I've been using karmic since alpha3 - it's been updated to alpha5 now,
and I love the performance. There are a few glitches, but it's fine for
a backup machine, reading email, listening to music, playing mafia wars
on facebook etc. The onboard intel i945 graphics have never performed
this well before. The compiz cube is snappy, and open arena feels great,
whereas the same machine was unusable with 9.04 because the graphics
were so sluggish.

I have been hearing good things mostly about the Alphas for the desktop, I am
currently downloading alpha 5 of the UNR for my netbook. I do not need it
everyday yet until the end of the month and aplha 6 is out Thursday I believe so
it is as good as time as any to give it a try and file any bugs if they crop up.

UNR has been given a new interface and I have using UNR since July last year so
looking forward to the revamp and some new features.

Have already installed Ubuntu One onto my current 9.04 installations and that
works great. The sooner the download finishes the sooner I can give more
details!

I am using regular Ubuntu on my netbook. I feel too constrained by the
interface of the Remix. When I got my eeePC it came with a similar Xandros
interface and the first thing that I did was change it to the full Desktop.
Then when I upgraded to a 9 inch eeePC it came with XP so I put the Remix on
then was dissatisfied with the lack of options and the ugly mess of icons on
the Desktop. I went with the full version of Ubuntu and have been happy ever
since. I have changed the theme to make it more suitable to a smaller
display, but other than that it is Ubuntu/Kubuntu.

Right...

Downloaded UNR 9.10 no problem. But the installation was a bit more troublesome.
Took several attempts before it would finally boot into the live desktop. Then
carried on to install.

After installation there were lots of updates to get. Also the odd programme
would crash, but a little box just pops up now, you click report and it compiles
the report, sends it in then takes you to launchpad to file it (usually there
are similar bugs already). Have done that a few times now. Though everything
seems to be getting more stable with every update that comes through.

Have got all my favourite programmes installed. Have tweaked the look with all
my fav icons and themes. Nothing has crashed this evening even though I am
messing with alot more then usual. So at this point relatively stable for an
Alpha. Alpha 6 due the 13th then I think the Beta is next after that, then the
final release in a few short weeks.

The new look of UNR I really enjoy. The only con is that you have to click
'twice' to access your fav folders now that the right side 'places' list is
gone. I find that everything works much smoother and looks more polished then
the previous version (which I have used since it's release).

Issues with the new version of Skype now working with pulseaudio (offering no
choices for input) are resolved here, but pulseaudio crashed after 10mins, have
not had a chance to try again yet.

All in all, I am happy with the performance of the alpha, though some bugs still
which are to be expected, nothing that would be considered a show stopper!

I downloaded Alpha 6. I've been using Ubuntu since about 7.04. I've tried
Alphas and Betas but never got sold on a new version of Ubuntu based on an
Alpha, until now. I liked the little "this is what Ubuntu can do for you"
during the install. After the install, I got a kind of an orange startup with
vertically moving sparkling lines. After the boot up was done I got a
notification that my hard disk was failing along with a hard disk icon on the
menu bar with an exclamation mark on it. Although I was disconcerted about the
idea of my drive going bad I thought "wow this is great!" Everything ran great
despite the "failing drive". I also noticed the USS (Ubuntu Software Store) on
the menu.

I like the idea of the Ubuntu Software Store but it has a kind of one at a time
thing. When I use Synaptic I go in and check off a bunch of things all at once
and then hit apply, It would nice if the USS was more like that.

After I did an update, the orange startup screen was replaced with a kind of a
chocolate brown screen with a horizontal line. I liked the chocolate brown
better than the orange. I was disappointed the vertical animation was replaced
with the horizontal. When the boot up was done, the notification of my drive
going bad was gone (I had already figured the "bad drive" notification was a
glitch). I noticed the USS was gone but assumed it would be back in one of the
future updates. Everything ran great.

The only draw back was that XP was not shown on the Grub menu. So I thought
"forget XP, I don't use it anyway". So just a day later, I installed Alpha 6
again. This time I used the entire drive for Ubuntu. This time, after the
update I got different results. The orange screen changed to brown just like
before and the failing drive icon went away. But this time the USS stayed and
the old icons were replaced with much better new ones.

I won't list all the things I like, but as I told my wife, if I had to pay for
the version of Ubuntu that's on my system now, I'd buy it. And I'm a very picky
person and a big complainer. However I've only used it for about three days so
who knows what bugs might show up. I've been back and forth for years on
Windows and Ubuntu. I actually liked Vista and Windows 7, but after this I
don't think I'll ever go back.

yeah, i read that somewhere,
that grub can lose the other startup options,
and they're working to fix this before the full release.
I wont try it until they fixed grub.

Ubuntu Software store replaces Add and Remove Programmes. It does not
replace Synaptic as you figured out. It is meant to be easier for newbies to
use than Synaptic. The name store is a misnomer because it is free. But it
has brought some controversy as people think that Canonical plans on selling
software to us. They have no plans for this but the opponents always look
for the worst.

Also new is Ubuntu One which is an Ubuntu version of Dropbox that is
connected to the cloud. It is for file sharing and backup, but there are
other uses planned.

It has a new Computer Janitor, Grub 2, latest OpenOffice and GNOME, Firefox
3.5 and kernel 2.6.31 and a host of things happening behind the scene. It
boots faster and runs snappier. It has moved from HAL to DeviceKit and udev
to handle cameras and other devices. There are many improvements that are
noticeable and some that aren't.

The kernel supports DKMS or Dynamic Kernel Module Support and this is
something that I don't know much about but want to know more. It is supposed
to make it easier to update drivers after a kernel upgrade without the
necessity of the OEM releasing new drivers for each kernel.

http://www.linuxjournal.com/article/6896

I also believe that restricted-extras no longer gives you libdvdcss2 to play
encrypted DvDs. Not certain about that as I don't watch videos on my
computer. Maybe someone could confirm that?