I've been using Gentoo on my laptops for the last 2 or 3 years and really like it. As you say, the feel is very much like FreeBSD. It *is* a pain to install (although I think they now have a graphical installer), but once done it's really easy to keep up to date. Just do an emerge everyday (or week or month) and it stays current. You don't ever have to do another install.
Gentoo Linux
Date: 2006-05-21 12:53 (UTC)jcs