I decided to try installing Debian Squeeze (6.0.4) in a VirtualBox this afternoon.  After hearing Fab from Linux Outlaws talk happily about Debian, I thought I'd give it a shot.  Things did not go well.

Debian and I do not get along.  I guess I'm too used to Ubuntu's user-friendly style (and perhaps too brain-tired at the moment) to deal with bull like 'you are not in the sudoers file.  This incident will be reported.' I've set up Mepis, which is built, I think, on Debian, but managed to set it up so I didn't get scolded by my own *expletive deleted* machine.  Also, Gnome 2 is HIDEOUS.  As in, 'Oh $deity, my eyes!' I'd forgotten how brain-tearingly ugly it is.

Casualties: a few hours' download time during install.  Got the hard drive space back when I deleted the thing.

Poop on you, Debian. XP

I gave this a brief go tonight on the VirtualBox. I'm not sure I know exactly what I'm doing, but it's in a VB so I'm not inclined to be especially worried about it. Being the impatient type I decided to try installing the regular Xubuntu on Parnaparnti. He powered through up until 50% of the system was installed, then popped up a 'your CD/CD drive is messed up/dirty or your computer is too hot' error. I thought it would reboot or give some other sort of, 'sorry, not gonna work' indication, but instead it logged in (not with the credentials I had defined in the install). After waiting five minutes for it to load the desktop, I rebooted. I'm fairly certain it was trying to load the LiveCD environment, and that's very much not going to work with Parna. Such a brave boy, though, my Parna. :)

Alternate CD is burning on BotanyBay right now.