Which one is better? 18-55 or 55-200?

Ill be geting a Nikon D3100 and the options were

D3100 + 18-55

or

D3100 + 55-200

what do you think guys? I'm leaning on 18-55 though.
no specific category of photography yet so the lens is for general photography. Thanks!

Added (1). @ALL - Thanks top all of you guys.really appreciate your comments.

If you don't know which specific phoography you will be involving with get 55-200

First off: neither one of these lenses is particularly good. They are also not particularly bad either, just pretty uninspiring zooms.

Given the choice between these two zoom lenses, you should go for the 18-55. The reason is simple: the other lens does not cover the "normal" range. Your camera is a 1.5x crop factor camera, setting the "normal" view range at about 35mm. "Normal" in this context means a zoom setting where the optical lines converge at about the same rate as they do when you view the scene with the "naked" eye. Anything below significantly 35mm (for this camera) would be considered "wide angle", anything significantly above it would be "tele" range.

There's a time and place for both, wide angle and tele. However, if you're a typical photographer, most of your shooting will be done in the "normal" range, and only the 18-55mm covers that.

If you have about $100 left over for a second lens: get a 50mm f/1.8 prime lens. You'll be amazed what you can do with that.

They are both kit lenses… Depends what you are wanting to shoot as to which is better…

the 18-55 is a standard wide angle lens… And the 55-200 is a zoom lens…

neither is particularly fantastic, but they are good place to start until you know what you are doing with the camera…

18-55.

The 55-200 isn't very usefull unless you have ALOT of room to shoot with due to it's field of view.
The 18-55 goes from fairly wide andgle at 18mm to normal view at 50mm. 50mm is a good focal lenght for portrait work for exmaple.

The 55-200 would be better for wildelife or sports.

Also, neither one of these lenses is particularly good (optically speaking) but they are good enough to get you started and figurig out what type of photography you ant and therefore what GOOD lens you'll need to invest in.

The 18-55 is a better allround lens.http://www.tamron-usa.com/lenses/learning_center/tools/focal-length-comparison.php should help to understand that.

And for the rest. You just can't beat a n 18-55 for price performance. It's pretty darn sharp if you stop down just a bit and the distortion is relatively easy controlled in Camera Raw.
Same goes for the 55-200VR. Cheap, pretty decent wide open and quite sharp when you stop down. Neither is particularly flare prone either. Both are fine lenses for a beginner to discover what photography is like and what he/she really wants from a lens.

Really depends on what you like to shoot. The 18-55 will probably be a bit more useful for general photography, but if you're into shooting things that are far away (wildlife, architecture details, sports) you might use the 55-200 more. If you're unsure and just starting out, I would go with the 18-55 because it's going to give you a much wider angle of view and is more all-purpose.

Http://keerok-photography.blogspot.com/2011/05/lenses-so-many-of-them-there-is-no-best.html

You should see now that if this will be your first lens, the 18-55mm is better for most shooting scenarios.