Fedora 8 (test 2 was the latest available when I performed this evaluation) definitely is further along than it's cousin RHEL (Redhat Enterprise Linux), as is typically the case between the "Enterprise" editions of various distributions (SuseEnterprise vs. OpenSuSE, Fedora vs. RHEL, etc.).

The hardware detection worked far better in Fedora 8 than in RHEL (CentOS) 5.

The audio, video, and NIC (network interface card) worked during the install and right out of the box.

The RAID1 setup was detected and install upon fine.

The wifi card was actually detected (unlike in RHEL), BUT the GUI only allowed configuration of WEP encryption. It did not offer ANY WPA related options. This was still case even after the installation finished.

Maybe this is an oversight due to this being "Test 2" and not a full release. I will have to retest it when the full release of Fedora 8 is out.

The desktop was the Gnomish style.

Nothing special or of note other than the above, Redhat/Fedora continues to be it's standard "underwhelming" distro. It's "ok", but not the flagship of Linux development it was long ago. They seemed to peak out in their lead around the 7x/8x days, and especially since splitting the community between RHEL and Fedora, it just hasn't been the same since.

Because the wifi could not easily be configured with WPA, this unfortunately means Fedora fails in this evaluation as well. Though it was VERY close but for the WPA missing options. Again, this is something to look into in the final release (and I'll see about asking the Fedora development community about why that is left out).

So, the score thus far is:

1. CentOS/RHEL 5 = FAIL
2. 64 Studio = FAIL
3. Fedora 8 (test 2) = FAIL