Shit sorry, yeah, I mean 10.04 the LTS ver and one of the last versions (sans 10.10) that was good with the cube. 11 is def more like a tablet than an actual computer OS.
I personally would try to familiarize myself with the older look and utilities rather than hop into 11 and be confused as fuck as to what is going on. I hate 11. Definitely would like to get 10 back on a laptop. I personally felt 10.04 was the distro that I was the most productive on. After that would be windows, then after that would be 11.04 and after that would be mac snow leopard.
I still don't get why there's this notion that all new users absolutely must be directed towards Ubuntu. Especially when you've got people saying that new versions look more like a tablet OS, and are confusing. If it's ill-suited to the task at hand (interacting with a computer, rather than a tablet), and it's confusing, why bother? There's plenty of other distros out there to recommend, and it seems like people are just trotting out Ubuntu because "it's for noobs," and nobody wants to bother coming up with another choice. Fedora isn't any more difficult than Ubuntu, in my opinion. Debian doesn't suffer from the silly changes Ubuntu is making, at present. Mint is pretty simple to use, and similar enough to how Ubuntu used to be. Mandriva is also pretty simple to use. Chakra offers some of the perks of Arch, but with a graphical installer, and a lot of the hand configuration of a normal Arch install done for you. FreeBSD offers a pretty straight-foward install, and excellent documentation to answer any questions you might have.
It seems like at this point people are directing new users towards Ubuntu simply out of habit, rather than because it's actually the best distro for them to use. I guess what I'm saying is, with all the crap that the latest versions of Ubuntu have, what is it that Ubuntu does so much better than other distros that you guys are still just echoing each other with, "Ubuntu, ubuntu, ubuntu" when someone expresses any interest in linux? Other distros have perfectly functional graphical installs. Almost any distro can easily be configured with graphical tools. Most package management systems have graphical frontends. Unless you want to do extensive customization, just about anything you might want to do can be done with some config wizard or another. And if you DO want to do this sort of extensive configuration, or you're using a WM like musca that doesn't have a GUI config wizard, chances are you are okay with the idea of editing config files to make the changes you want.
Also, to make it clear, when I say you guys just echo each other, I'm talking about linux users in general, and not just on this forum About a month ago I saw the same question pop up, and there was a similar parade of "Ubuntu!" answers. The guy tried to install Ubuntu, and things didn't work, so I agreed to help him. Everyone insisted he must have screwed up something, because "Ubuntu always works, and it's for noobs." After spending my whole weekend helping him, we realised there was a hardware incompatibility with his machine and the stock Ubuntu kernel. A fedora ISO installed flawlessly within minutes, though. So why do so many of my fellow linux users treat Ubuntu like it's appropriate for all new users, even when it obviously has limitations? Depending on hardware, intended use of the system, and any number of other factors, one might change their assesment of which distro is best suited, yet many people seem to shout Ubuntu as soon as they see "Want to try/new to linux" without considering (or often even knowing) many of the basic factors that should go into forming their answer.
