FOSSwire

The new release boasts an updated Live CD installer, the Live CD now using Xfce by default, vastly improved hardware support and many updated packages to bring the core system up to date.

For those new, or who haven't heard of the distribution, Gentoo is generally aimed towards the more experienced Linux user. While it does feature its Portage package management system, Gentoo puts emphasis on building software from source to fully optimise the system and squeeze as much performance as possible from your machine.

You can download many versions of the new release from the official download page.

Just a quick note to say that the second most popular web browser out there and one of the most used bits of open source on the desktop, Firefox has had version 3.0 go gold.

Unfortunately, at the time of writing Mozilla's servers are down following an attempt to win Firefox a Guinness World Record for being the software most downloaded in 24 hours. The sheer weight of traffic attempting to snag the new release and help achieve the record has brought pretty much every Mozilla site to its knees.

Still, when things do come back up, be sure to grab yourself Firefox 3.0, get your Firefox-using friends (on all platforms) to upgrade and of course help convince others to switch!

Once it's back up, you'll be able to get Firefox here.

UPDATE: I've now managed to get on the site, so the links might well work again. Or they might go back down... YMMV.

Linux music player application Banshee has just been updated to version 1.0.

The new version features significant performance improvements, plus a host of brand new features, including Video, a new Play Queue feature, Shuffle and improved support for third-party media devices and Last.fm.

"Import, organize, and discover new music with Banshee through its simple
and powerful interface and wide array of innovative features. Create
your own radio stations or listen to a friends' through Last.fm integration;
experience automatic cover art fetching as you listen; and easily browse,
search, and control your media collection."
Source

Depending on your distribution, it might be a while before the 1.0 release hits your software repositories and appears for update. The download page, however, includes packages for Ubuntu, OpenSUSE, Foresight, Fedora and Debian and of course you can grab the source code and compile it yourself too.