FedoraFedora, formerly known as Fedora Core, is a Linux distribution sponsored primarily by
Red Hat, with significant community participation. The Fedora Linux distro produced by the
Fedora Project was based on the original Red Hat Linux distribution and is made up entirely of free and open source software.
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Note that the Fedora Project produces several "spins," including live CDs, DVDs containing the full set of Fedora packages, and boot ISOs for Internet installations of Fedora. See the
installation guide to figure out which version of Fedora is right for you.
Freespire
Freespire is the community-oriented version of Linspire.
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GentooGentoo is a source-based distribution, meaning all of its programs can be compiled from source code rather than installed as binary packages. That makes it highly configurable. Because the operating system and all of its applications can be compiled for the specific machine architecture it's installed on, Gentoo can perform extremely well. Gentoo is available for at least eight 32- and 64-bit hardware platforms. The distribution is more complicated to install than many others, but an active user community can help those who wish to tackle it.
Gentoo uses a package system called Portage that resembles FreeBSD's Ports. It lets you quickly install more than 10,000 pre-built applications.
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KnoppixKnoppix is one of the most popular live CD Linux distros.
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Linspire
Linspire is an Ubuntu-based distribution whose chief distiguishing feature is the ease of installing new software with its Click-N-Run (CNR) installation utility. While Linspire costs $50, its sibling
Freespire is free.
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Linux MintLinux Mint is an Ubuntu-based distribution that comes in two main CD versions. The Light Edition avoids non-free patented software. The Full Edition includes proprietary plugins and codecs. Both use the GNOME desktop environment by default. You can also download a KDE Community Edition DVD or miniKDE Community Edition CD, or an XFCE Community Edition CD.
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Mandriva LinuxMandriva Linux, formerly known as MandrakeLinux, is an RPM-based distro that was originally designed to be binary compatible with Red Hat Linux. Mandriva produces versions of its Linux distribution for consumer desktops, corporate servers, and for high performance clusters. Some, but not all, versions of Mandriva are free to download.
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