Hi,

# I've installed OpenSuse 11.3 and it's gone black with a frozen cursor, (and keyboard apparently) 3 times in two days. I have had to warm boot and re-install. Could there have been another option?

# OpenSuse 11.3 is shipped with kde 4.4 I don't know if online update installs the latest stable release 4.4.4. How can i find out which? -with a Bash command?

If it doesn't, I'd like to try it. or I understand 4.5.1 is also an option.

Can you advise me please.

Thnks for your time

To a relative noob (note, this is descriptive and not degrading in any way) I'd recommend Kubuntu. Not only is it a decent KDE implementation on top of an Ubuntu base, but you will find the forum (www.kubuntuforum.net) a most friendly and forgiving place.

My 2cs.

openSUSE with 4.4.4 is the standard distribution and you should have no problems with it. If you do, there are plenty of people on http://forums.opensuse.org/ who will help you.

openSUSE also offers you the option to upgrade to 4.5.1 because the next openSUSE release, 11.4, will be shipped with 4.6. So people who want to try out 4.5 would have no opportunity to try out 4.5 without this option.

But, installing 4.5.1 does require some manual adjustment to the default openSUSE settings and, if you are a newcomer, I would recommend staying with 4.4.4. Because I use openSUSE for my business, I have stayed with 4.4.4 rather than added 4.5.

Are you up-to-date? Make sure you check "online updates" and that the update repo is enabled. There were some kernel bugs that were causing freezes, but they are fixed for me at least.

This has nothing to do with the kernel problems which did not affect me. I tried both the online updates as recommended and the Live-CD and both crashed the entire installation. I don't have the time to solve problems when the recommended routes fail - so I reverted to 4.4.4. Others also had problems with the Live-CD.