xubuntu how I love thee.. let me count the ways.
 Now don’t get me wrong, Ubuntu is marvellous. Point and shoot wondrousness, especially good for putting on the PC’s of those that wot not a lot. I have however been swearing and crashing about a fair bit recently, trying to fudge some working things out of the PC graveyard that clutters my house. For old and manky PC’s, you can’t beat xubuntu.
On various kludged old PC’s, I found that the xubuntu install went much more smoothly and quickly, notwithstanding the obvious benefits the light desktop has on the final effort. Even things that afaik shouldn’t be any different.. Perhaps I am imagining it. I’ve even cleaned off one Ubuntu install and replaced it with Xubuntu – even after I replaced Gnome post install it just still isn’t as neat. Problems with shutdown and all sorts. These machines are on the ragged edge of the min requirements.. I have admittedly been a self declared hardware-o-phobe for many years now, and never have much got into Linux other than randomly installing it a fair number of times, fighting with configuration files and irritating command line Stuff (terrible allergies have plagued in that area for some years), deciding it just didn’t have what it takes to be a useful alternative and wandering off somewhere else for a while, gibbering quietly.
I just haven’t been able to get my geek on about it.
What with the promise of super cheap desktops (especially the wal-mart teeny form factor $200 ubuntu based desktop, oh I drool and plan many mad implementations..) and an OS that works well enough that you can just get on and play with the fun bits, my geek is stirring.
Oh yeah, and an OS you can dish out to the relatives without the horrible knowledge of impending malware clearing DOOM. Shiny.