distro i have used so far (but i have not really tried pardus yet, except the livecd, but i do not speak turkish so i have been struggling :( )

my current ranking would be
1- mint lxde
2- Crunchbang
3- Slitaz
4- pclos, when i tested it (2 years ago so i guess i need some update here)
5- lubuntu, really last at this time

Slitaz with the best potential because it is so small and fast !
I just have been struggling a lot with it to make my environment work and eg remote printing still does not work as it should.... but once these are solved i want to switch to slitaz.

Oh I forgot ! the number 1 ist still windows 7, and number 2 windows XP (no troll, no flame please: they just work out of the box).

And I want to test pardus of course !


One question: do you have a "prefered" distro for easyness ? i am thinking of a senior adapted distribution. Could pardus have this role ? or do you have a better idea ??

thanks

Pardus is just easier for people that work say in a office and don't want to spend time learning Linux. It's designed to just work - the only pain about it is it's install and no real demo via a livecd. If I was going to convert over somebody in my family (who all use Windows XP) - I would use ylmf linux because it looks and acts like Windows XP - it's a nice way to get people used to Linux.

The best prefered out-of-the-box distro? I would probably go with Ubuntu based because you get all the packages and general network support. It even comes with the option module installed and build-in dialer setup called pppconfig and pon and poff (which I use for my broadband). The reason I would go with a remix like Mint or Crunchbang is that it generally has all the codecs and flash installed - so no having to download and figure it out. The interfaces also aren't that bad. I would drop to LXDE though because I've been using it a couple of months now so I'm used to it and I prefer it.

SliTaz has the potential to grow into something better than Puppy and DSL could ever be. It's getting better every day. I already converted over a couple of packages and programs so I can use with it. It just rocks.

Ubuntu made things way too easy for me and had quarks I didn't agree with nor wanted. Where SliTaz on the otherhand is just simplicity and power itself. It also has a couple of quarks to work out, but I can live with them. In a way I like that it has quarks I can deal with and fix where in Ubuntu you never had that choice.