Reader supplied reviews for SolydXK
Average rating
8.0 from 19 review(s)
Version: 12
Rating: 8
Date: 2023-12-19
Votes: 8
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I have visited and re-visited SolydX over the years since 2013. Like all linux distros it has gone through changes, some good some not so good. However it has always maintained an interesting course somewhere between stock debian and some of the more flamboyant variations.
SolydXK 12 is based on Debian Bookworm (Debian 12) I do not use KDE so the following refers to SolydX 12 only.
On the download page you'll find there are links to the standard release and also the EE release. As it states quite clearly, EE is based on Debian Testing and is therefore inherently 'fragile'. In the past I have used EE during the last few months in the run up to a new Debian version release, but in December 2023 that's a bit far away to consider using as a daily driver just yet.
Testing carried out in Virtualbox 6 and on Dell 7040 SFF (2019) and Lenovo Thinkpad Edge E530 (2012)
SolydX 12 boots from either USB or in Virtualbox at exactly the same speed as any other Debian based distro I have tried or used. Subjectively it may be a tad faster. Shutdown speed is also uber fast. So, no complaints there.
SolydX 12 includes Virtualbox Guest Utils and is therefore nice to use in VB straight from boot.
The installer is standard Debian Calamares and so no drama there and installation is predictable.
A nice touch is that wifi configuration is carried over to the installed version.
No problem with any hardware detection. I choose to remove xorg-synaptics and just rely on xorg-libinput (already installed) to handle the touchpad on the Thinkpad. Both work, but libinput is much much better behaved on my hardware. YMMV.
SolydX 12 comes with smaller selection of software than stock Debian. Perhaps the most obvious area is LibreOffice with just LibreOffice Writer, Calc and Startcenter. To be honest this makes good sense to me. Multimedia and Graphics sections are lighter than with some debian distros.
However, this is more than countered by the extra software installation options in the Welcome screen. These stretch from Lutris and Steam, through Handbrake and Pitivi to Clementine, Samba, codecs and Clamav - the other bits of LibreOffice if you want them - plus others.
Notable extras in the installed Accessories are KeePassXC and Ventoy.
There's a really useful set of tools in SolydXK System Settings which includes stuff for tweaking the Grub and Plymouth theme choices, setting up encryption, adding lines to fstab, setting download mirrors and locale and installation of open device drivers.
There's an update checking tool to - well - keep your system updated.
A neat little under the hood tool is used to keep your .xsession-errors file from overflowing all over the place. Not an issue with XFCE but I know from past experience that KDE vomits huge amounts of output into that file all the time - so this is a thoughtful addition.
There are a other useful goodies tucked away here and there - you'll have to try it out to see what they are, but their standard Thunar custom actions are really jolly good!
There is a user forum. It is not hugely active, but I have found the developers to be very approachable and in a few days they did make some changes to a small area which was very nice.
Is SolydX the ideal distro for a newcomer to linux? Possibly not. All in all I find this to be the sort of distro you would install if you like Debian, you like XFCE, you prefer to be in charge of what software is installed and what isn't. The only way I can describe it is linux for grown-ups.
Do I use it? Of course.
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Version: 12
Rating: 1
Date: 2023-12-07
Votes: 1
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I have just downloaded the newly released SolydK 12. I went to set up clock (right click systray). It does not work. You cannot set up a clock on SolydK 12. How they managed to break Debian is beyond believe! Rating 1.
I simply cannot say more. Maybe that SolydK it very laggy and boots very slow. This does not happen on its base: Debian. This Distro should be "solid" because its based on Debian, but how the devs managed to break Debian is beyond anything I have ever seen. And I have seen a lot for the past 15 years. This tops it: A distro based on Debian that breaks it beyond repairable. User cannot set up a clock.
Moreover. The security is questionable, because behind user's back they install unverified extensions. And they reinstall them even if user removes it. This is not good!
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Version: 10-202108
Rating: 1
Date: 2023-07-04
Votes: 0
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I've been using Linux for over 10 years, and I've tried a lot of different distros. But I've never seen one as bad as the EE version of SolyxXK
I installed it on my laptop, and it wouldn't even boot. It just got stuck on the boot screen. I tried everything I could think of to fix it, but nothing worked.
I finally gave up and reinstalled a different distro. I'm so glad I did, because the other distro worked perfectly.
I don't know what's wrong with the EE version of SolyxXK but it's clear that it's not ready for prime time. If you're thinking about trying it, I would strongly advise against it.
The EE version of SolyxXK is a complete disaster. It doesn't boot, and there's no way to fix it. If you're looking for a Linux distro, I would strongly advise you to avoid this one.
I was particularly disappointed with the EE version of SolyxXK because it had a lot of potential. The underlying distro is actually quite good, but the EE version is just a mess.
I hope that the developers of [distro name] will fix the EE version soon. But until then, I would strongly advise everyone to avoid it.
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See all 19 reader reviews of SolydXK...
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