witch one should i most concider

pdieken

I am trying to set up a dedicated system for programming micro controllers and i'm not sure witch version of linux to try to use for it. i have been using a raspberry pi for a while now for the arduino stuff but find it lacking in compatability with other types and programming needs of non bootloader micro controllers but i also want a lot of the same kinds of functionality of my widows 7 machine and also being new to the whole linux world in general i am quite lost in understanding what it is i should be looking for i would like to use my long unused acer aspire netbook as the platform but not sure what changes i may need to make for it to work properly with the linux system