plugbox/arch versus debian

Hello community !
allow me the following question (im a linux noob, i confess;) )

what are the (main) advantages of using debian instead of plugbox/arch on the dockstar?
as far as i understood:
- arch is considered to be "very fast" & small (but you need to do more things "manually")
- debian consumes more space, but will support more features/devices natively

I plan to use my DS for
hardisk-sharing (LAN & WWW),
simple webserving,
control of external hardware (via USB-RS232 converter cable), like microcontrollers,
maybe webcams.

thanks in advance & thanks for this cool forum ;)
lou

I picked Debian because it already had a package I wanted set up. It's worth looking at the package lists for each distribution, to see if there is something you need.

And, while I've been using Linux & Unix for decades, I found the Debian painless... Jeff has REALLY put together a gold-mine here, and with his code! THANKS!

Hi Lou

my Decision to choose Debian was:
Debian GNU/Linux comes with over 25000 packages, precompiled software bundled up in a nice format for easy installation on your machine.
More Informations @ http://www.debian.org/intro/why_debian

Kind regards Robert

Thanks yachris & robert :)
so by installing jeffs-debian (http://jeff.doozan.com/debian/)
i will get this: (http://packages.debian.org/squeeze/
?
I wonder if packages like "x window system" or "tex" are included in jeffs release. (I guess no ;) )

I found
RELEASE=squeeze
VARIANT=minbase
MIRROR=http://ftp.us.debian.org/debian/
EXTRA_PACKAGES=linux-image-2.6-kirkwood,module-init-tools,udev,netbase,ifupdown,iproute,openssh-server,dhcpcd,iputils-ping,wget,net-tools,ntpdate,uboot-mkimage,uboot-envtools,vim-tiny
in the installscript, used by the debootstrap-call.
Where do i get infos about "minbase" ? (a search on debian.org for "minbase" didn't yield results)
I found some info here (http://www.digipedia.pl/man/doc/view/debootstrap.8/),
saying "...minbase, which only includes essential packages and apt."...
I dont have a running debian installed to call "man debootstrap" :-|

sooo, what is "essential" according to "debian squeeze"? Anybody got a good link?

thanks again!
Lou