Gentoo is the best distribution I have used (I haven't used too many: ubuntu, fedora, gentoo). I love the USE flags. I love watching (and questioning) what is going to be installed. I love emerge. Supposedly gentoo lacks being able to have a system "just work" without thinking about anything. But in my experience on linux, this simply isn't the case anywhere. With ubuntu, for example, I had trouble with sound and ethernet cards that I could never figure out... and the kind of answers I get on their forums drive me insane ("my uncle once said that his cousin typed this magical command and it worked fine for a little while so maybe try that").
And what's the deal with these "major release versions" of the other distros? Why do that? Thank you to all the people who contribute to it... and to those who are giving great advice/solutions on this list! Chris