Ricardo:

LOL I knew you Deb guys would bite! ;-)

Well, if you will wave such a silly comparison at us ;-)

Yes, the Red Hat Update requires registration, but they do not block

It's still a single source supplier and they want your data for something, I'm sure.

What I was impressed with was that I had EVERYTHING working within 4 hours ( except the slight internet hiccup and my USB CD-writer). Leaving me time to d o fun stuff like not using my computer. ;)

Yes, but that's probably just a simple case of having a better match for their Hardware Compatibility List than you did for Debian. Debian itself is also *very* cautious in trying to autodetect things, in case it locks the machine up.

With Debian I floundered with no usable X installation for.... well, weeks, before I gave up. [...]

I still quite don't understand what your problem is there, actually. You either go with X3 and an old kernel, or use the X4s with a new kernel. Not exactly rocket science...

just saying I got this working to my satisfaction very quickly, it does every thing I want, and does it well with the minimum of fuss.

Good luck. I hope you don't get burnt by the RPM problems that put me off for life (hey, when's RPMv5 coming out? ;-) )