OK, I just joined this list, but I'll jump right in.

I'm an experienced s/w engineer; I've been hacking on
unices for 10 years, and I've been using various Linux for
several years.

The Debian installer is a mess. It is not for a beginner.
apt-get is great when you learn it, but I've seen too many
people give up on Linux because they tried Debian first.

If someone who worked for me made a program like the last
Debian installer I tried, I'd fire him. Installtion options
that conflict with each other, and let you do just that,
are brain damage. Having to go through an incredibly long
rolling command line configuration of everything that you
installed (even if you dont want to configure/startup them)
with obscure options is brain damage. Pardon me, but
if I did that to my customers then I would be fired.

There's absolutely nothing about redhat or mandrake that
keeps anyone from "getting under the hood". And they are
a WHOLE HECK OF A LOT easier for a beginner to install.

-- 
Douglas Jerome
http://www.primenet.com/~jerome
http://hackerlabs.sourceforge.net