[Melbourne-pm] [OT] Seeking the 64-bit linux that's right for me

[Sisyphus]

Hi,

I use mainly MS Windows - not that I understand that OS all that well, but I 
probably understand it better than I understand the linux systems.

I have an AMD Athlon 64 X2 Dual Core Processor 4600+ 2.40 GHz processor, 
with 1.00 GB of RAM, and a (new) 465 GB hard drive.
It's currently running (more like "walking") Windows Vista64, but now that 
I've got hold of a new Windows 7 (x64) box, I'd like to stick a 64-bit linux 
distro on this older box.

The requirements are pretty basic:
1) Be able to connect to the internet via my Satellite BroadBand account 
with Optus;
2) Be able to run an OpenSSH server (so that I have a server against which I 
can easily test my Windows builds of x64 and x86 Net::SSH2);
3) Supply (or provide the capability to build) gcc-4.7.0 or later, including 
g++ and gfortran;
4) Supply (or provide the capability to build) recent versions of perl, 
going back to (say) perl-5.8.8;

I take an interest in PDL, so X11, Prima, gnuplot, and PLplot are also of 
siginificance as regards graphics capabilities. I would expect that all of 
these  are readily available on most versions of linux ... but please tell 
me if you happen to know that such expectation is unrealistic.

Apart from that, I'm mainly just interested in checking on the modules that 
I maintain:
http://search.cpan.org/~sisyphus/

Any advice ? Have I left out stuff that has a bearing ?

Cheers,
Rob