I am using Mint 16 now; first time using it. Previously I was using Ubuntu. I had to switch to Mint because we got W540's at work which has a lot of new hardware that is not currently supported (well). I wasn't able to get Ubuntu working on it properly, but I have been impressed with Mint so far. The only issue right now is that it doesn't see my nvidia card and so I have to use the integrated chip instead of the discrete one. I'm hoping that Mint 17 fixes the issue.

How hard is it to get a custom system up and running from Arch? I haven't done anything like that in a few years although I've had a lot of experience with setting up custom FreeBSD systems. Is it more or less like that?

What I'm reaching for is something that "just works" and that I can work on reliably instead of having to fix obscure problems all the time. I figure once I set something up that works, I can simply create an image of it to use later.

Arch isn't that hard to set up, it's still easier than Gentoo. You just have to set it up from an explicit point of view. You must know every detail of what you want, and each item up, rather than a "10 clicks and I have an OS now" type of setup.

It helps to have a good knowledge of Linux to do it, because you know where things should go and where to look if there is a problem, but it doesnt' require you to become a kernel hacker just to get it to a prompt.

Honestly though, the only thing that attracts me to Linux in the first place is digging into the source and pulling apart the pieces and putting them back together again, so that I can understand the tools I use more intimately.

To me, distribution projects like Debian, Arch & Gentoo serve as a useful source for complete repositories of working, interoperable packages, moreso than they serve as a convenient provider of a working operating system.

I tend to chalk up buggy, quirky work-arounds and long waits for bug fixes in Linux as the price I'm willing to pay to be able to see the source, and receive the software for free. Annoying glitches are something I wouldn't tolerate from Apple or Microsoft, if I'm going to shell out for the high price tags placed on their operating systems.

I'm with you 100%. Often times I do use Linux as a dumb platform to do work like I would Windows or OSX, but occasionally I love tearing into it and messing with it, which is priceless in my book.

In your experience, is Debian less prone to breakage when upgrading from stable to stable than Ubuntu with its release upgrades? I've run Debian but I have never been patient enough to stay with a stable release and find out.