The excellent distribution suggestions keep coming from Brian Masinick and here’s yet another one, Sidux 2009-2. Sidux is based on Debian and you can download a version that uses the XFCE or KDE desktop environments. You can also opt to download the lite version that weighs in at about 600MB or the full version that weighs in at around 2.1GB. Being the greedy app pig that I am, I opted to download the full KDE version.
Requirements & What’s New In This Release
Here’s some of what’s new in this release:
- Debian sid, as of 2009-07-14.
- kernel 2.6.30 (smp, hard preemption).
- X.org 7.4 (xserver-xorg-core 1.6.2).
- KDE 4.2.4 (en + de).
- new, SVG based, art theme created by the sidux art team.
- offline manual for en + de directly on the disc, online manuals for more languages online at http://manual.sidux.com/ and available via apt; a big thank you goes to the documentation and translation teams!
Please note that the offline manual is only available on the running live CD or the installed system.- many changes for the manual.
- iwl3945 support (Intel Pro Wireless 3945 chipsets).
- iwlagn support for IPW 4965 and the IEEE 802.11 a/b/g/n part of the Intel Wireless WiFi Link 1000/ 5xxxAGN/ 6000/ 6050 family.
- at76c50x-usb support for 11 MBit/s Atmel wlan cards (at76c503a, at76c505 and at76c505a).
- ath5k support for 54/ “108″ MBit/s Atheros wlan cards (AR2425, AR5210, AR5211, AR5212, AR5213 and AR5414).
- ath9k support for 802.11 draft-n Atheros wlan cards (AR5418+AR5133, AR5416+AR5133, AR5416+AR2133, AR9160, AR9280 and AR9281).
In order to use Sidux on your system you’ll need to meet these requirements:
-
- amd64:
- CPU requirements:
- AMD64
- Intel Core2
- Intel Atom 330
- any x86-64/ EM64T capable CPU or newer
- RAM requirements:
- KDE: 512 MB RAM (?768 MB RAM recommended), 1 GB RAM for liveapt.
- XFCE: 256 MB RAM.
- VGA graphics card capable of at least 640×480 pixel resolution.
- optical disk drive or USB media.
- 3 GB HDD space, 10 GB recommended.
- CPU requirements:
- i686:
- CPU requirements:
- Intel Pentium pro/ Pentium II
- AMD K7 Athlon (not K5/ K6)
- Intel Atom N-270/ 230
- VIA C3-2 (Nehemiah, not C3 Samuel or Ezra)/ C7
- any x86-64/ EM64T capable CPU or newer
- RAM requirements:
- KDE: 384 MB RAM (768 MB RAM recommended), 1 GB RAM for liveapt.
- XFCE: 192 MB RAM.
- VGA graphics card capable of at least 640×480 pixel resolution.
- optical disk drive or USB media.
- 3 GB HDD space, 10 GB recommended.
- CPU requirements:
- amd64:
(11 votes, average: 4.36 out of 5)
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Check out http://sidux.com/index.php?name=PNphpBB2&file=viewtopic&t=16940&postdays=0&postorder=asc&start=15&sid=1d91564ebf556b777062fe281bc239c1
for experienced Debian users looking for a supported sid, sidux is great. I’m a complete convert; have it running happily on three notebooks now. I had to change from gnome to kde, but that turned out to be a win.
I agree that Sidux is not the distro for beginners. I consider myself an intermediate Linux user and I still have trouble with the Sidux installer. But my regular distros are Mandriva and PCLinuxOS, both of which I believe have the best installers of all Linux distros so my opinion on this is biased.
I will give Sidux another spin in VirtualBox.
good review, I am also a big fan of sidux
Good review of a very good distro.
Regarding the install procedure – well it is always going to be a scary moment for the newbie, when you have to re-format something. Even now, (after several years using Linux and trying-out distros) it still worries me, causing multiple re-checking (was it sdb6 or sdb7???) to make sure something doesn’t get over-written accidentally. I’m not sure if the sidux installer is really much worse (or better) than the others available e.g. anaconda or SUSE (Man! That has to be the most complicated installer in the world!)
The forum at sidux is also a big plus – always helpful and a goldmine of technical help – just do your homework and be polite.
Finally, who said Kanotix is dead? That’s still my productive system! I dream of the day when Kano brings out a new version – but I agree, I’ve been waiting a long time now……
in your review you mention the logo being a spider or tick thing. the sid in debian sid/sidux comes from the character “sid’ in toy story, the boy who transforms and/or destroys toys. the logo is a similiar example of one of the “transformed” toys in that movie.
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