New VectorLinux

Just installed VectorLinux (ver.5.8 standard final) today. I've used Slack many times since '98 but it has never been my main distro. I haven't tried any Slack based distros until now.

With all that said. I found the install to be a slightly easier version of the normal Slack install. It isn't newbie friendly but it tries and explains a lot of the dialogs you are dealing with. I assume the stumbling block for most will the the partitioning tool.

Once installed everything is pretty polished looking. I like the Lilo splash, the bootsplash, etc. Only minor gripe would be the default window borders.

It does include multiple tools for browsing, multimedia, etc. Flash 9 is installed right off. I would say at the moment the speed is the most notable part of the system.

The package manager Gslapt was kind of hit and miss. It seemed to complain about dependencies on a lot of things. It doesn't appear to resolve them automatically. I probably need more time to play with it.

This isn't a formal review or anything. I've only been using it off and on. Just thought I'd share some first impressions. I've used Debian (and more recently *buntu) for awhile. So I'm not ready to jump ship I just check out anything non-rpm once and awhile. :-D

Pretty good choice and distro. You would find Vector much much faster than Ubuntu or any of the Debian-based distros. The Debian based distros have greater repository or access to packages. Vector linux and Zenwalk are both slack-based. I think you should try both of them first. The newest Vector 5.8 still uses xorg 6.9 if I am not mistaken. This is one limitation for doing xgl related stuff. Soon this would change ofcourse. But in the meantime, I am using Zenwalk 4.0 which is almost as fast as Vector linux, but uses more bleeding edge packages like xorg 7.X.X, etc. I run kde 3.5.5, kernel 2.6.18.1 soon to upgrade via the gui to 2.6.19 as it is already available.

Everything runs faster in Zenwalk and you have the option of using gslapt {same as in Vector} and netpkg {the defacto packager.} On Zenwalk, all packages and their dependencies are well handled. Ubuntu Edgy has gotten crisper also, but Zen has the dge for me since I have an easily working gnome 2.16, kde 3.5.5, beryl going, all sorts of games and developer stuff. Not to mention that one can easily go to linuxpackages.net and download and install packages. Very little to no bloat. And it is very easy to install one app like amarok, without having to install all of kde should you choose not to. This is getting better in Debian though as well. Ubuntu Edgy is making me dabble more and more in Ubuntu. But Zenwalk kicks some serious butt.

I have used Vector Linux in the past, and I do like it. Once I get a bigger hard drive on my computer, I likely will install it and check it out.

I'm downloading 5.8 right now; and decided to give it a shot; from the screens and some of the listings they had on things, it's worth a look at, plus this is a nice fast mirror for downloading (Holding steady at 500+ KB/sec), I haven't tried any slackware based, so this is something new, but I'm not really afraid of new things, and a challange is always fun, provided it's not a gentoo install type challange ;)

I guess I'll try to make a bigger assessment tonight after I get everything set up; the repo thing is just a bonus, since I'd rather compile things from source anyway, for the most part now that I'm getting a handle on linux a bit better.

I agree that vector is really fast. there are just a few things that I did not like about it. at least its default GUI after installing. if you plug in a thumb drive, it will show two Icons, one to access the drive the otehr ot unmount it. next is that, unlike ubuntu, the gslapt does not show a list of packages that you could install until you serach for something. lastly, by deafult ( i think) it installs a lot of things that I dont need. I dont have any wireless devices but software for those are installed by default.

I think I'll try zenwalk. is it easier to install?

I like Vector Linux for older machines, it is a really slick distro. I think they should get the award for the most humorous installer; some of the menu selections during install are very funny.

I didn't notice the penguins that walk around the login screen in 5.8, did they do away with them?

Rumor said: I didn't notice the penguins that walk around the login screen in 5.8, did they do away with them?

For Version 5.8, Vector switched from WDM (WINGS Display Manager) to KDM (KDE Display Manager). To get the penguins back, you probably should install WDM (I don't think xpenguins works with KDM).

I'm thinking about using vectorlinux on a print and file server. Any thoughts?