I can't give an honest answer to you Wade. I have been using linux since
1997 and have used several different distro's a few with KDE, Till I
found Warty, before upgrading to fiesty, I installed KDE along with
Gnome on dapper and used it some, but did not feel as comfortable with
it as Gnome. it may be just me but it seemed like kde had to much eye
candy for me, but it may be that I like the more simple interface of
gnome. I also had some small problems show up after installing KDE in
dapper which may have been some screwup on my part also. I have been
using linux as my sole desktop for years now(but am nowhere near being
an expert on anything), since redhat 5.2 which was crude to say the
least, but have never really taking a liking to kde, may be it works to
much like XP.

I do not care for kde but like many of the applications and happily run
them on my gnome desktop. korganizer, kaffeine, knode and kopete being
my top 4.

mix and match and make it your way.

while I prefer Gnome desktop, I too use some KDE applications.
Kaffiene and K3b are the to I use the most.

I love having the ability to mix and match.

When I first came to Ubuntu, some 2 months ago, I remember being told
by a few that KDE was supposed to be easier for people coming over
from 'other' OS. Since I jumped in the deep end never really
considering KDE.

But I did install for a few day about 2 weeks ago, Kubuntu. I did not
like it as much as Ubuntu. Yes there are a vast array of applications
in Kubuntu, but I have yet to find myself saying, "I miss having....".

Kubuntu does look and feel much like my previous OS, but I do not have
happy memories of that so maybe that does not help Kubuntu. I use
Amarok as my music player, love it, think it is the best available,
but I am not currently using any other KDE applications.

Least we forget, the point of KDE was to creat a Kool Desktop
Enviroment, though the Kool is now just 'K'. But Ubuntu running Compiz
Fusion...that must be the ice cold desktop enviroment!

End of the day you go with what you like and I think virtually all of
us have mixed and matched Gnome and KDE to some degree. So back to the
original question...are we really missing out? I do not think so, we
get the best of both worlds.

I've now been experimenting for over a week having loaded all three
environments - really just to find out what programs were in each.
Loading the meta packages on 'edgy' - i found it more than a bit edgy.

I found i had a fair bit of confliction - allegedly one is supposed to
chose the environment at login. Sometimes Ubuntu standard would load and
KDE splash screen tended to come on the screen at startup and shutdown.

It would seem that one should choose one of the three environments and
then add on other programs. e.g. if one doesn't like Synaptic, add
Adept. Is this MIX & MATCH what is in fact intended - i don't know? It
seems to me that they put more thought into Gnome (in terms of smooth
working and bug free) than the other two. I just wanted to have a rather
more windows environment than Gnome offers, but KDE offers that but with
a penalty of lots of games, much slower and similar apps like Koffice
suite (poor compared with OpenOffice) - i.e. rather bloated. I still
can't get windoze style desktop icons.

So "missing out" - from what i can work out the standard Ubuntu is best
and add on the one or two KDE programs you want.

Are you saying that you wanted a more "Windows looking" environment? I
know that I'm doing some serious nit-picking here, but Gnome can be
altered to look pretty much any way that you want it to look. My goal
was not to make my desktop look more "Windows looking". I just didn't
want my tool bars split between the top and bottom of the screen, but I
have to admit that the end result was a bit "Windows looking".
http://www.geocities.com/clubtender/My-Gnome.jpg

That is the sort of thing i'm trying to get round to. I'd like to keep
the toolbars on the bottom and put icons on the desktop for the most
frequently used. I gather one goes into Gconf and edit the apps menu. I
thought installing KDE would do that and provide a way of getting icons
as it was more windows in style. I realise now that was a not the route
to go down. Much better it seems is to remain standard ubuntu and to get
it running as fast as you want; switch to reduced resources, remove apps
you don't want and install those that you do [e.g. replace Evolution
with Thunderbird (as i've used it in windoze and like it)].

It's a "right click" and "drag & drop" operation for the most part. The
icons are available all over the internet. The graphics that make the
toolbars look like one toolbar are cropped out of screenshots of various
applications. I use my home folder a lot like a Windows C drive and is
where I store all my "non-OEM" wallpapers, icons and graphics. It's a
lot easier to save everything there than to track down their proper files.