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I know the classic BeOS installer was great in terms of ease, although not flexibility; I've never tried Zeta though. I've not installed a Redhat since 6.0 either, although that wasn't so bad; similar for mandrake.
Beyond that, I know and don't like the FreeBSD and Debian installers. The FreeBSD one makes it way too easy to mess up and need to restart parts of the install, imho; a typo shouldn't be able to do that with no warning.
The only distro I've really installed recently is Gentoo, but I'm not nominating it for best install for some reason... hehe.
Otoh, Knoppix might be a contender; I haven't tried the hard-disk installer of that either, but it's pretty impressive at things like hardware detection.
I'd guess that MacOS [I know nothing about its installer] or some of the more user-friendly linux distros have the best install.
Anaconda is the best Linux installer overall (except the fact that DiskDruid is on crack and it shuffles partitions randomly when creating them, instead of creating them sequentially).
Mac OS X installer is good too. BeOS' installer is great too.
I can't decide between these three. Anaconda is the most powerful of the three (but still simple to use), but OSX and BeOS are even simpler.
Xandros' installer ain't bad either, it just doesn't look as good.
FreeBSD and Debian installers are great and easy to use.
I think this means that nobodys installer is actually what a user would consider great. But some are good and this will show that, also the usual distro bias will shine through.
In a way, the BeOS installer was the best because it was the simplest and easiest. In other way, the Debian installer is far superior, because it let's you install Debian on pretty much anything. You don't even need to boot into an installer --- you can install Debian from an existing Linux setup, even remotely.
Being something like a minimalist (as so using gnome and ubuntu). Idealy I think an OS installer should just dump the cd image on the HD, perhaps with intergrated partitioner but thats basically it.
Then the desktop enverioment would detect that it was the first run and run a wizzard desktop and system configuration tool. Hardware detection is also handled by the desktop env working together with the system.
> I have.
Well, sure, it's a poll on your site. Kudos, though.
It might be interesting to have a few more non-linux things on there though; iirc, QNX has a decent installer, while Solaris' installer, last I used it, was painful. [for some reason, I couldn't partition from the usual cd and in English; I ended up having to use Japanese rather than English to run fdisk, then rebooted so I could install in English. Probably just a slightly corrupted disk, but ...]
I don't know about other people but I've only installed Red Hat and Windows XP. So it's hard to judge which one is the best since I haven't installed them all.
These are really small OSes, most people haven't tried them. That's why there is a "Other" option on the poll.
When I first read it, I assumed "good" meant ease of use (I voted for YAST). Now I'm reading comments and seeing people comment on things like ease of flexability, interface, etc. I still think YAST offers a good combination of most positive perspectives, but I've only tried it a few times. Anyways, interesting comments, got me thinking a bit...
Been using the /stand/sysinstall for years and I've never had a single problem with it. Maybe I'm just gifted or something, I don't know but it just works. It's a very simple installer, which gets you up and running quickly, and that's what I like the most about it.
How any other operating systems can you install with 4-5 mouse clicks?
If you've tried Longhorn 4051, although it took a LONG time to boot after the install, that was pretty sleek. Nice graphics, simple, attractive.
But as is, I had to vote for Anaconda. Nothing is quite as sleek, and short, super simple installers scare me.
I'm pissed off that my NTFS is labelled Windows XP correctly, but my damn FAT32 crossover partition is always inserted into Lilo or Grub as "Windows" too, even though it's got no OS. I'm much happier with the option of control.
> Being something like a minimalist (as so using gnome and ubuntu). Idealy I think an OS installer should just dump the cd image on the HD, perhaps with intergrated partitioner but thats basically it.
I'd argue whether that's really minimalist. I'd like at least a "click here to dump" "click here to config", and "cancel" button/key.
> Then the desktop enverioment would detect that it was the first run and run a wizzard desktop and system configuration tool. Hardware detection is also handled by the desktop env working together with the system.
Let the desktop environment have the option to run a config util whenever it doesn't find its usual dotfiles, or when it has an equivalent lack of configuration. Agreed that hardware detection should be automatic, with the caveat that it needs to be easy to turn _off_; I doubt it'll ever work exactly perfectly 100% of the time.
I'd rather have the option to configure the system at install time, as in BeOS' installer, than be forced to do it by a wizard as soon as I boot.
wheres the option for dos? boot to a dos floppy, type in 'sys c:' and viola! its installed :]
anyways, as far as ease of use, I'd have to pick BeOS. Its very fast and works perfectly.
> These are really small OSes, most people haven't tried them. That's why there is a "Other" option on the poll.
Oops. I somehow missed that. Sorry!
I voted ``Other'' for the DragonFly BSD installer.
>> I voted ``Other'' for the DragonFly BSD installer.
Me, too!
It's now included in FreeSBIE, too! 
http://news.gmane.org/gmane.os.freebsd.freesbie/cutoff=1132
I voted OS X, it is simple and is very fast. Gives you only a few options but really thats all you need. I really like the Archive Install feature.
Though BeOS takes a close second place for me. Windows even though I don't really like it the installer isn't bad, it seems to take a long time to install though.
For a simple partition layout, Mepis is the simplest, easiest Linux install I've ever experienced. Granted it may lack some of the flexibility that others have.
After trying it I think all cd based install disks (not net-installs) should move to a live-cd format (a cross between what the live cds currently offer & what the installation cds of Fedora & Mandrake, etc. offer).
What about Gentoo's installer (not the Anaconda-based one that VidaLinux did)? Sure, it's pretty much all hands-on, but you are in complete control of what it does, and Gentoo's documentation pretty much hold your hand through the entire process, as well as explaining what each step does, so not onoly are you in total control, you learn a lot more about the inner workings of Gentoo (and this knowlegde can be applied to other GNU/Linux system Unix-like system etc.).
My two cents...
Where are the QNX Neutrino, OS/400, and Plan-9 options?
QNX 6. (Some might say Neutrino, but that is really supposed to refer to the kernel. Although even people who work at QSSL call the OS Neutrino sometimes).
I think zhe installer M$ is planning for Longhorn will be pretty much that what I understand as a good installer: copy some kind of image to HD and do a hardware detection and a bit customization afterwards.
But for now, I would say Anaconda is the best installer. I've tried it in Fedora; nice graphics, not too much options and relatively fast.
Knoppix install is the best.
The BeOS and MacOS Installer are good, but they just install the OS but Knoppix installs the OS + all programms you need
My vote goes to the BeOS/Zeta installer, no doubt about that. And yes, I have also tried practically all of these. Mac OS X' installer has a resemblance with the BeOS/Zeta one, so that one also ends up high on my list.
I was doubting a little bit whether or not to choose the QNX Neutrino installer (other), because that installation is also extremely easy and fast. The bad thing is, though, that that one is not graphical and therefore not good enough.
As for Linux installations: I prefer the one from Mandrake. It was the first Linux installer I ever tried and thereofre I am very used to it. And I like the extensive partitioning tool included.
OpenBSD has by far the best installer I've ever used. It is extremely simply to use, yet still maintains that level of configurablility that the experienced user wants.
Because it's not an installer...?
Come on. I like Gentoo but I can make the difference between an installation document and an installer.
you can't get better than OSX's installer.
BeOS would have been considered 1st but it has a nasty partition utility with plenty of drawbacks.
Nobody said anything about Mandrake's installer, but imho its much better than anaconda. The perfect combitation of power and simpliness. And its partitioner...
I like Be's partition utility. Explain these drawbacks please.
Here's my ranking of my favorites, based on server installs:
1. FreeBSD - possibly the easiest and fastest of all.
Partitioning is a breeze, and it only asks a few questions.
Minimum install footprint is only at abt 100M (4.10).
2. Debian - In my opinion, its quite easy, but that's me. I like
the old d-i with cfdisk than the new one with a sort of graphical/ncurses
parted.
3. OpenBSD - Also very simple IF you read and understand the docs.
Once you do it twice, you got it covered.
4. Slackware - Minimum install is as easy as any. Just takes a little longer
if your doing it the first time and would like to select packages, especially if you
haven't figured out package dependencies. I find the 'menu' option the easiest way.
5. NetBSD - Feels like a cross between OpenBSD and FreeBSD. Just take a
moment to study the partitioning program and its all easy afterwards.
6. Dragonfly - Pretty easy, a bit raw though, but very easy. Partitioning feels
like the new d-i, but faster to go through.
7. Anaconda - This is the future of installation. I have nothing it. I just prefer
text based ones.
IMHO Slackware's installer is the best to me, may not be the most user friendly for the clueless but it works for me...
Although Mac OS X is extremely smooth and simple, if you are an advanced user, it's all too easy to miss custom installation options. And if you ever change your mind later, you cannot easily install or uninstall features.
chown -R netbsd_installer *_installer
better yet
chPWN -R netbsd_installer *_installer
The _new_ debian installer rocks! I've used it on X86, Sparc and PPC without issue. It's great!
lol. I've tried to install it three times, no good. WTF are you supposed to do to partition? What does it mean by creating a "disklabel"? Why did it delete my hard disk when I tried to make one?
Who really cares? its not like any single vendor is going to abandon their installer for another. Kind of an inane poll if you ask me.
Ubuntu: extremely simple and fast, somehow similar to Slack but easier.
Anaconda has a really good balance of power and simplicty.
It's weird to have OS X and Windows on the same poll as Linux installers, since they have completely different requirements. For example, you won't be doing much partitioning in either, nor package selection (only a tiny bit in OS X). Having said that, OS X's installer is so superior to Windows that it's not even funny.
Of course Eugenia's tried them all, she runs a site called "OSnews"!!!
The *BSD's prepare your drives in a different way than Linux.
BSD makes a single BSD partition and then 'slices' that up into smaller chunks. These chunks are where you mount the filesystem. In order for *BSD to know w/c slice is w/c, you have to give them 'disklabels'.
Best install distro:(opinion me)Slackware,Debian,Gentoo!and...FreeBSD & Solaris!!!
I have installed Windows, Redhat, Mandrake, BeOs and Debian and FreeBsd for years.
FreeBsd does all the necessary checks before installing, whereas others tend to crash if preconditions are not ok on the machine.
Ex :
- trying to install on a too small partitions ==> crash the partition
- trying to install from 4 CDs with the third that cannot be read==> Crash of the install
{well, I have little luck with installations)
- ... Partition annihilated, No possible reboot, ...
Hopefully, we still have a reset button and a bootable floppy !
olive
How any other operating systems can you install with 4-5 mouse clicks?"
With SUSE's YAST I can install in 2 mouse clicks. One to say install and one to say yes to a warning about deleting partitions. Of course I never do an install like that because I wan't to configure the packages to my liking and I usually need to change my timezone, but that could all be done after the install.
Hemm ... What is good about The installer of WindowsXP ?? Why do some people vote for that one ? Can someone find some arguments for it ?
it's ...
* ugly
* slow
* not flexibale
* sometimes you have no idea, what is happening.
beos get my vote, yes it's not a bell and wistle installer but it goes to the point. It sure can be improved, like suporting instalation from network and allow instalation on a bottable cd or any other volume.
Another thing i would like is when an installation occur from a boot CD we would not have to reboot, all would be "hook" back to the HD instalation.
Honorable mention for amiga OS 3.0
I don't know how recently you tried Mandrake, but I'm fairly sure it has a free space check now, and it *definitely* offers to skip packages and continue the installation if you're missing a CD, or the CD is corrupt, or whatever.
I actually prefer the Red Hat over the MacOS X, although they indeed are both very good. No unnecessary questions, always comprehensible, but still enough options for the power user.
that would be almost technically feasible with most current distros; the only real remaining problem is that distros tend to have a separate installation kernel with some specific differences from the general purpose kernel. If these were merged, most distros could have a "no reboot" install.
Hmmm. I really like FreeBSD's installer.Coming from Linux, it was different, but not less simple. I also like Arch's and Slackware's installer. Simple and fast. I cannot comment on the new d-i, because it had some serious issues with dhcp on my system. Yast was also very nice, but tends to be somewhat slow.
Installers I don't like: old debian, gentoo, windows 9x.
Guess I'll have to make up my mind about this before I vote.
Xandros is by far the best OS installer. Way better than Windows. I haven't got a clue why Fedora is rated so high. It's o.k but far from the best. Waaaaaaaaaaaaaay to many questions.
Xandros asks the least amount of questions and is easy to use. Windows is a close 2nd place with all others taking a very distant 3rd or further place.
I don't know mac os x installer but linux installers are a *lot* better these days....they're with no doubt much better than any windows installer. Windows installer overwrites your MBR without even asking (not even an "advanced" button) and the partitioning stage is in text mode, not graphics (and partitioning is IMHO the _one_ step where graphics have sense - for the rest debian-like installers are ok)
Note that we're missing a installer - dragonfly's installer. Take a look at www.bsdinstaller.org
how can you not vote for windows..
it's so easy, you don't even have to install it!!
</joke>
... in terms of too simple, you have admit, 3 clicks and a game couple games of tetris later that gives you a pretty full featured KDE Distro. Even Grandma can do it
I enjoy debian's installer. It's powerfull and has improved quite a bit. Gentoo's is also nice for the control it gives you, though you want to be careful of what you do with it.
As far as my worst experience, though, it would be Windows XP. To put it simply they make the installer too easy. To the point where they try to stop you from installing it certain ways. Due to their idiotic installer it took me 5 tries to set it up the way I wanted. Now that's easy...
It took you 5 tries to get xp installed the way you wanted it? What in the heck were you trying to do? The xp installer seems idiot proof. and if you goof something (I dont know how..) you can fix it after windows is booted. unless its sometthing like you loaded it on the wrong partition.
Classic AmigaOS... several modes to choose from depending on user experience, and it´s more or less a disk copying procedure :-)
Do we vote for the easiest (Xandros) or the most powerful (Linux From Scratch) installer...?
I would prefer a powerful installer that lets me configure things like multibooting and nondestructive partition resizing (etc.), reliably, fast and relatively easily. But I do not prefer something like Gentoo, LFS, CRUX or Rubyx, not something unnecessarily difficult.
A good usability rule for OS installers could be that a relatively competent user of that particular OS should also be able to install the OS without following or even reading a manual outside of the integrated guidance of the installer. But having enough features (so not simplifying the installer too much), is important for usability too.
any installer that genuinely lets me have a very basic install is great. that includes netbsd (install sets which do't include x11). its quite hard to install minimal linuxn ow without perl or X being install or some graphical related libs. but people do want to do it. remember freebsd wanting to remove perl dependencies in its base system. good stuff.
Of all the options, I've tried BeOS/Zeta, FreeBSD, OS X, RH/Fedora Anaconda, Debian (both the old one and the new D-I for Sarge), and all the Windows installers.
Voting for any of the Windows installers is a joke. They're far from flexible, and not very easy to use. For instance, no Windows will allow installation to a logical partition. And if you for some reason only have logical partitions on the drive, you're f*cked because the installer's partitioning program won't let you delete a logical partition and recreate it as a primary partition -- you have to erase the whole extended partition. So you have to use other apps to partition the drive. BeOS/Zeta's partitioner isn't quite as bad, but the UI is worse than plain fdisk -- quite an accomplishment for a graphical app.
OS X is shiny and good looking, but nothing really special. It is quite polished, though. It works just like it should on a Mac -- not very flexible, but it does install Mac OS on a Mac.
Of the Linux installers, Anaconda is far more user friendly than Debian, so it gets my vote. It's flexible and powerful, yet shouldn't scare anyone off. FreeBSD's installer is also quite powerful, but it's quite confusing, and not only to newbies. It's not always easy to understand whether you partitioned or formatted the drive, etc., and if you hit a mirror that lacks your particular version of FreeBSD, you have to choose the packages again, and so on. Sysinstall just doesn't seem very fault tolerant. Oh, and if you change your config with sysinstall later, it will clutter your rc-files.
A vote for Anaconda from this Debian user.
A:> SYS C:
A:> C:
C:> _
Can't get much simpler than that :>
What about Slackware installer........???
Easy, strait forward from a geeks way of looking (right)
Ugly!!! But gets the job done, deps no.... I kinda like it that way
I have no ideal where the Mepis installer came from are what it is but think anyone would have no trouble ,even if was the first O/S of you ever installed and its fast enough for the amount it install,s.Other than installing ever thing (and thats easy to fix with Synaptic).I,d think a first time PC user would have little trouble.
Do we vote for the easiest (Xandros) or the most powerful (Linux From Scratch) installer...?
I'd rather nominate the BeOS installer as the easiest one... Ever tried it?
Select partition, optionally initialize partition, copy over - and on the unofficial "distributions" and on Zeta you can even "restart the Desktop" and browse the web while itis copying the files over.
I can't believe XP/2k3 have the votes they've got. I suppose it's better if you happen to live in the States, but personally I find it bloody annoying that I have to tell it where I live four times in subtly different ways - input language, time zone, regional setting and keyboard map. Why on earth can't it ask me what country I live in and look up the other answers from that - giving the opportunity to change them, but at least the default would be okay then.
Anyway, no chance to vote for the mighty Gentoo command-line install... damn :-)
I voted for Redhats installer because it gives you a mix of easy and technical if you want. It's quite pleasing to the eye for newbies and not too intimidating. Some have knocked the windows eXpee installer for giving no choice, but the amount of documentation and support available for creating a customised unattended install must be mentioned, the power offered under this environment is quite hard to beat.
(I understood that you were partly just joking but anyway)
an installer that expects you to know some odd unfamilar commands that you should write on the blank screen, is not exactly very easy.
SYS C:?? Now what on earth is that SYS? And what the heck is that C: supposed to mean...? ;-)
The same can be said about the Gentoo installer (and the likes), although following the excellent Gentoo documentation can make it much easier.
All installers has good things, i really like RH anaconda and SuSE YaST, but those to lack a lot on partitioning, which is horrible using what they provide (i won't mention why, thats even more flamebait), but i really like diskdrake, good flexibility, easy to use, secure.
The winner for me is the Mandrake installer, altough it would be nice an anaconda installed enhanced with diskdrake and better error handling (ask me whatever to stop installation if something fails instead of just rebooting)
None of the Windows installers are pretty, they're not particularly simple, not overly powerful and also force you to enter a key every time you instal. Definitely not user-friendly.
Some of the newer linux distros are certainly getting friendlier - definitely friendly than Windows, in any case.
Debian is my favourite OS, but it has an awful (but immensely powerful) installer.
MacOS... pretty good.
BeOS... has to take the prize. Dead simple, user-friendly, looks nice and does everything you'd expect an installer to do - install
Poll not showing here, for some reason. Javascript is on though...
Anyway, BeOS. Fastest, simplest installer I've ever used. Followed closely by the Lycoris "installs whilst you configure" installer, the one with Solotaire in it...
Minimal install, it evens installed the 3d nvidia drivers, 25 minutes
Gentoo is missing from the list ;-p I love to install gentoo!!!
I'd rather nominate the BeOS installer as the easiest one... Ever tried it?
Yep, BeOS's easy. But what about hardware support? Does BeOS (or Zeta) detect and configure for instant use most hardware out of the box too? Hardly. Neither Xandros can, but it's a safer bet in that respect (and if ease of use is what you're after).
Windows (& Mac OS X) has pretty good hardware support too, naturally, but there may often be less need of installing/hunting for separate drivers with modern Linux distros.
Zeta and all the BeOS distros have a their own installers, or they were released as image.
It was not that clever to pack them in the box.
Yeah, Gentoo installer r0cks, even women think of that since when I install Gentoo, I'm the installer
Now thats good...u got a full fledge desktop while u install an os to ur HD
I prefer text-based installers. I prefer the NetBSD & Crux installers.
redhat is over windows? come on. This is a very anti-windows site
> redhat is over windows? come on. This is a very anti-windows site
Correction: This is a very anti-windows world.
Get used to it!
redhat is over windows? come on. This is a very anti-windows site
Consider, for example, this scenario:
I have bought a shiny new laptop with Linux (or Zeta, or BSD, or Unununium etc.) preinstalled on it. But because I desperately want to play the latest Snooker simulation game (for some odd reason only available for Windows) on it occasionally, I buy and want to install the latest (though all too expensive, just to play that darn game...) version of Windows on it too.
So my very simple goal is a multiboot sytem of two OSes. But what the heck? The Windows don't want me to install it on any other but the first prinmary partition on the machine. Nor does it easily let me configure a multiboot system, something that one would expect from any modern OS. And Windows installer doesn't even even keep my MBR and default OS loader intact! Is that supposed to be easy and practical?
I know nodody uses it for real work, but download, write image to floppy, boot. How much easier does it get?
I've been working on a mockup for a new intstaller for Yoper for some time now and only tonight finally got it posted - then I read this!
So, since it is very much on-topic, you'll find it here:
http://www.blachford.info/computer/The_Source/index.html
Tell me what you think...
--
My own favorite is the BeOS installer, amazingly easy to use. Move a few sliders, press a couple of buttons and that's it.
Should have put Gentoo on there just for jokes, and to see if it would actually get a vote lmao!!
Hold everything! STOP! Somebody really screwed up here in creating this poll. They totally forgot the Linux From Scratch "distro". Common poeple. Sheesh. Get your act together.
Ooh. This is a toughie. The Mac OS X installer is pretty nice, and so is Anaconda. I like the DragonFly installer, but it does need some more work before I could say I prefered it over any others. Xandros also has a fairly nice installation routine.
But, like some other folks here have mentioned, you just can't beat what was available back in the good old dark ages of DOS ;^)
Anaconda is scriptable. At least, you can kick start an anaconda install. You cannot, as far as I know, do that with Windows. Do you have any idea how nic it is to be able to type kickstrt.cfg to run the kickstart install. This means you can plot the entire install without actually running it, and you can do this presumably for multiple architectures, just answer the right questions.
You can even specify a few scripts to run when you have done the install.
The Windows installer requires you to reboot once before you actually start he proper install. It is text based then and has a poor partition utility. You cannot install Windows to a secondary partition. It will refuse to install. I do not know if it is scriptable like anaconda with kickstart, but I tell you, that is one fine feature. The windows installer does its job, but you must also realise, Windows istalls nothing but the OS, but Anaconda installs everything, enad handles it with aplomb.
"You cannot, as far as I know, do that with Windows"
Yep, it's called an unattended install, you can do that since Win2k
This program mkaes it very nice to do in XP personally:
http://nuhi.msfn.org/guide/
YOU are the instller. I guarantee you'll know everything on your box, why it's there, and how it was compiled. Setting a temporary environment variable on the command line when invoking gcc, for example, was something I'd never seen until I did this one.
OTOH, a thumbs down to Windows, for the way it queers the hard drive partition table if it's not the first OS on the drive. Boo, hiss, and an international gesture Redmond-ward.
Doesn't get any simpler than that, unless your using scripts or something like Jumpstart.
I love the OpenBSD install, it is quick and easy with no bullshit or infinite loops involved (there was one in FreeBSD at 5.2, dunno about 5.3).
One floppy does it all, you do not understand the hate I have for the various operating systems with more. I am so suprised that FreeBSD needs 3 to install now.
Hah, you get over it.
I do agree with the post past yours that explains the windows partitioning issues and what not. I agree with you..
however, I don't exactly know if this poll is overall the best, even if its complicated or if its the easiest to use yet powerful or whatever.. too general.
I'm doing it by what's easier... so that explains the windows comment.
I prefer the OpenBSD installer, it's truley Bad@ss
I'm surprised it's not on the list. And after installing, removing unneeded software is as simple as dragging a file to the trash.
My vote is for Knoppix Live CD/DVD for first selection.
Secondly, Archlinux because of its pacman upgrade capability.
I see other people have beat me to the 'Gentoo' jokes. A couple of times ^_^ But if we're talking installers as in 'package managers' I think Gentoo's Portage rocks the socks off a lot of the others.
I voted for Windows XP but it hurt to do so. I really liked the installers for Mandrake and Fedora Core however I really can't accept being stuck in the middle of installing from FTP when the site goes down. It seems that it should be trivial to offer a way to choose a new site in this case but... So I had to give my vote to Windows XP which has never given me any problems even though it doesn't offer as many options as the Linux installers I've tried.
Where is the "I install my OS from scratch, you insensitive clod!" option? (http:/www.linuxfromscratch.org/)
Anyone remember one of the first good installers for Linux? I wish I could recall the exact name of it. I had always hoped it would become a defacto standard. The coolest feature? You could play Tetris while it copied files! Too bas SCO scoped them up 
Storm Linux had a good installer too.
But the best intallers are just getting started: Live CDs.
You are missing the SO cool OpenBSD/MirOS installer,
which works when you have only a line printer and
keyboard *g* and is actually pretty usable and even
user-friendly - after you've gotten the partitioning
right, especially on x86.
Where is gentoo?? That is my favourite installer. I can chat with irssi and listen to music while the system is compiling itself =)
I think Slackware's got the best installer, not too cluttered with graphical elements and easy to learn.
Well i wud settle with Anaconda. V hv a anaconda based installer and we had succesfully got it working in some 100+ different types of systems. Kudos !!
And the kickstart feature, well what else one needs. Interface too adds up to that. Though not cute, it does well. But we hvnt got it working in some SCSI systems, for obvious reasons.
No comments abt knoppix !!
I hv also tried Mandrake, Debian & SuSe's Yast.
I have tried every one of these OSs and theirfore their installers. Linux has come a VERY long way in the install process, but all of the linux installers still have some issues especially with unrecognized hardware. If the linux installers, i prefer yast. beos is an absolute joy to install BUT it is way to simple, no configuration options, just click and wait.
OSX has, IMHO, the best OS installer to date. functional in simplicity yet flexible. OSX is also the only installer that looks smooth and elegant from boot to reboot, no funky text scrolling, no nasty "starting bootloader" screen.
Windows installer is crap, it is fairly easy but absolute crap. no installer should take 2 minutes to start, and go through 3 seperate phases just to install an OS that is standardized, it might as well just be a norton ghost image of a functional windows(stop laughing, it happens occasionally) with a 'runonce' reg entry to redetect all hardware, ask for a key, and setup users.
4 time more votes for Debian than for Xandros ... this has t be a joke. I think this poll definetly is more about OS preferences than about installers.
BTW: The all-so-praised OSX installer might be nice, but actually the job it has to perform is much inferior to the PC installers with much more diverse hardware requirements - even the graphic cards are different. So PCs are much more challenging to installers than OSX.
last time I installed openbsd (3.1) I had to use a caclulator for fdisk. Is it still like this? Anyway I enjoyed the openbsd installer.
But my favorite is Debian.
If we would talk about configuration tools I say Windows 2000/2003 Server. Thay make the essentials tasks to get the server running in production very easy and fast.
"BTW: The all-so-praised OSX installer might be nice, but actually the job it has to perform is much inferior to the PC installers with much more diverse hardware requirements - even the graphic cards are different. So PCs are much more challenging to installers than OSX."
So? It's still the best installer/OS setup program....
Ben
4 time more votes for Debian than for Xandros ... this has t be a joke. I think this poll definetly is more about OS preferences than about installers.
maybe. But most experienced admins/users prefers to have the possibility to make the install as lean as possible. I dont know if xandros is simmilar to the debian installer in this aspect.
I am a bit surprised to se so many votes for Windows 2000 Installer. I hate it, simply because if you don't like the standard settings (for example I usually want to have my user profiles folder somewhere else), then you can only change this during installation using the "unattended installation". And this really is ugly.
Plus you can only load additional drivers th first few seconds - if you don't know that you need some special drivers for your SCSI-Drive you will have to restart the installation. And only loading the installer itself is a lengthy process.
Plus you don't see the result of these options until the installation is finished, so I used three attempts for my last Windows 2000 installation.
But fortunately once Win2k is installed, normally you don't need to reinstall it like it was with Windows 98.
Kaya
BeOS came to mind quickly... but the choice could only be between these (and those with similar capability): Suse and FreeBSD. Both are very easy and straight forward - what makes them stand out is their ability for network / internet installs. Either you can or you can't do such thing, so all others loose out here. Since Suse is even pretty in addition to being easy, I voted for Suse.
I voted from a sysadmin viewpoint. I have used all kinds of installers (or the lack of) for many years and have come to love two kinds of installers which should be based on the same library (in the perfect world).
1. As a sysadmin I often install via a serial console. Thus I need a text based installer that work in almost any terminal.
To mention some that works. Solaris and OpenBSD. Both systems provide text based installers that work well. OpenBSD's installer however has a few problems. In some places one cannot undo a decision. A couple of years ago one had to start all-over but I think this has been changed to redoing a couple of steps. In other ways OpenBSD's installer is extremely flexible. The fact that one can use the swap-space on solaris as a base for rebooting into an OpenBSD installer is just great.
Also as a sysadmin I like the installer to be scriptable. Solaris has jumpstart which is great. FreeBSD can be scripted as well (and RedHat). This is a must!
2. The other kind of installer is the one that does everything for you. I like to test new OS'es on my laptop once in a while. When I test an OS for the first time I prefer a really painless installation. Something like:
auto-detect and setup hardware, a good auto-partitioning with support for a multi-os machine and with a bootloader that provides a menu for all installed os. If X is needed the installer should autodetect the graphics card and monitor and create a working configuration.
A few software targets like laptop, workstation and custom where almost everything has been setup - powerprofile, ease networking and such.
These to kind of installers provide the opposite but is the same in many ways. One of the very important things is to make the hardware work out the box. Few installers/OS do this.
I allmost allways end up doing a PXE boot and script my installation if I think I will have to install the same OS more than a few times.
Installers are nothing where to put much glance and glamour in or something, because they are just for putting the os & friends on the machine. I for example like NetBSD 2.0beta installers... They are text based, u go through it step by step, have to answer basic and clear question, choice of software is well structured and limit. I thing this is the way how to do it.
But I had to choose and choosed the BeOS one... It is very similar. You choose a disk and a pkg set and say go. Thats it.
Its fast and just working(tm).
Regards
Andreas
When I read the poll topic I knew the answer was an easy choice, hands down BeOS. But when I saw BeOS was clumped together with Zeta I could no longer vote for it. Zeta really took the beauty of the BeOS installer away - it's incredible simplicity.
For that reason I went with my next favorite installer, Mac OS X, for the same reason I love the BeOS installer - does it's job, asks very few questions, and get's out of your way. All the other settings I can do once everything is installed.
whatever os was on the VIC 20
Namely AmigaOS.
On second place, I'd put OpenBSD just for the hell of it. :-)
Linspire got the least number of mouse clicks I've ever seen in an OS installer.
sometimes you don't have a graphics or VDU, so text over serial is essential
Really, had to choose between Gentoo and Windows XP. So Windows XP - the pragmatists choice. At least I have plenty of experience with its installer 
Linspire (previously known as Lindows) has the easest installer hands down.. Its the only installer I know of you can go through in 2 clicks.
If this vote is about ease of install I have not seen anything that even remotely compares. But if there are other factors such as customizability of install (choosing GUI or partition formats or even partitioning and what apps get installed... etc...) then I guess it dont score well there but since it targets the newbs what newb is gonna even know what any of this stuff even is?
Lets not forget 10 min install.. Fully working OS.
Is CNR considered a installer too? =)
1 click install apps is great to.
... geddit..?! The W9x/Me installer is large and by the same as for W2K/XP, still, there are zero votes for W9x, but plenty for W2K/XP -- obviously, people feel obleagued to vote for the OS they are using, not for installers. Otherwise, there would be equal numbers for W9x - W2K/XP. Nothing to worry about... I expected this anyways...
And btw, it is not about easiest either, it is about *best*, as it clearly reads in the headline. There is more to being good or even best than how many/few clicks it takes to install, so finally knock it off with Lindows. Even if you have to make a dozen clicks this is still no rocket sciene, it's still easy. If you can't handle 3 questions upon installing + 10 clicks - how are you ever to use the system in the first place..?
If anyone that has installled MacOS X votes for any other OS, he's a liar.
Getting a pre-installed Linspire box is a joke, because the OS is practically already installed when you put the cd in the drive.
My vote goes for Mandrake. The partitioning system is fantastic, and it even works.
OS Emu wrote: "I'm surprised it's not on the list. And after installing, removing unneeded software is as simple as dragging a file to the trash."
MacOS X is even better.
An excellent example is the package for MAMP (Macintosh, Apache, MySQL and PHP) which consists of one (1) file.
http://www.webedition-cms.com/english/downloads/mamp.php
Double click it to start and - that's it.
Quit and drag it to trash. Gone.
That really made my day.
NetBSD's sysinst has always been a pleasant experience for me. It's quick, simple, and efficient. The first time may be intimidating for users used to heavy and slow GUI installers but there's documentation available http://www.netbsd.org/guide/en/chap-exinst.html#chap-exinst-install and if you've went through sysinst a couple of times it's simplicity itself. Installing first only the base system and then installing other stuff you want is much better than the mess many other installers leave behind by default, with every available service enabled and all kinds of things going on in your system that you don't know about. The *BSD style of installation is much better if you want to keep the control of your system to yourself.
NetBSD 2.0 hasn't yet been released but Release Candidates are available, and so I gave one RC a test drive. There are unofficial ISOs for these RCs but doing it from ftp with only two floppies is much more fun (provided you've got a reasonably fast net connection). Modifying disklabel partitions is perhaps the only part where one needs to take a quick look at documentation but selecting distribution sets (GENERIC_LAPTOP kernel for my laptop, but no XFree86, thanks) and the rest of sysinst should be clear using plain common sense. After installation I did some quick system and shell tweaks using vi, then used cvs to get pkgsrc, and off I went installing Xorg and other stuff from pkgsrc.
One thing I've noticed is that there are plenty of installation tutorials, or stories of individual installations, of GNU/Linux distros like Slackware available on the net but nothing similar for NetBSD. There's the official documentation (and it's quite sufficient) but numerous stories of individual installations, where slightly different choices have been made, are more "personal" and they make installing Slackware sound somehow easier. If you cannot figure out your own installation using one of these tutorials, there are many others to turn to. But if you find something in NetBSD's sysinst (or in official documentation) a bit difficult to understand at first, you may just give up. And yet, having used both numerous times, I'd say that NetBSD's sysinst is easier and simpler than Slackware's installer. But that's, of course, only my opinion. ;-)
I can't speak for BeOS/Zeta, MAC OS X, Debian, Lycoris but I've had plenty of experience in the rest, and the numbers in the vote simply are not true.
*BSD has been the worst. Have not been able to successfully get through an install process (OpenBSD, NetBSD, or FreeBSD) because of the tremendously complicated harddisk partitioning.
The following are too long and overly complicated:
RH/Fedora Anaconda
SuSE Yast2
Mandrake
Windows XP/2k3
The fastest and least complicated are:
Xandros
Lindows
Have another vote on sky color, and we'll find that it is aquamarine.
Actually the BeOS drve setup utility is one of the nicest i've seen and I still use it even to set up a lot of non BeOS partitions,the only real drawback to it is its NOT non-destructive,maybe Haiku will address this shortcoming in the future.
I voted foe Mandrake because it's easy and full featured,.Plus I also loved the installer that came with Mephis.Don't get me wrong I still love BeOS but certain elements of it are beginning to show thier age somewhat,just like the Partition magic special edition that comes with R5 Pro that allows you to make a maximum sized BeOS partition of 2 gigs,this was fine back in the day when a 6 gig HD was Huge,but now it's laughable so if you want a bigger BeOS partition you have to use it's own drive setup utility which is a destructive one or use another 3rd party non destructive utility.
I will have to go with MS windows 2000XP installer. All I wish MS windows could use other types of FS natively. Still MS windows 2000 works for me. I just need to upgrade to XP pro soon.
what i said earlier,I still use the drive setup utility in BeOs if I'm going to set up a new drive,I jusst plug the drive in my Dell 410, boot BeOS and set it up,then install the OS's on it wherever,i even have a laptop drive adapter to do laptop drives this way,and it's nice to be able to set it all up before you get down to the nitty gritty of oS installation,the only drawback to this is you have to have a sort of plan in your mind as to what you want on the drive ahead of time
I really like NetBSD's installer. It's the simplest, easiest one I've ever come across.
It's been a long time since I installed BeOS, but as I remember.
- It wouldn't install at all unless you already had windows installed.
- All kinds of floppies were required. All CD installs were common, even then.
- Several reboots were required.
- Total pain in the azz. Constantly had to reboot, then make another floopy or two, reboot again from those floppies, and so on.
Frankly, I never saw anything so great about the BeOS install, or anything BeOS for that matter.
BTW: I'm no msft fan. I use debian as my main desktop. I also like apple. I just never got the BeOS hype.
That is the BeOS PERSONAL EDITION installer. We're talking about the non-freeloaders version, e.g. Professional, which you booted off CD, pointed it at the partition from the GUI, clicked go, and it was done in ten minutes. Reboot, system is done, bootloader is installed, hardware is initialised
But if you have all the supported hardware, Solaris is quite an easy installation routine.
Oh, and on my Windows 98 system I remember a Personal Edition install involving one reboot, no floppies; on XP one reboot, one floppy. Something tells me you're thinking of another OS here - I'm not, considering I user BeOS
I don't know why, but the simplisity of Slackwares installer (which happens to be mostly if not all one large shell script)
I think it is a bit incorrect to put BeOS and Zeta together.
Ad far we all remember, in first Zeta reviews here at OsNews just Zeta Installer was very subject for blame.
It breaks idea of BeOS supersimplicity and turns BeOS in something like "linux-work-in-progress-forever". Some people may like it more, some - less.
Maybe YT changed it now, but anyway,
BeOS and Zeta have DIFFERENT installers and Zeta's one was just YT's own work. So those cannot be put together in voting.
Because you only have to do it once.
I think it took a total of 3 clicks to install Lindows. (wipe the HD option)
What in the hell are you talking about? r5 lets you boot from a cd and install. thats it. r4 might have made you make two floppies (one has some version of dos, the other a partition utility) and run an installer via windows. I'm not positive though. I have never installed r4. But anyways, beos r5 does not require any host OS and can boot from a cd. if your system wont boot to cd's you can make a boot floppy thatll boot the cd. Beos no doubt progressed a lot since you had last used it..
I can boot my beos cd and have a full install in 10 minutes. Only reboot is after the initial install so the OS will load like any other install.
Because you only have to do it once
Actually quite a good point. What good is an "easy" install that you have to do every time when some bigger changes or fixes need to be done to the OS, and so if the OS itself is not stable but in constanmt need of fixing? Or if the install leaves you with a poorly configured system that you have to tune and configure for hours to get a functional system. Though, in this latter sense, ease of configurartion, Debian may not be particularly easy... =)
Anyway, you cannot well evaluate the installer separately from the OS. In a poll like this it's understandable that people evaluate both the installer and the OS in general.
Installer works well, is simple. The same program can be used to post-install configure most any aspect of the system and can be used to upgrade an entire system. Beats all others in flexibility and overall usefullness.
Darwin/GNUDarwin/OpenDarwin definately has the best installer. Choose Disk, Y/N, Done...you can't get easier than that (as long as you don't want to dual boot). Its worth remembering that Mac OS X/Windows/Anaconda/YaST2 *don't* work over a ssh connection. . This should have been a poll of the worst installer - for me that would have been a toss up between Solaris/Gentoo - although I don't think that fair, as Gentoo doesn't have an installer - and I like that...and yes I've used all the installer on the list.
In my oppinion, the Slackware Linux installer (which is quite similar to FreeBSD's installer) is by far the best there is out there.
Simple, to the point, text based (so it works everywhere), rock solid, easy to customize, does the job. What more do you want?
So between them I still pick windows, just click the install file, what is not to love., YaST is good to if you installing of the cd/dvd. How do you pick a file of the drive?
No, R4 installed purely from CD. R3 did not, it came with a boot floppy pre-made in the box though, along with two seperate disks.
1: AmigaOS
2: Windows95 from floppy disks 
(Was there 50 floppies? I don't remember.. haha!)
I would also vote MorphOS, but it requires manual setup of the boot-partition (and in 1.4.2 it must be FFS!) before installing.
I don't understand how this can be an accurate pole because I think it's safe to say that the majority of people voting have not tried all these installers. Therefore it turns into a pole of "which installer have you used and liked."
Wow, I don't think I've seen a post with this much mis-information ever so lets address every sentence:
It wouldn't install at all unless you already had windows installed.
NOT TRUE. Although Peronal Edition (intended to be a demo of BeOS given out for free) installed inside Windows OR Linux the full version of BeOS always installed in it's own partition. Keep in mind BeOS started as an OS which ran on it's own custom hardware, then on Mac clones, and then the PC...needing windows makes absolutely no sense.
All kinds of floppies were required. All CD installs were common, even then.
Once again , NOT TRUE. Even the preview releases (97) came on CD's and this is many versions before they had an intel release. (http://www.beatjapan.org/mirror/www.be.com/aboutbe/pressreleases/97...). When they did port BeOS to the intel archetcture they had a boot floppy incase your system did not boot from CD, but that was the only floppy and only needed if your BIOS didn't support boot from cd.
Several reboots were required.
Guess what...NOT TRUE. The BeOS install only had to reboot once, when it was finished.
Total pain in the azz. Constantly had to reboot, then make another floopy or two, reboot again from those floppies, and so on.
NOT TRUE, see above!
Frankly, I never saw anything so great about the BeOS install, or anything BeOS for that matter.
Frankly it sounds to me like you never saw anything even simular to BeOS!
BTW: I'm no msft fan. I use debian as my main desktop. I also like apple. I just never got the BeOS hype.
Maybe you should actually give BeOS a try one of these days just to see what the hype was about. It was well deserved. Be represented a new OS built from the scratch with the latest technology (at the time). But most of all it was well designed, powerful, and easy to use. Many of it's features are just being imitated now in mainstream operating systems. (Mac OS X SpotLight and WinFS all take a page from the Be File System, BFS).
If I want to do a "serious" vote I must know the all the intallers. But that is almost impossible. Only the IT might be able to do a "serious" vote (and only a very selected group).
openbsd intaller sucks. debian installer sucks.
Anaconda is the best Linux installer hands down! Has a cool text installer and an amazing graphical installer.
BeOS gets my vote. It's livecd too - just ctrl+alt+delete and click "restart the desktop". Never saw something simpler and faster than BeOS installer. It need good partition software though.
OpenBSDs installer! Really! It may be not the most user-friendly, but it definitely is the eastiest, fastest and most flexible way to install an OS.
I have tried all four O/S and the one I found the best for ease of instalation, software instalation and ease of use was Linspire.
I vote Lindows ease of installation,ease of software instalation ease of use and B.T.W the O/S is called
Linspire I have never come across a distro with such ease of instalation I had to recoment and vote due to the out dated name used. I have used Fedora,Mandrake10 Windows98 and xp but Linspire is the best
I love Gentoo installation process. Yeah, I know it's not exactly an installer but it's the one I trust the most. Total control on my hands. And as others have said, you can install it flawlessly from Knoppix or another distribution. Piece of cake.
I used Classic Mac OS for 10 years and I have no memory of installing it.
That's for me an awesome installer.
I like flexibility in an installer, but it should also be easy to use.
The one I like best was the old Mandrake installer (circa MDK 7.x). The newer versions are too slow and force too much on you, even in expert mode.
Anaconda could be good, but it has always been inflexible in the most annoying ways. For example: There is no simple way to tell which packages are on which CD, and if you accidentally select a package from say Disc 3 and don't have that CD, the installer will hang. I'm somewhere between a noob and an expert, so others are probably beter with this stuff than me, but the only way out of this I found was to reboot and start the whole install process over. At least Mandrake's installers ask you ahead of time which CDs you have. This is one example, I have run into several other examples where Anaconda would run into problems and hang, where most other (non-beta release versions of) installers have never done this to me (correction: Windows installers have frozen up on me, and Mandrake's has, but only when doing the X-setup test, and Mandrake's X-test was after the package installation and the rest of the setup was completed, so you at least had a working system if the test froze things up). (disclaimer: I haven't tried Anaconda since RH9, it may have improved)
I hope that Debian's new installer is great, but I haven't had a chance to try it - I like the flexibility of the old one, but would not call it simple to use. I tried one of the beta releases awhile back, but it wasn't compatible with some of my hardware.
I'm currently using Gentoo, which is also very flexible, but not simple enough to even be in the running.
"But if you have all the supported hardware, Solaris is quite an easy installation routine."
You mean if you have Sparc hardware - the x86 Solaris install was anything but simple last time I tried it.
For example OS/2 Warp 3 goes I think disk 1 2 3 4 then back to 1 again, insane. Those are floppies BTW.
Once on a redhat installer I clicked a back button and it crashed. Don't remember the exact version number of it.
Most installers these days are a breeze. Anyone ever installed windows 95 from floppy? It's about 13 floppies.
QNX is easy and always been trouble-free for me. But it's not as flexible as others. For instance it requires a Primary partition.
Anyone installed Oberon? It's probably not on the poll for a reason. It hurts my brain...
The last Mandrake I've tried is 9.something. Very nice, and easy to customize. And it didn't scramble my extended partitions, unlike Red Hat.
FreeBSD has a very unique system, using a single Primary partition that the OS divides into it's own "Slices", vs Linux that requires multiple partitions.
I've never installed BeOS from media, but using the Installer app to 'copy' BeOS from PE to a dedicated partition is an incredibly easy operation.
For the absolute easiest OS installation, I voted Lycoris. Definitely simpler than any other Linux I've tried.
-Bob
i really like the win2k style installer from WinXP
( http://nuhi.msfn.org/nlite.html ) enables it.. im lookin for a way to do it normally thou.. i dont like their *ware..
if anyone knows please link me. thnx..
I have. Plus (in no particular order) OS/2 from v3 through v4, Plan 9, Inferno, Menuet, QNX, Win3x/95/98/98SE/NT4/2K, DOS/Desqview (still a favorite of mine; wish I had an old enough system I could run it on), Solaris, NetBSD & OpenBSD (to go along with that FreeBSD), Mac OS 7 (but not 8 or 9)... Oh, I'm tired of typing.
For me it was a very hard choice between Mac OS X and RH/FC Anaconda. The former is the nicest, easiest, without sacraficing all configurability install while the later is the doesn't give you to much but still lets you configure anything you need for an initial system, be it desktop or server install. In the end I had to go with the RH/FC option. But only by a hair.
I've tried and used every OS on the voting list and I must say , putting aside the technical standpoint, BeOS has the most clean, easy to use installer I've come to use.
I also like the FreeBSD installer.
MacOS is also great.
BeOS was my vote however..
Well.. OpenBSD installer is the best. Full OS istall in about 4 minutes with everything working good after install... best, isn't it ?:P
In response to the Anonymouse user..
"And btw, it is not about easiest either, it is about *best*"
Well the "best" installer can be a lot of things.. Most flexible? ease of install? Most user friendly? and a million other variables. Having tried a few installers in my opinion Linspire is the easiest and most user friendly installer. Not much flexibility.
" If you can't handle 3 questions upon installing + 10 clicks - how are you ever to use the system in the first place..?"
Well thats another strong point for Linspire.. You dont need to know how to do all the console commands or what hardware sits in you puter in most cases. And you dont need to worry about a lot of other technical things like file system types and partitioning or kernal setup and compilation. In other words you dont need to be a linux geek to use it.
Someone else said what good is a easy install if you have to spend hours configuring the rest of the system.
Again not true on Linspire system. The system is just damn user friendly and detected hardware is setup.
Now Linspire is not the *all mighty* OS but it is the best newb friendly OS helping build a bridge between Linux and that other monopolistic system. Linspire at the cost of extreme user friendlyness does suffer long boot times and useless modules preloaded. Other OS's like Gentoo will give you quick boot times and very quick OS at the cost of a installer that would overwhelm any newb but is completely flexible and tuned every little bit to your system setup.
when do people actually ever have to install mac os? seems like all the work is done for you when you have hardware specific appliance-like os like mac.
where is the slackware installer? simpler and easy.... that's all that you need
> Anyone installed Oberon? It's probably not on the poll
> for a reason. It hurts my brain...
I've installed Oberon (System 3) several times. If you can learn the interface, it isn't hard at all.