New to Linux - how do I select a desktop?

[grahamc]

Totally new to Linux and PCLinuxOS. The download site where I found this forum offers half a dozen different versions of the OS, with different desktops to 'suit my needs' - I watched a couple of the videos which had some nice music, which moved some windows around, but I'm none the wiser, really. Couldn't find anything else that would explain the differences, so;

I have a home network with one router, a Win XP machine connected to it via ethernet, and two other Win PCs which connect wirelessly to the router.

I also have an old Win98 PC which seems to have a fried motherboard. The plan is to refit a new mboard, install new HDDs, an ethernet network card, and see if I can hook it up to the second ethernet port on the router and have it as a file server within the network.

Does this help to point me at any particular desktop that I should use?

Thanks in advance

[grahamc]

Does anyone have a text description of what the differences are....?

I know what my needs are as described above, but unsure what the different needs are that led to the developers building these into different desktops......  I'm not sure I want to try all of them, just want to pick one and run with it; I think.

[Phil]

Google (and Wikipedia are your friend)

At the end of the day all the desktops do a similar job, and all the software you need is accessible to you whatever you decide to use. Some desktops are complex, some are pretty, and there is a school of thought that all you really need is a terminal.....

If in doubt install the default KDE and then get used to it.

After that and when you are ready do a search in Synaptic for task. You will see say a dozen or so windows managers. Try LXDE, XFCE and Gnome (the default desktop is KDE)

When you login initially note the "Session" option. Use this to switch you to a different desktop environment, assuming you have them installed.

It will probably take you a long time to decide which is the "best" desktop, and you most likely will change your views from time to time.

Enjoy

(I prefer KDE3.5 and should really move on to KDE4. I like the look of LXDE, but not so much XFCE. I don't really like Gnome, not sure why.)

[thorper]

Welcome home grahamc

The spec of your machine may also have some baering on which desktop you use. KDE is windows like, many newbies prefer this since it is in their comfort zone, but KDE does require more memory, although it will run in 256k but slowly.

Gnome is the most common desktop in many Linux distributions, but can get some getting used. It's down to personal taste.

LXDE is a lightweight desktop similar to KDE ideal if you have a samll amount of memory. I run LXDE on a 768k laptop

As previously mentioned it might be best to download the default KDE version of PCLOS first and try it out as a live cd. If you enjoy PCLOS then install KDE then you can add other desktops later and run from the "session" option at boot up, as stated by philwebs

Enjoy the experience and if you have any questions just post and someone will try and help.

[parnote]

Welcome home to PCLinuxOS, grahamc!

I second both what Sproggy and philwebs have stated. Look them up in Wikipedia and Google, but most importantly, give them all a try from a Live CD. By doing the latter, you can see which one runs best on your hardware, as well as which one is best suited to the way you work with your computer.

parnote