Forum members; I need your opinion

[soulangel]

Well, I have been distro hopping for a short while now (Ubuntu, Linux Mint, Fedora Core 6 and of course Sabayon 3.3). Not quite sure on which one I'll stick with on the long run. I know Sabayon is awesome, having seen the installation process recognizing everything and the fact the distro is full of goodies. The only thing that scares me in Sabayon is the Portage (emerge) system. Considering Ubuntu's repositories is fairly easy for me, I am somewhat hesitant in keeping Sabayon on my system.

This is my question: To forum members; What makes Sabayon linux special for you? What do you like the most about it (a program, feature, etc)? And what would you like the least about it?


P.S. I'm trying different flavours of linux. And maybe I am not ready for Sabayon yet? I am a complete noob in Konsole (Terminal), and still relatively new to Linux in general.

Thank you for your input; as this will give me a perspective about Sabayon

Steph

[wolfden]

Emerge/Portage! <--best thing ever

Customization!

No Binary!

Config and USE Editing!

Tweak it, build it the way you want it to run and you learn more about linux than you ever will. Yes, there is a learning curve. Learning curve is good, because it makes you learn and when you learn you see the true power that it can do. Too many are not using it to the full potential. The documentation is huge, plenty of learning material and solutions to problems.

[soulangel]

Yes, considering keeping Sabayon on my laptop (and reading more about portage/emerge/Gentoo/. My father gave me a desktop and considering putting Ubuntu on it. So the best of two worlds. When I installed Sabayon 3.3 I saw it had a lot of Ummmph! So, when and if there is a learning curve with Sabayon, I will learn at my own pace, since I will have Ubuntu on the desktop (more familiar with this distro).

Thanks wolfden

[totedati]

1. the fact that is a livedvd distro ... a VERY complete livedvd distro ( with mp3 + dvd playback + ati + nvidia latest drivers + real games ready to play with it, not tetris and solitaire only + one of the most solid support for a very large range of hardware devices)

this means that you download it, test it in a very broad sense not like many other live distros ( multimedia support, gaming and office, virtualization, internet connection, wireless?, etc, a good chance that all your devices will be recognized and working from the first time, putting in shame vista ) , is really a very complete live distro, and if you like it you install it, and can work in it without more install extra steps ...

for me is the best live dvd distro ... this means that for a broad range of joe users, all you needs is already here, in livedvd ... and this can help a lot to bring new users to linux in general ...

2. no dependency hell? thanks to portage for that ...

3. a very good and gentle introduction to gentoo and portage world ...

4. until this day a good distro, can manage to do anything i want in it, can install, uninstall and reinstall and customize any package i need .. still waiting for a program that i need and can not install in sabayon, thank to portage for that ...

is enough for you?

[totedati]

5. and the latest and best wow factor in linux world: the best compiz and beryl support

i forgot to mention this, maybe i am a bit too biased about this thing ... because i do not test this wow factor in other distros ...

[soulangel]

Wow, that is amazing. You gave me good reason to stick with it. And you are right about Sabayon putting Vista to shame. How else can a distro (like Sabayon 3.3) detect all of your hardware and the installation time takes about 1/2 hour, while when putting XP on it takes 3 1/2 hours (on my laptop, OS and drivers).

[totedati]

true, true .... from the first time i step in to it, after a disapointing mandriva upgrade to his latest version, was mandriva 2006, i love it ....

the livedvd or cd or usb stick, whatever you want to name it, feature is a killer feature for any microsoft contra-argument ... think about it a bit ... you need to buy something, you test it, if you like it you use it FOR FREE, and if you like it really so much, always can buy it or support it with donations ... what can do microsoft here? NOTHING ... they want you to buy it before can have a chance to see if you like it, they try to force you to buy it with your new desktop computers, with all this OEM deals with hardware vendors, they trust in their huge market share to trickle you in to thinking that "well is the most used os for a reason, surely must like it, is the best not so?", then a sabayon livedvd will pop-out and dismantle this marketing trick ....

many thanks from me to Klaus Knopper for his briliant ideea about a 'knoppix livecd distro"
http://www.knopper.net/knoppix/index-en.html
was a genius ideea ... and then the storm begin, and bill is very scared, and all is history now ...

[eshum]

I would highly recommend you spend some time at the Sabayon wiki . I did and learned enough to get through the learning period for emerge and portage. Also make a list of the commands you will need to use emerge and portage and keep them beside your keyboard for a while. I have learned to trust portage and seldom if ever open portato. Oh my command List has fifteen commands on it. I strongly suggest that you stick with Sabayon and we will grow together.

ed