As a relative newcomer to using Linux, I’d never really known why I should use Gnome over KDE, or vice-versa. I’ve had a few different distributions installed in the past (Suse, Red Hat, Knoppix) and have just gone with what they’ve installed as default. However recently I had found that several apps I had wished to use ran under KDE. So I decided it was time for a change.
I found a nice little guide at The How-to Geek, which told me everything I needed to make the change, which installs Kubuntu (KDE for Ubuntu). All you really need to know, unsurprisingly is:
sudo apt-get install kubuntu-desktop
It is quite a long install, and you will be given the option to choose whether you want to set Gnome or KDE as the default. Having tried them both now, KDE seems to have some more apps (Kflickr was one I really needed for uploading the large numbers of pictures I take to Flickr, and under Gnome I had been doing this by hand for a little while), and also wins on the look and feel front for me.
Not very hard to change at all, I have found my way around quite quickly. If you make the change and have been using Gnome for a while, it is worth looking through the new apps you now have installed, and also comparing old apps you’ve been using to see if there is a KDE version that might now suit you better.