For the last week I have been playing with Linux distributions. I have tried several different desktop environments like Xfce, KDE, Gnome and LXDE. The most stable and easiest to install have used Gnome with the exception of Linux Mint LXDE. KDE looks great but always feels slow and clunky. Xfce seems to use the least amount of RAM but has been really buggy form me. LXDE works in Linux Mint LXDE but not so well in Debian LXDE. I don't like the standard Gnome desktop layout but it just seems to work better. Desktop environments like LXDE and Xfce promise low resource usage but Debian Gnome was really low on resource usage and not as buggy as Debian LXDE or Xfce.
I have made these initial observations on just the ease of install in VMware Player with different flavors of Linux Mint and Debian distributions. I also used the systems initially to just surf the net and play some YouTube videos. Very low usage over a short period of time in a virtual machine by a beginning user like myself does not make a definitive review. But it just seems like I have been having better luck with distributions that use Gnome as the desktop environment. I don't understand the technical reasons for this but that will be my next area of study. But for the moment I will be staying at Gnome. (couldn't resist the pun)
