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1 • Live disks (by brad on 2016-01-25 00:42:08 GMT from North America)
Live USB's for testing, rescue/repair, and anonymous web surfing.
2 • Chromixium Name change & BSD vs Linux (by pcninja on 2016-01-25 00:48:59 GMT from North America)
I'm not a user myself, but really there is no way somebody will confuse Chromium with Chromixium and Google shouldn't have complained about the name.
--------------------
Hardware support is lacking in some areas on the BSDs compared to Linux. but atleast you'll be free from pulseaudio and systemd. Some people use one or the other, and some use both (Example: Slackware and FreeBSD).
3 • Live Disks. If not available, useless! (by Greg Zeng on 2016-01-25 01:10:28 GMT from Oceania)
Many scam artists release Linux distributions that are guaranteed not to run. That is why they cannot make Live-Disks.
This is what I have found, after testing so many (all?) Linux distributions in the last 20 years.
4 • live disks (by bob on 2016-01-25 01:19:29 GMT from Oceania)
Checking out new distr, recovery and demos on other machines.
5 • live disks (by live.disc on 2016-01-25 01:57:43 GMT from Europe)
I use live discs for other things: mainly Clone(zilla) and Gparted.
6 • Live Disks and Mint (by Ken on 2016-01-25 02:18:00 GMT from North America)
I always take a new distro for a test run with a live disk before installing it. I find it works better than trying it in a virtual environment. Plus, live disks come in really handy when I get adventurous, bork something up, and need to recover data. Live disks save the day!
I have always been impressed by Mint, and run it on my laptop and my office computer. It was the very first distro I ever tried, and I learned how to use GNU/Linux on it. It's still the one I recommend to anyone thinking about giving GNU/Linux a try. Stable, functional, simple, elegant all around. Cinnamon is still my favorite DE.
7 • Mint (by claudecat on 2016-01-25 03:40:38 GMT from North America)
Mint was the distro that first got me using Linux full time, after years of dabbling with the likes of Red Hat, SUSE, and later Ubuntu. But I'm beginning to feel like it's a bit too conservative, shielding the user from potential harm perhaps a bit too strenuously.
One example: Synaptic is offered by default, but is crippled (you can't - and from their point of view shouldn't - install updates from there). You can see which updates are available, but it won't let you mark or install them. I get why they do that, but why even provide Synaptic if you're going to prevent it from doing what it can do? Of course you can still use apt-get from the command line, so what's the point?
I dunno... after having become a full time Debian user years ago, and using Arch, Gentoo, Slackware, Fedora, openSUSE, etc., I just don't see the allure anymore with Mint. Even Ubuntu or PCLOS let you have more control, don't assume that the user will destroy his or her system by updating it without another level of hand-holding.
Don't get me wrong. Mint is an important distro that's done great things in helping MATE and Cinnamon prosper, and one I still recommend and install for those new to Linux. I just think it gets a bit restrictive once you know what you're doing. Plus the artwork is beginning to look a bit stale, no? I think I even prefer the orange and purple of Ubuntu to the silver and green these days!
8 • Live Disks -- other (by Andy Figueroa on 2016-01-25 04:28:36 GMT from North America)
I use live disks for (1) testing and installing new systems, and (2) for rescue, repair, backing up, and restoring systems, (3) selected utilities (GParted, PMagic), and (4) so I can always have at least one or several Linux system in my pocket when I travel without a PC or tablet (which is rare).
Note: I think a live disk that is guaranteed to not run is actually a dead disk. I've never experienced that. (Ref: comment by Greg Zeng)
9 • DW-news (by LF on 2016-01-25 05:13:13 GMT from Europe)
Huh... no wording in the DW-news about the January 15, 2016 Linux Foundation's change, that usurped individual members (the community) of the right to vote?
10 • Live disks(distributions) (by Bobbie Sellers on 2016-01-25 06:00:28 GMT from North America)
I have several live distributions on USB Flash Drives which I carry with
me whenever there is a possible need, I have Knoppix 7.6, Magiea 5
PC-LOS and when I want to present a new distro at a LUG meeting
I try to get it onto a Flash Drive for faster loading.
I have to say that Mageia 5's IsoDumper is an excellent tool for
moving iso files to Flash Drives.
bliss
11 • Mint (by herold on 2016-01-25 06:36:32 GMT from Europe)
I have tried most every distro on the planet starting with SUSE on a lot of diskettes.
Mint has always been the one which seems to run on any hardware, that including several computers where all other distros I tried including ubuntu failed on first attempt. Yes I could work around but why should I. On Artwork, ubuntu makes me retch. I rarely use Mints packet installer, apt-get update && apt-get upgrade or "dist upgrade" feels much more efficient. Mostly I just cut and paste it these days. is my Synaptic on Mint 17,3 different, it still works perfectly for me.
I do not consider Mint to be particularly restricted unless we speak of the dependancy bloat it inherits from Buntu. debian edition is better in that respect but feels a bit less polished as installed.
I am using Sparky LXQT on two older computers, a bit more polish and that can challenge Mint for my crown presentation.
12 • Linux Mint (by frodopogo on 2016-01-25 07:05:26 GMT from North America)
@7
Claudecat,
Have you tried LMDE2? (Linux Mint Debian Edition)
It might give you more of the freedom you want with the polished quality of Mint.
You do sound like you've graduated to a considerable level of Linux expertise.
I must say though that Mint's continued high rankings indicate that a lot of Linux users don't agree with you. Maybe these hits are all from Linux geeks reviving their grannies dead Windows XP boxes, but the Mint formula is certainly working for a considerable number of people. Some people want access to the guts of an operating system, some want to be shielded from it. Really, isn't the whole idea of a GUI to shield the user from having to deal with the guts? The Mint approach is the logical extension of that idea, not the antithesis... and of course, so is a Mac, for a much higher price! Whether corporate IT techs, or the Linux user who is his family's computer expert... it's understandable if such a user wants more freedom in his own computer.... but the wise ones know the same level of freedom provided to an average computer user may only give them more problems to fix, more calls for assistance, more work than they want or need.
13 • Live disks(distributions) (by denk_mal on 2016-01-25 07:27:57 GMT from Europe)
I am using Live distros for data rescue and disk repairs of windows systems. Especially data recovery is easier, faster and more effective than using windows tools.
Only my 2 gt, YMMV of course.
14 • Linux vs BSD (by Andy Mender on 2016-01-25 07:57:56 GMT from Europe)
Dear Jesse,
Thank you for mentioning BSDs in your Q&A section. I think the major differences pertain to core aspects, like the c/c++ compiler(s), compiler libraries, monitoring tools, device naming, etc.
There is a lot more UNIX in BSDs than in GNU/Linux.
What personally brought me to BSDs was the quality of documentation, separation of base OS from third-party software and the incredible stability resulting from the latter. Not to mention a skeptical and cool-headed approach to software design :). Currently, I run FreeBSD, but plan to give OpenBSD a try, too.
15 • Live disk images (by zykoda on 2016-01-25 08:01:45 GMT from Europe)
I have used live/install disk images to boot/install from:
(1) CD/DVD
(2) USB
(3) Internal hard drive copy of live iso.
I prefer to use a GRUB2 stanza from which to kick start (3)
16 • Live disks (by Marame on 2016-01-25 08:23:26 GMT from Europe)
I am switching slowly to USB sticks but use CD/DVD still. I have a lot of old computers of socket 478 and early LGA775 era and they are often tricky or dont work with USBs at boot. So disc is the only alternative there.
17 • LM Xfce (by Sondar on 2016-01-25 08:45:15 GMT from Europe)
Superb distro, excellent review (if a little too long anticipated). LM in all its incarnations is exactly what most users need and want - one of the facts correctly demonstrated by the PHRs. Maybe a large number of DW readers are technically proficient and knowledgeable in the IT department, but they may not be entirely representative? Mint does all those menial daily chores that regular users rely upon, flawlessly and continues to do so. Getting the message out to the proletariat accustomed to dipping in their pocket for flawed software, updates, and dubious promises is more difficult especially when the world's largest corporations have bottomless resources to promote their bent products.
18 • Magazine and accompanying DVD (by Lee on 2016-01-25 09:04:11 GMT from North America)
My subscription to Linux Format magazine provides me with a DVD every month
containing up to 5 distros, most of which boot in live mode.
19 • Mint (by Bill on 2016-01-25 09:36:20 GMT from North America)
I use a more..."involved" distro, but I think Mint is great, my best friend hates anything that even resembles computer geekery, so I introduced him to Linux Mint. He's been happily using it for years without a hitch, it's stable and complete, he's never even had to add software to it. I love the fact Linux distributions give us so much choice, and Mint is excellent for people who don't want a crash course in programming, just a working machine.
20 • @2 Chromixium Name change (by greg on 2016-01-25 09:53:11 GMT from Europe)
"2 • Chromixium Name change & BSD vs Linux (by pcninja on 2016-01-25 00:48:59 GMT from North America)
I'm not a user myself, but really there is no way somebody will confuse Chromium with Chromixium and Google shouldn't have complained about the name."
there are only 2 letters difference. i believe it should be more than 2 letters and not to sound similar or somehting like that. if they were selling Chromixium oranges it wouldn't be an issue. since it is an OS who tries to copy look and feel of the other similary named OS - that would cause trouble.
Platinum OS or Gold OS might be better than Chromixium OS - if you want to stay in the realm of metals...
21 • Mint 17.3 (by zykoda on 2016-01-25 10:31:35 GMT from Europe)
A very positive revue of an excellent all round distro, and well deserved.
I installed XFCE and MATE on mint cinnamon 17.3 with the Nvidia 304.131 driver to avoid an issue with the GeForce 7300 GT video card that causes cinnamon to crash immediately to fallback mode. 3d acceleration nevertheless worked. Clement is aware of this issue with the 7xxx chip sets and the recommended driver. I have five other machines running 17.3 cinnamon flawlessly.
22 • LinuxMint Xfce re.No.7 (by Someguy on 2016-01-25 10:47:36 GMT from Europe)
"...Synaptic is offered by default, but is crippled (you can't - and from their point of view shouldn't - install updates from there). You can see which updates are available, but it won't let you mark or install them."
This is factually incorrect. It works exactly has it done for years. You are doing something wrong.
23 • boot form usb (by peer on 2016-01-25 11:15:14 GMT from Europe)
@16:
I also have a old pc that is not capable off starting from an usb stick. I have a cd with Plop Boot Manager (https://www.plop.at/en/bootmanager/download.html). The Plop Boot Manager makes it possible to boot from usb on old pc's or laptops.
24 • Linux Mint - Live iso (by kc1di on 2016-01-25 11:35:26 GMT from North America)
I use Live ISO's for a variety of things , but normally use them to try out different Distros before installing.
Mint has never failed me it's not as fast as some, not as bloated as others. but is a good Distro and I almost always have one version of it loaded on one of my machines.
Only bug I've encountered with it is the Nvidia bug which causes Cinnamon to crash with the 304.xx driver install. Unfortuantely Nouveau also does not work right with those cards and Cinnamon the other flavors run perfectly with the 304.xx drive so I use xfce or mate on that machine.
In any event the Mint team does a very good Job of putting out a stable and usable distro for which I greatly appreciate their work.
I believe the look is going to change in the next edition also. that will make some happy . I for one think the current look is better that many others :)
25 • Linux Mint... (by Marc Visscher on 2016-01-25 11:45:28 GMT from Europe)
Linux Mint is, in my opinion, the best what Linux has to offer at this moment. It's stable, it's sleeque, it's chique, it stays out of your way and normally it doesn't confront you with strange quirks and unexpected behaviour (by default, that is). I recommend and install it to new users for years now, and I never heard any complaint so far.
Before I read the review I already knew the conclusions/outcome of the review. Yes, in a point you might say that Linux Mint is the most boring Linux OS around these days, but in a good way. And it's great to see that Linux Mint has similair experiences with other desktop environments.
Thank you Clem and your team for making such a quality distro. It's much appreciated.
26 • Mint and Synaptic (by Angel on 2016-01-25 13:07:42 GMT from Asia)
@ 22: Number 7 is correct. I had never noticed, so I just tried to update from Synaptic. Install options are grayed out.
@7: Perhaps it's done so users who keep the 1, 2 and 3 options don't do it from synaptic by mistake and end up installing unwanted updates. I expect it still can be done from the terminal, but not in the mood to check right now.
27 • Linux Mint (by Dave Postles on 2016-01-25 13:55:24 GMT from Europe)
I received Linux Mint 17.3 with a magazine with a default desktop (Cinnamon or Mate - can't remember which). I prefer XFCE, so I downloaded it from the repo and logged in as XFCE desktop. I simply couldn't get the terminal to work. The terminal would open, but it was impossible to get a cursor inside it to enter text. Not that I've ever been a fan of Mint.
28 • @$12: frodopogo: (by dragonmouth on 2016-01-25 13:57:53 GMT from North America)
"I must say though that Mint's continued high rankings indicate that a lot of Linux users don't agree with you."
You assume that numbers indicate "quality". If 50 million people say a foolish thing, it is still a foolish thing. Does the 100's of millions of Windows users mean that it is the best O/S around? Most of those users do not even know that there is such a thing as "Linux."
29 • re; live distros... (by tom joad on 2016-01-25 13:59:19 GMT from Europe)
For my two cents worth I would say Mint with mate is the top of the linux heap. As ubuntu used to say a decade ago...'it just works." The rest are just lacking of a good reason to install permanetly.
I use live distros to test new ‘flavors' of linux, to fix stuff and for other chores. Parted Magic is a gotta have as is backbox.
I have looked over in the last week the beta of Zorin and Extix running both "live." I like Zorin better but Extix will load in ram which I really like. In ram it runs like the wind. But Extix is just not ready. I wish is was. And I tried the Exitix persistent install twice...that didn't work. Tails will allow for a persistent partition from the system but Extix can't figure that out.
If I could wave a magic wand I would make all distros with the option of running from ram. But who knows what the future will bring.
30 • @7 claudecat: (by dragonmouth on 2016-01-25 14:06:55 GMT from North America)
"Of course you can still use apt-get from the command line, so what's the point?"
It is possible that the Mint developers figure that if you know how to use apt to update your system, you are competent enough not to destroy your system.
Different strokes for different folks. I, too, find Mint confining so I use antiX. Mint is great for newbies and people who want to use Linux without actually having to learn Linux.
31 • Re: responses to Mint (by claudecat on 2016-01-25 14:15:34 GMT from North America)
Maybe I shouldn't be complaining. Mint is without question a quality distribution that deserves praise, which I acknowledged originally. The Synaptic thing just irritates me is all really, and to a lesser extent the bloat, though that's nothing compared to a default install of PCLOS with every printer driver ever concocted and 4-5 programs for any given task, some quite obscure. As a more experienced user, I now appreciate Arch and similar distros' approach, which allows one to install just what is needed. Dependency checking is one thing, making a distro suitable out of the box for every possible hardware combo may be overkill once you know what you need and why.
@11 - You know that Mint only wants people to use their updater though, right? Apt-get and Synaptic are discouraged, and yes, as @26 discovered, Synaptic won't even let you do updates.
@12 - I tried LMDE years ago and found it unpolished, a work in progress. I'm sure it's improved since then, but why not just use Debian itself? With minimal effort and a little experience you can make it as pretty and easy to use as any other distro.
@19 - I get what you're saying here, and agree. Most people just want something that works and couldn't care less about having the latest version of the kernel or whatever program. That's why I often install Mint for people less technically inclined. But I've also set up these same kinds of users with Debian stable (KDE usually - carefully configured it uses ~400MB RAM for 64-bit) and they've been just as happy. I don't think you can do much better than Debian for a stable system that rarely if ever even needs updating and is rock solid. It's my daily workhorse.
So, I didn't mean to beat up on Mint. It does what it does quite well, and really is ideal for those new to Linux. So are lots of others, including the dreaded orange and purple with Unity. Heck, I've even come to like Gnome 3 lately!
Oh, and I'm no programmer, just a guy that's tried a lot of distros and learned a lot by tailoring them to my needs. Just about any distro can be great with a little reading.
32 • @2 chromixium confusion (by Pearson on 2016-01-25 14:16:58 GMT from North America)
I suspect the concern was that Chromiuxium might sound like an official Chromium or Chrome based product, not necessarily that it might be confused with Chromium or Chrome.
33 • LM with mag subscription (by brad on 2016-01-25 14:19:44 GMT from North America)
@27 Dave - If you have the time and inclination, download LM XFCE and install it as is, rather than as an "add-on" to MATE/Cinnamon. I think you will like it much better than your previous experience.
34 • Mint, numbers an indication of quality. (by frodopogo on 2016-01-25 14:41:56 GMT from North America)
@dragonmouth,
While in some cases that's true, I don't think your reasoning holds up in this case.
Windows users are deliberately being kept ignorant of Linux, and if they hear about it at work, it sounds like something the IT techs are supposed to know about for servers and firewalls, but not them.
Also, while the security aspects of Windows are a nightmare, there is nothing wrong with the user interface of versions up to Windows 7.
The high ranking on Distrowatch is more likely the doing of informed users, not ignorant ones, and as such, I think it's a lot more meaningful.
35 • Live disks, kudos to Mint and BSD considerations (by far2fish on 2016-01-25 14:43:42 GMT from Europe)
- Using Live disks when testing distros in VirtualBox.
- Writing live disks to USB thumb drives with 'dd' command when I want to run it on physical hardware.
- Using GParted from CD-R for the rare job of fixing partition issues).
- Keeping a set of distros (Ubuntu 14.04, Debian 8, Mageia 5) on DVD-R for the odd chance I want to test something on physical hardware,
I have not spent much time with Mint, because there are other distros I like a lot more. But there is no doubt that Clem is doing an excellent job with it, and he and other contributers deserves a big "thank you !" for the work they do in bringing Linux to the masses; both newcomers and more experienced people.
The text on comparing Linux with BSD was really interresting, and I some point I guess I need to test BSB too.
36 • 22 et seq. (by Someguy on 2016-01-25 14:53:50 GMT from Europe)
Naturally, I tried Synaptic before writing my riposte to 7. And, yes, it is fully functional. Not sure what those folks who deny so are doing?
37 • @7 @12 (by Alessandro di Roma on 2016-01-25 14:55:21 GMT from Europe)
@7: You're perfectly right, the LM's brain-damaged Synaptic is the first reason for which I prefer Xubuntu to LM Xfce.
@12: I tried also LMDE at least three times, but I found it too unstable. Many people like LM? maybe it's because LM is the best for them, the very benefit of Linux is the freedom of choice it gives you, if I feel comfortable with a distro I don't think you're wrong if you like another...
38 • Mint Synaptic Update Apply (by Bill on 2016-01-25 14:56:12 GMT from North America)
Well, I like Mint 17 quite a bit and I also like control of my synaptic,
so here is how I restored the greayed out button, and it works great.
http://tuxtweaks.com/2014/09/restore-mark-all-upgrades-in-synaptic-linux-mint-17
Have fun!
39 • @31 - Mint and apt-get; @36 synaptic (by Hoos on 2016-01-25 15:11:12 GMT from Asia)
@36 - just to check, are you using the Ubuntu or Debian-based Mint? Because Ubuntu-based definitely does not allow system update from Synaptic, although you can use it to install or remove selected packages.
@31 - Have Mint developers ever discouraged the use of apt-get?
While Synaptic in Ubuntu Mint is crippled, there are no restrictions on apt-get terminal commands as far as I can see. Just dist-upgrade from the terminal and you'll have a full update, even those updates marked 4 and 5.
As for why use LMDE (or any other fully featured and pre-configured Debian derivative) instead of pure Debian if you're installing for someone less technically inclined? Well, it saves me time.
I've posted here previously that I tried installing the official Debian MATE image. Sound did not work out of the box and there were a few other niggling issues which I can't recall off-hand. Would I have been able to figure out what was wrong with the audio and sort it out? Probably, with some time. But why should I?
And especially since I'm installing it for friends who might be there watching the actual installation. You want to give your friends the assurance that the distro just works.
40 • evolving Mint (by John on 2016-01-25 15:31:18 GMT from Europe)
I have been using Linux Mint on various boxes since Mint 2 Bea. (I got my start in Linux with Mepis 3 back in 2004)
I stopped at Mint 10, the last version to include Gnome 2 DE. This is still a fast and snappy distro while the later Gnome 2 forked MATE has never quite equalled. Despite being 'obsolete' for some time now, it's still a great working distro.
For a MATE DE I prefer Debian Wheezy based Point 2.3, which has integrated MATE and compiz-fusion far better than any Mint distro. That's been my experience.
Point 2.3 is like Mint used to be when it reached the top of its production curve. Most distros these days are becoming increasing sluggish and bloated.
A bit like roads - build a bigger road and the traffic will increase to re-introduce congestion.
41 • live discs (by Mark D on 2016-01-25 15:35:19 GMT from Europe)
I use live disks for rescue/repair, or testing hardware; however I find CDs slow and many new machines don't come with an optical drive these days, so I dd the ISO image to a USB stick if I can.
GRML goes easily onto a USB stick and works well.
Some of them I have on a PXE image too, like clonezilla-live and gparted-live - all excellent and useful distros!
42 • Live distros, Mint, and me. (by Arkanabar on 2016-01-25 16:00:40 GMT from North America)
I use live distros for testing, repair/rescue, and disk partitioning.
Like claudecat, Mint 6 "Felicia" was the distro to push Win2k off my desktop. According to WineHQ, it had the best experience running WoW at the time, and Blizzard was dropping support for Win2k, and I couldn't afford a WinXP license. After a little bit of wrenching around, it worked quite well for me.
Like claudecat, again, I also find that Mint, by default, tends to limit how much control you can get over the distro from the desktop. The update utility will not install new kernels. @22: as provided, Mint's version of Synaptic does not have a button for "mark all upgrades," so I found myself always updating from the command line, a habit that carried over into #!, Madbox, and the other debian/ubuntu based distros that I used afterwards. I even do this from time to time in PCLOS, which uses APT and Synaptic for RPM.
Mint remains an excellent distro for Windows converts, and I readily recommend it, especially in that capacity. But it's not for me. I want some convergence -- a KDE distro that works well on both my Dell N5110 lappy and my XPS8700 desktop (I hate Dell's bank, but my wife loves them), because AFAICT, KDE is still the most energy efficient DE out there. (Phoronix, are you listening? Are you ready to test again yet?) And every Debian/Ubuntu KDE distro wound up with an X lockup on my desktop. This includes the distros that LMDE's developers now run, SolydX and SolydK. Hence, PCLOS, the first linux distro I ever successfully installed and used (tho to be honest I prefer the MiniMe installation, cos Texstar and co. really DO like to include everything and the kitchen sink).
43 • Mint Synaptic Update (by luvr on 2016-01-25 16:08:59 GMT from Europe)
@38 - That's exactly what I did to restore the "Mark all updates" for Synaptic under Linux Mint.
It's not that you cannot apply updates with Synaptic by default, it's just that you don't have the option available to mark them all in one click.
It's one of the reasons why I consider Linux Mint not entirely suitable for me; I get that it may be an interesting and appropriate measure to protect newbies from potential issues, but I'm not too fond of this much hand-holding.
44 • Mint (by David on 2016-01-25 17:11:57 GMT from Europe)
Over the years I've tried, and often reviewed, over 100 distros, of which I'd say about 40 were fit for purpose. But when people ask me what to use for a general-purpose home PC, I usually recommend Mint, even though I myself use CentOS on my desktop and Salix on my laptop.
45 • Mint (by Jake on 2016-01-25 17:15:31 GMT from North America)
I agree with many of the comments. Mint is great and is what most Linux distributions should be. I first used it because Ubuntu forced me to install grub to /dev/sda, which was the USB installation drive! (This meant I could boot my system only if I left it in; LM at least asked me for the drive).
I also agree with the nitpicks. Since LM17, Synaptic and package management have been restricted. I wish I had my old Synaptic back with the old Software Sources list so that I can add custom stuff without terminal hacking. I know they are trying to keep me from breaking things, but it's a pain when I miss some security updates because they use custom packages to shield users (they only get worse at this with stuff like the 17.3 release that did break a lot of people doing clean installs). I've installed some upstream Ubuntu stuff and PPAs to get around most of my gripes, but I wish LM were more flexible.
For those recommending LMDE, that's not an option. Even Clem says that users who care about security shouldn't use it. I want a (relatively) stable system with security updates as they come out, not weeks later (or never) because QA doesn't see it as a priority. It's more principle than paranoia.
Despite this, when I load new distros in VMs to try them out, I rediscover why I use LM in the first place. It does "just work" while letting you do your thing (for the most part). They also really benefit from the Ubuntu/Debian base for documentation. The LM website is pretty anemic and useless when it comes to software IMHO. I look stuff up on Ubuntu and proceed as if I were running that since that mostly works.
46 • Misc (software anemia and live CD/DVD/USB) (by dbrion on 2016-01-25 17:39:22 GMT from Europe)
I was appealled, 5 years ago, when things like unetbootin appeared, but now, I prefer having real instals on USB (as if it were on a HD, but somehow slower) and have "only" Mageia5 and Fedora (since FC11), when the installer is not too terrible (I skipped FC22 , FC23 could be installed without too much pain) or when begin to have interesting software(I waited till Mageia4). I used FC23 live CD (in fact,it was USB) as a rescue disk for a friend of mine (could go on browsing while copying his Windows files: did not find it difficult at all).
On the PC side, my friends have very old computers and I use their CD/DVD reader to install Lubuntu (I gave up, after testing Mageia and being satisfied) or Mageia5 (had too many viruses with pirated XP/7).
On RPi side, I am very satisfied with Rapsbian ...
On other ARM stuff, I use cross compiling and understand what I do with reading LFS book.
I am therefore indebted to Mandriva/Mageia, Fedora, Debian/UBU , Arch (read docs from them; never used) and LFS for documentation, sources and binaries...
This leads me to the question : what is the use of a Mint, if it is "anemic and useless for documentation" and if I (and my friends, who are beginners) get everything (binaries...) needed from other distributions?
47 • Live media (by Peter086 on 2016-01-25 17:50:38 GMT from Europe)
I carry both a Wifislax pendrive with persistance for "basic" recovery and a 99% probabilty of a working wifi, and Sergei Strelec's Win based recovery suite. In my limited experience, I have recovered files not visible to Testdisk/Photorec BUT ALSO saved data not identified by some well known Win software (Actxxx, R-Lxxxxx or UFxxxxxx). A 43 Gb video was in an inaccesible partition for a repair shop using whatever soft they had, and was "empty" for 2 popular data recovery programs, but was easily copied to an Ext. HD after booting a standard Kubuntu usb.
I am an avid Linux user, having all but abandonned Windows, but sometimes you must use what works best, specially with data recovery. For all the rest, I trust Linux more than most Win apps.
48 • @27 (by kc1di on 2016-01-25 18:32:15 GMT from North America)
" I simply couldn't get the terminal to work. The terminal would open, but it was impossible to get a cursor inside it to enter text. Not that I've ever been a fan of Mint."
Are you running it in a Virtual box session?
I have no problem with XFCE and the terminal in mint here.
49 • @46 (by Jake on 2016-01-25 18:38:27 GMT from North America)
Let me be a bit clearer. I'm not saying LM is useless (I use it every day). There are just places it's lacking. As an example, compare these two pages:
http://community.linuxmint.com/software/view/zsnes
http://packages.ubuntu.com/search?keywords=zsnes
Unless all you want to know is znes appears somewhere in LM, that page is pretty useless (I guess I put little stock in the review section because most packages have little to no reviews). By contrast, the Ubuntu page gives me more package details, information about if my branch has version X (or if a newer release does), where to find and file bugs, etc.
It's also easier to find documentation/bugs/fixes when search "ubuntu" than "linux mint" in my experience. Generally I start by searching for fixes in either distribution; the different forums will have different answers. It's actually a benefit to both teams to have such popular distributions share enough in common that I can do this.
As for its use, Mint fixes several problems Ubuntu seems to have like the installer problem I mentioned (maybe that's fixed by now; that was a while back). The Mint team "fixed" GNOME3 in Cinnamon and MATE (something I'm very grateful for). Their desktops also don't have the same privacy concerns as Unity. I actually wish LM could support a larger development team because I think they do great work in general. I just don't like some of the flexibility that's been removed, but it's not enough to make me jump ship. The dev team does a lot and tries to strike the right balance. I think their work is excellent and Jesse's review shows that.
50 • Installing kernels in Linux Mint 17.3 (by frodopogo on 2016-01-25 18:41:36 GMT from North America)
@42
There IS a way of installing kernels with the 17.3 LM update manage, but it's not part of the default update, reducing the chance someone will do it accidentally.
Under the menu item "view", there is the menu item "kernels". Try that.
@46
Old hardware is evidently not the same across the world. I have 3 old computers, about 10 years old, all of them HP's. Two were given to me by someone who got them at work but whose family uses Macs. One was bought for $100 from a company that recycles computers, including donations from corporations. And all three have more than 2 gigs of RAM and run at 2 gHz or a little better, and all run Linux Mint comfortably.
I think the Mint programmers are aware of this, that relatively powerful old computers are available cheaply in many places.
But I understand that's not going to be true everywhere. You simply have to try Mint yourself, and try the lightest version on a computer typical of your friends. That would likely be the one reviewed by Jesse this issue. Like many reviews of Linux Mint, the review is kind of boring- no problems to report. Boring reviews because of no problems to report tends to mean that your friends bother you a lot less often! Also, with Mint, many little things are just easier. I've tried other distros on Live CD's, but they seldom get installed. One common reason was that Mint just detected whatever sound card I had better, and gave me more options for fixing it if it didn't get detected. I'm a musician, so a computer with no sound is NOT an option. I've noticed other things like that, but that's the one that springs to mind.
51 • @2: Google Needs To Complain (by buzrobot on 2016-01-25 18:44:40 GMT from North America)
It's apparent that "Chromium" and "Chromixium" are very similar. Chromixum also copied the ChromeOS interface. It is not unreasonable to imagine someone would assume it was also affililated with Google.
The law is such that Google's failure to contest "Chromixium" would weaken its ability to win a court case involving an even closer representation.
52 • what makes mint special? (by Tim Dowd on 2016-01-25 18:52:37 GMT from North America)
I would love to hear a Mint user explain why they prefer Mint to Ubuntu MATE or Debian. It's been years since I used it (12 I think was the last time) and I just genuinely don't know what differentiates it.
I understand why there needs to be spins of Debian for new users, but Ubuntu fills that role pretty well. Even Debian is pretty simple for a new user to maintain once it's set up the way they need it. I put a newbie on Debian Testing recently (they have a bizarre computer that wouldn't boot from a DVD and I couldn't think of any other way to get something in the Debian family on it other than a netinstall cd) and told them to run aptitude update and aptitude dist-upgrade every time they log off and they've had no trouble at all.
Anyway I promise I'm not trolling- I just want to know why Mint, and not Ubuntu or Debian.
53 • Live CD use (by Charles Burge on 2016-01-25 19:16:31 GMT from North America)
I had an interesting use case for a live CD just a few weeks ago. We're planning to set up an anti-virus management server at my workplace, and we needed to configure firewall rules so that some remote locations can see that server on port 80 but nothing else. The actual server wasn't built yet, but I fired up a copy of Knoppix, gave it the IP address we intend to use, and turned on apache. That way we were able to verify that the firewall rules are working properly.
At home, I sometimes run Knoppix on a laptop that I share with my wife. That way it doesn't interfere with the Windows installation that she uses.
54 • Debain vs. Ubuntu (by linuxista on 2016-01-25 19:33:51 GMT from North America)
@31 "Most people just want something that works and couldn't care less about having the latest version of the kernel or whatever program... I don't think you can do much better than Debian for a stable system that rarely if ever even needs updating and is rock solid."
There's the rub. I think many users do need the latest version of at least a couple of programs. For example, I do audio editing, and Audacity has added some very important features in the last 6 months. Fortunately I use Arch, and so, there's no effort at all in getting the latest bug fixes and features. Where would I be with Debian? 2.0.6, with no real-time effects editing, and I'd be stuck there for who knows how long unless I started pinning from testing or unstable. At that point all arguments about Debian being rock solid go straight out the window, and I certainly wouldn't wish that sort of package management on any newbie. I've never had any experience pinning in Debian that didn't eventually result in package conflicts or dependency issues.
That's a primary reason that, if I didn't use Arch, I'd use Ubuntu or Mint. At the very least I'd have recourse to PPAs for certain packages I needed the latest features in. And while not completely straightforward, some newbies (who also seem to have the need for at least one or two of the latest of whatever program) that I help out have managed to add PPAs and keep them updated without too much trouble.
@52 The primary (and to my thinking, the only significant) difference b/t Mint and Ubuntu is Mint's new release model of having point releases of their LTS version. Mint has always been wary of performing release upgrades (as they should if you're really concerned about stability), so instead of intermediate releases upgrades like Ubuntu, they just upgrade the Cinnamon and MATE Desktop Environments and various Mint tools.
55 • Re: 54 - Debian for newer package needs (by claudecat on 2016-01-25 20:24:24 GMT from North America)
The phrase "...many users..." is nebulous, but your point is a good one. For people like you (and me) that want or need current packages Debian stable is not a good choice. That's one reason I have Arch installed as well, and several other distros just for fun. Lately Manjaro has been getting serious consideration here as an every day use contender, as it has fairly up to date packages and is theoretically more stable than Arch.
But I'd venture to say that the majority of people looking to ditch Windows (I deal with older folks mostly) probably don't need the latest version of Audacity (or whatever). They just want to surf the web, use Facebook and Twitter, email, edit photos, etc. In Debian that's perfectly doable, as is more involved routine daily work for me. At least one can stay current with Iceweasel by using the Mozilla repo.
Debian stable may be behind the times with packages, but it never breaks, and that counts for a lot with people unfamiliar with how to fix things, most of whom wouldn't know where to begin with something like Audacity. For the rest, there are plenty of other distros.
And fwiw, I find juggling PPA's in Ubuntu/Mint/etc. more trouble than it's worth. Arch, Manjaro, Gentoo, even Sid or Fedora (equally stable in my experience) are probably better choices.
56 • Re:52 Mint instead of Ubuntu (by SallyK on 2016-01-25 20:52:12 GMT from Europe)
Just as an individual answer to your question - I've been using Mint since 2009, when I preferred it over Ubuntu because it came with mp3 support etc, as standard, rather than having to install it afterwards, and because I preferred their desktop layout with one panel and the Mint Menu.
These days I stay with it because Cinnamon is my perfect DE - customisable enough, but with basic sane defaults. And because it's so easy to install, and to keep the stable LTS base, while upgrading to later versions of important software. Nearly all of those things are attainable in Ubuntu, but in Mint they come as standard, which means less work in getting it set up and out of my way.
As for Debian - I'm just not confident in the testing/unstable versions, and stable is far too stale - Mint gives me a stable base, on which I can keep up with the latest software through PPAs, the best of both worlds.
57 • #52 Mint/Ubuntu/Debian (by zykoda on 2016-01-25 21:18:41 GMT from Europe)
OOTB Mint LTS Rosa needs less effort to set up for my everyday use; Easy to maintain and longish term. Mint Debian edition is less polished. Debian Jessie is quite good too but requires initially more effort and time. No point in being in the the middle ground of Ubuntu especially when development strays into Unity, Mir and undesirable wares. Handwriting recognition for keyboard substitution is quite lacking throughout the Linux ecosystem for note taking and formula evaluation.
58 • @55 re Debian and Mint (by linuxista on 2016-01-25 21:59:51 GMT from North America)
Yes, "many users" and "most people" are nebulous. A significant percentage (maybe 20-33%) of newbs that I've helped convert to linux asked for something that required a PPA. But for over a year now Manjaro has been my default choice for newbies, and it has been a great choice, mostly because my Debian/Ubuntu skills are getting rusty. But I've also found Manjaro seems to need even less follow up attention than Debian/Ubuntu/Mint. They update themselves just fine; I never get a call to hold their hand through a release upgrade. Maybe that's just my perception, but I've had no thoughts of reverting to Ubuntu or Mint. I might consider it in a case where I would be totally unavailable for questions, but I don't know. Manjaro has good GUI tools, and the archwiki is probably a more comprehensive resource than anything else.
@55 "...the majority of people looking to ditch Windows (I deal with older folks mostly) ... They just want to surf the web, use Facebook and Twitter, email, edit photos, etc. In Debian that's perfectly doable..." You might be right. That's certainly often the case. My octogenarian mom, for example, just knows how to open firefox, surf, get her email, etc. But wouldn't almost any distro, once installed, be stable in this sort of use case (for her Ubuntu Unity 14.04 LTS)? If you just did the security updates and never upgraded, would you even notice any bugs or breakage that was not a kernel panic or boot fail?
59 • Using Live Distros (by Ben Myers on 2016-01-25 23:04:31 GMT from North America)
I use live distros for testing and diagnosis of hardware problems and to evaluate new distros.
This poll needs to have allowed multiple selections. I guess I can go back and vote again?
60 • Mint MATE vs. Ubuntu MATE (by frodopogo on 2016-01-25 23:19:46 GMT from North America)
First of all, 12 years is TOO LONG. That's very close to most of the lifespan of the Mint project. Download from a mirror near you, and test from a Live USB. RECENT first hand experience is best. It's fairly common for people to mention flaws from Mint 15 or something as a reason for not using it... those reasons aren't really likely to be valid anymore.
I'm not a Debian user, so I can't do that comparison.
It's a difficult question to answer, because to me, when an OS and it's GUI are working the best are when they are transparent, when they get out of the way, when they DON'T force me to pay attention to them. And Mint truly does that for me most of the time.
So if you're not thinking about it, it's hard to remember why it seemed so enjoyable. Occasionally I get off the beaten path, and I notice a new little tweak they have made, and marvel at the thoughtfulness of the change, but I don't keep a log of those times, but they happen.
I do get curious however, and when I noticed Ubuntu MATE becoming official about a year ago, I did check it out, and it resides on another partition of my main computer as part of the French Cubuntu spin. Before that I just had a straight Ubuntu MATE there.
Since I use the Mint MATE edition as my "daily driver", the comparison was obvious-
What does Mint offer that Ubuntu MATE doesn't?
And the answer was, the difference wasn't massive. I could easily use Ubuntu MATE as a backup in the unlikely case something went wrong with the Mint install. It's far closer than many other distros I have tried. And I'm paranoid enough to want a backup in place.
Many of the annoyances were in the main Menu... Mint has done a lot of tweaks to that, calling it "MintMenu", and as an ex-Win XP user, I found it intuitive and easier to use.
The Ubuntu MATE menu wasn't as good, although I think they made some changes recently. But it was useable...easier for me than, say, Xfce.
Another thing.... I realized I hadn't updated the MATE install in a long time. Mint MATE strikes for me a perfect balance... they inform you of an update, without nagging you or forcing you to do it whether you want to or not (the Microsoft WAY!!! ;-P). Ubuntu MATE makes you go looking for the updater, and the different menu layout made that harder... but I did find it.
And I really like the Mint Update program. I find it makes updates quite painless... the hardest part is typing the password carefully!
Other niggles... I like the Mint color scheme... I find grey and green to be easy on the eyes, and the relative dullness makes the icons stand out, like the balls on the pool table.
Ubuntu MATE seemed kind of drab. Cubuntu, in addition to Ubuntu MATE, has a Cinnamon desktop available and the Unity interface available via logging out, and logging in again and specifying the new desktop. The Cubuntu version of Cinnamon is really attractive... so attractive that it makes orange and purple look good! I was impressed... Ubuntu needs to pay attention!
I DO like the Ubuntu Software Center better than the Mint one... more info, more easily accessible. The Mint Software Center is at least graphical, but it's kind of "meh". It hasn't changed much since version 5!!!
In some cases I used the Ubuntu MATE install to check for interesting programs, then used the search function to find the program in the Mint Software Center and install it.
The saving grace of the Mint Software Center is a "Featured" section that has a lot of useful software that people are likely to want, but not quite enough to make it onto the ISO.
I agree with the poster who wished the Mint project had a bigger staff- maybe then they could get to stuff like that.
61 • special (by brad on 2016-01-25 23:48:43 GMT from North America)
@ 52 - Tim - I went from Ubuntu to Mint when one of the non-LTS Ubuntu releases (10.10???) just wouldn't boot. I was new enough to fear mucking around further, and I had a separate /home partition, so I stumbled upon Mint.
It's still my go-to distribution; even though I've become more familiar with Debian and its offspring, I have enough oddball hardware that I would always run into issues. Mint always came through, as far as universal hardware support was concerned.
Nowadays, I feel (almost) comfortable enough to consider replacing Mint with Manjaro - for now, I'm running them side-by-side (always sharing /home - the best advice I ever got as a noob was to create a separate /home partition).
62 • Cubuntu (by linuxista on 2016-01-26 00:39:04 GMT from North America)
Never heard of Cubuntu. The name could pose some problems in Latin languages. I propose "Cinnabun". :)
63 • Live DVD/CD world (by Jordan on 2016-01-26 01:28:22 GMT from North America)
That was my linux world for a while as I was using school computers.
I'd bring my (obviously non-persistent) CD to school and set up my
(slow) OS and feel awash in The Linux Revolution to Destroy Microsoft
and Other Evils of the World.
Microsoft is still around I hear. I've failed.
Manjaro on my hard drive makes it all worthwhile, though.
64 • Mint advantages (by M.Z. on 2016-01-26 02:09:30 GMT from North America)
@52
There are a number of big advantages that mint has over Ubuntu & similar distros & in my mind they include:
1) The best default configurations for average users right out of the box, including full multimedia capability by default & a UI that all Windows converts will fell productive with instantaneously regardless of which desktop you choose.
2) The best update manager in Linux, which includes the helpful rating based filtering mentioned in the article & quick/easy updates with the helpful & unobtrusive reminders mentioned by #60.
3) Outstanding management of multiple different software sources, including the quick & easy mirror selection tools mentioned in the review easier PPA handling tools than Ubuntu.
4) As #54 & others hint at the optional upgrades with the latest desktops & LibreOffice on a stable base is something you just don't get with Ubuntu. I suppose you could play with PPAs, but Mint seems to do an outstanding job of QA between their point releases, so I think its a far better option than an Ubuntu PPA setup or a non-LTS version of Ubuntu that has a higher risk of regressions.
5) Trustworthiness - Ubuntu have shown with their spyware fiasco in the Unity desktop that they put profit ahead of users & their privacy.
Frankly I don't really see any good reason to use Ubuntu over Mint. It's more work & risk to get results as good as Mint & again I don't trust Ubuntu & see no reason to use it while they still give users any download that defaults to giving any users spyware.
65 • Live Images (by Zork on 2016-01-26 02:50:40 GMT from Oceania)
I use Live Images to test whether a new distro will run on my old hardware and to see how much bloat/eye-candy the Distro contains...
There has been a general trend with the "Established" Distros to package ever more programs of which I have no need and pretty Desktop niceties which I don't see ( 99% of the time I'm looking at FF or LibreOffice and not the Desktop ) each release... None of which actually enhance my user experience...
Would really like to see Distros forget the "Release for the sake of a Release" mentality when there is no new content or functionality that hasn't been pushed as updates already...
If it wasn't for Bug/Security fixes I'd never bother upgrading my system...
66 • Android x-86 4.4.r4 Short Look (by Ben Myers on 2016-01-26 04:02:23 GMT from North America)
Installed Android x-86 4.4.r4 on a laptop this evening. Seems to be a pretty faithful port of Android 4.4 on top of a Linux kernel. Still has a strange quirk, though, when installed on a computer without the motion sensor common to phones and tablets. With your phone, if you rotate it 90 degrees, the screen orientation changes from portrait to landscape. With Android x-86, if you click the phone icon, it switches from the default landscape of an x86 computer to portrait. This was not too easy to use, and it is anything but intuitive to figure out how to get it to switch back again, so I gave up doing anything else. Seems to me it would be a handy setup option to ask the user whether or not the computer had some sort of motion sensor or if the user wanted to inhibit the switch from landscape to portrait.
67 • The Case For an LXDE edition of LinuxMint (by Nemrut on 2016-01-26 07:47:59 GMT from North America)
I often install Linux Mint's Xfce edition on old hardware for friends and acquaintances as Linux Mint's Xfce edition works fine on old hardware. However, an LXDE edition of Mint would work far more better.
Few weeks ago, this issue was raised here on this forum by a number of folks (including myself) appealing for an LXDE edition of Mint. Now, it would be really nice if some developers from Mint could drop a comment regarding our ongoing request in question.
Meanwhile, yes I'm aware of all those distros out there offering LXDE editions. But I, unfortunately, found none of them as reliable or properly maintained as Linux Mint is.
68 • @67 - Have you heard about Perpermint (by Stan on 2016-01-26 09:01:11 GMT from Europe)
http://distrowatch.com/table.php?distribution=peppermint
Peppermint uses LXDE, Mint tools and the same core base Ubuntu LTS 14.x
It is the perfect drop-in replacement of Linux Mint LXDE, why duplicate work and waste resources on what is already provided.
Search within Mint Forums and you will see that Linux Mint LXDE is pointless while Peppermint exists.
69 • Debian fanbois: Why people might prefer Mint (by Why should I? on 2016-01-26 10:02:00 GMT from Europe)
Anyone who can read (e.g. Jesse's review right on this page!) should understand by now why many people prefer Mint over Debian. It just works - right out of the box in most cases.
Of course, Debian (and Arch, Fedora, Gentoo, whatever... ) is perfectly stable and "just works" once you have set it up properly, installed all the software you actually want to use (esp. non-free stuff!) and configured everything to your liking. It seems that those who really like Debian and use it frequently don't realize anymore how much setup and configuration steps they perform when installing a fresh system (I'm talking desktop here - not server or such).
Mint shows that in most cases, I SHOULD NOT HAVE TO perform these steps - esp. if I am unsure of what I am doing.
And RE: Mint LXDE, I suggest that those who really want such an edition take it up on the Mint Forums - the Mint Team might not be willing to discuss this here, even if they are aware of these comments.
70 • Misc : friends computer and Mint + doc (are ther as good books for BSD as for Li (by dbrion1 on 2016-01-26 10:39:00 GMT from Europe)
"But I understand that's not going to be true everywhere. You simply have to try Mint yourself, and try the lightest version on a computer typical of your friends."
But my friends seem satisfied with Lubuntu / Mageia (I waited till their W$ broke to install ) . I doubt they will lend me their computers for other trials , as they have common sense :
Why should I try Mint on their computers I managed to have working (and I never will test Mint on my computers, as I already have 3.5 satisfying distributions (+ from scratch) for me : Mageia, FC -once installed- and Rapsbian ) . Mint did not teach me anything (Arch, I never installed, did....)
This leads to the point of documentation :
I believe reading, as long as eyes are not too old, is a more satisfying experience than distro(s)hopping. That makes documentation (I often advise Ubu 's one, though Ubu linux is not my favorite distro at all, because it can be very helpful ... for Rapsbian) an important point, more than their safety policy or the way they handle non-free software (may last longer).
GNU linux has a lot of very good books (just google search "Love Linux" or "Kerrisk Linux"), tutorials and howtos . Are ther simple inline books for BSD which is in th Q&A section?
71 • Live discs (by Thomas Mueller on 2016-01-26 11:01:03 GMT from North America)
I formerly used live CDs of Linux, FreeSBIE (live-CD version of FreeBSD, now discontinued) and OliveBSD (old live-CD version of OpenBSD, more recently LiveUSB-OpenBSD, now also outdated). Now I make some of my own Live USBs with NetBSD and FreeBSD: useful for editing partition table on hard disk, fixing a file system, and functional also for when application software including web browsers get messes up in an unsuccessful update. Also useful for backing up an OS installation as I have done successfully with NetBSD, and made it bootable.
I also sometimes use System Rescue CD written to USB stick, limited use; I can also build and run Rod Smith's gdisk with FreeBSD; that has been useful.
72 • Live Disks... (by Vukota on 2016-01-26 11:26:48 GMT from Europe)
Several of my computers don't have CD/DVD on them, so I try to stick with live USB sticks (despite having external USB DVD drive) and only of those distros that I can "burn" using plain old "dd" (which surprisingly not all distros support). I hate "live" USB sticks creators/burners as they are not reliable and don't work well on/with all distros and often have problems booting with (U)EFI boards which are now standard on any modern hardware.
73 • Mate is fine on old PCs (by session on 2016-01-26 15:11:05 GMT from North America)
Every time I give LXDE a shot on very old (pre-2000) hardware, I remember why I don't use it. Puppy Linux's JWM + Rox interface is more coherent and far snappier. Mate's window manager behaves lighter than Openbox (and Xfwm) as opaque move/resize movements are "rate limited" to consume far less CPU cycles...
74 • Reading vs. testing via a live disc or USB (by frodopogo on 2016-01-26 16:51:01 GMT from North America)
@70,
No doubt, reading can be an important part of finding the right distro. The review section of each distro's page here at Distrowatch gets a lot of attention from me. What the reviewer says definitely whets (or kills) my appetite for a hands-on test drive. Once in a great while, though, Jesse starts a review of a promising distro that I've heard about and...
it fails to boot, or crashes. or freezes!
He won't even give it a second chance on other hardware, which I wish he would, but he has a point- the crash or freeze sends a powerful statement about whether the distro is ready for public use.
And the same has happened to me... I download the distro, burn the ISO to a DVD or USB and (drumroll)..... NADA! RIEN! NIENTE! ABSOLUT NICHTS! And, truth be told... so far I haven't given them a second chance myself either!
I do however weight the occurrence depending on the hardware. When my main computer was an eMachines (cheap off-brand found at places like Wal-Mart and Best Buy), I didn't think a non-booting distro was nearly as big of a problem as when it won't boot on one of my current trio of Hewlett Packards, one of them business quality.
And a test can be done with a Live CD, Live DVD or Live USB, so you can do it without endangering the computers hard disk. So the risk is low, very low.... you could take the media to your friend's house next time you work on their computer, and ask if you could do a test that will take about 10 minutes, if that, and won't damage their computer....
Even if they currently have a distro they are happy with, you never know when a distro project will lose key people or support, and end operations. You also never know when a key software component will stop being maintained, sometimes because the distro project has to make a judgment that hardware that is 15 years old and isn't that common is only going to get less common, and it's a waste of programming resources to write drivers for it.
Anyway... for someone to write with strong opinions about a distro... and they haven't even actually run it on their computer (or possibly even haven't run it at all)...
Well, I sure hope no one takes their words about the distro seriously, because it amounts to baseless slander!
75 • Mint/Xfce (by beejay on 2016-01-26 18:07:34 GMT from North America)
Nice review and thank you. I currently run 17.3/KDE. I can report that Mint's new upgrade-in-place worked perfectly for me as I went from 17/KDE to 17.3/KDE. Not having to reinstall from an iso to get the upgrade was quite nice. One side-benefit is that 17.3 seems considerably more responsive than my earlier version. One caution: As always back up before you do this! Let me just sneak in a reference to antiX MX-15, 64-bit, which is as good an Xfce as I have seen. If you are looking it might be worth the comparison.
76 • @70 Once you have two distributions satisfying ... why go further? (by dbrion1 on 2016-01-26 18:32:56 GMT from Europe)
" reading can be an important part of finding the right distro."
My Holy Graal is not to find THE right distro, but understanding what is inside a given distro (google search "Robert Love Linux " or "Love Linux nutshell" :. I have known since 2006 (with Knoppix, Paldo Linux -compiled everything when needed, which was strange (and a bad choice on a life CD) ... and ... tens of others I forgot- Most of them worked... Then I used unetbootin with other tens (Prefered Scientific Linux) since 2009 I am very sorry, but I cannot remember them (but hope I can remember what is inside books)
" you never know when a distro project will lose key people or support, and end operations. You also never know when a key software component will stop being maintained, sometimes because the distro project has to make a judgment that hardware that is 15 years old and isn't that common is only going to get less common, and it's a waste of programming resources to write drivers for it."
Well , drivers for 15 years old stuff (and old PCs are not that old) have long been written : if a distribution gets rids of them, that may be
(a) because they/nobody cannot maintain them (maintain, not write)
or
(b) because there is not room enough on a life CD...
I was onec annoyed because FC was getting too difficult to install and Mageia {x, x<=4} was not satisfying for me : I just kept FC 21 and waited ... till FC23 **and** Mageia 5 arrived -both satisfy me ... and I can choose which one can satisfy some needs of friends of mine : disk rescue, not coming to an Internet Cafe with an USB stick filled with ...300 viruses : from theway my friend handle old PCs , I doubt they will be 15 yrs old).
BTW : both - FC since FC13 FC Electronic Lab respin, in 2010; Mageia inherited it from Mandriva- install the grub on the same USB xternal disk / USB stick : with FC, it was a default option at install (their installer can be terrible enough) with Mageia : one sometimes had to be **very** careful at the end of a tedious install to have the grub arriving at the right "disk"..
I do not have any opinions about Mint (which has been know fio years because of its fan boys : had non free software , as it is not based in the USA : sorry, that does not make it a deity ) ... but, from reviews I know they cannot offer me more (nor less : you see I am VERY kind) than I already have....
Every week, two new ditributions arrive, maybe some disappear : if my favourite oneS get bankrupt (and, for Mageia, Rosa should disappear , too...) I think I shall have time to choose.
OTOH : BSD seems to lack books describing how it works (and keeping being simple, with examples : Kerrisk's one is very nice, but for Linux).
77 • mint 12 (by Tim Dowd on 2016-01-26 18:48:37 GMT from North America)
@60
Thank you for your comment- this is what I was looking for. I'm sorry for my unclearness in the original post- I haven't used mint in like 3 years (since mint 12.) I wasn't clear.
You hit exactly what I was looking for, which was "how is Mint different than Ubuntu MATE." Like you said, I find them extremely similar with a few small differences.
@69
Please read my original post more carefully. I very clearly stated that I understand the need for a Debian derivative that works without any tweaking. My question was about why there needed to be both Mint and Ubuntu to fill that role.
If I could summarize the answers I got, they seem to add up to:
"I had a reason to switch from Ubuntu (technical or philosophical), and Mint has always worked the way I want it to and I like it." Given that a huge number of users agree and that means a robust and healthy community, that makes sense to me. I was looking for technical differences but I neglected community differences and also release model differences.
78 • Mint 17.3 - more great incremental improvements (by mikef90000 on 2016-01-26 22:05:01 GMT from North America)
Very puzzled about all of the Mint haters, especially about the synaptic mods. As an experienced Linux user I've come to view mass updates with trepidation - go slow is my motto. So the 'Mark All' button is missing, big deal. You can hit cntl-A and accomplish the same thing if you want to live dangerously.
I'm more of a 'function over form' guy, so I never got the big deal about some compiz features. In 17.3 you can smoothly switch between several window managers without the pain of researching manual configuration prerequisites. Wobbly windows work in virtualbox, interesting but not a 'must have'.
Not mentioned are a number of new features in xfce 4.12 like intelligent panel hiding, very nice. See more details here:
http://www.xfce.org/about/tour
79 • Installation (by Ken Eggerts on 2016-01-27 01:13:09 GMT from North America)
Tried to install Linux Mint on my Win.32 bit PC running Win.10 OS.Error came up "ACPI PCC PROBE FAILED"? I went ahead with the installation and the next message was "No detected operating systems on this computer".
The same thing happened with an Ubuntu system I had installed on this same PC when it was running Win.7 OS.
Are these Distros not compatable with Win.10 in a dual boot config.???
Any help with this would be much appreciated.
Thank You,
Ken
80 • Live images are pretty much obsolete (by Poet Nohit on 2016-01-27 01:51:04 GMT from North America)
I don't use "live" images because those don't really exist outside the realm of really niche distros. Ubuntu has long since abandoned the concept (in favor of the hybrid live/installer images).
81 • @80 - context of the poll (by Hoos on 2016-01-27 07:05:06 GMT from Asia)
Isn't the poll more about whether you run a distro live via CD/DVD image, and if so, for what purpose?
I doubt the poll distinguishes between whether the live image is a pure live-only or hybrid installable image.
82 • Quick_and_Clean_Tails_2.0 (by k on 2016-01-27 09:55:27 GMT from Europe)
After upgrading from 1.8.2, Tails 2.0 performs as promised by its developers, much thanks to them and TOR project developers. The upgrade has to be done manually, and user needs a 2nd USB flash drive for it, but the results are really worth the investments. Just follow the safe and excellent illustrated instructions at https://tails.boum.org/upgrade/index.en.html , and you will have back your upgraded USB flash drive with persistence, no errors no worries.
83 • @77 and 52: ubuntu doesn't cut it (by Why should I? on 2016-01-27 10:05:00 GMT from Europe)
Sorry if I misread your post.
Concerning ubuntu, my experience has been that "just works" is more of an unfulfilled promise/hype (Canonical IS good at marketing) than the real user experience. This is especially true since they decided to become more experimental (Unity, Mir, phone OS etc.) with very short support cycles - forcing users to change their system frequently.
Their hardware detection seems to be quite good, though, and ubuntu is probably the best known Linux distro to the general public (thus more likely to get software developed for it), so ubuntu LTS is probably quite a good base for a distro that actually fulfils their goal - such as Mint.
84 • Live images (by AsWas on 2016-01-27 11:57:57 GMT from Europe)
I use live installable hybrid iso from here; http://www.linuxinsider.com/story/83031.html
85 • Junkware in most Linux distributions !! (by Greg Zeng on 2016-01-27 13:39:25 GMT from Oceania)
About nine Comments seem to not know how to use Synaptic Update -- (@7 • Mint claudecat, @11 • Mint herold, @22 • LinuxMint Xfce re.No.7 Someguy, @26 • Mint and Synaptic Angel, @31 • Re: responses to Mint claudecat, 39 • @31 - Mint and apt-get; @36 synaptic Hoos, @42 • Live distros, Mint, and me. Arkanabar, @43 • Mints Synaptic Update luvr, @45 • Mint Jake, @78 • Mint 17.3 - more great incremental improvements mikef90000).
Many years ago here in DW comments, I explained that Mint and the Ubuntu-fans mistakenly include Braille, and strange foreign languages in their distributions. Nothing has changed.
The conservatives from last century (Pacman, Synaptic, Apt-get, etc) do not understand that the GUI has replaced hours of text studies.
The Synaptic coders do not understand anything about user-friendlines, nor good screen layout. Hence there are very many "replacements" being re-invented for Synaptic's poor design.
The developers of the lightweight distributions KNOW that the "FAMOUS-BRANDS" are loaded with junkware. In the Ubuntu-based distributions, it seems to me that only Peppermint & Watt-OS have removed Canonical's junkware properly.
86 • the long-term stability i also had not considered (by Tim Dowd on 2016-01-27 14:14:43 GMT from North America)
@ 83
That's ok- I was trying really hard to ask "what is good about Mint" in a way that wasn't going to start a flame war and I probably made it unclear. I really did want to know.
Your post and others tell me something else I didn't understand about Mint- that it's an attempt to balance the new-featured software with a stable base. I had not considered this. I'm currently pretty happy with Debian testing, but I usually jump back and forth between Ubuntu and Debian when something goes wrong- I will have to consider Mint in the future.
87 • @79 Mint and Windows 10 (by Ben Myers on 2016-01-27 14:37:31 GMT from North America)
Can't solve the problem of Mint and 32-bit Win 10 running in peace and harmony. Can give a little bit of background. But the pain-in-the-butt UEFI is one part of the problem. Microsoft is doing everything in its power to railroad people into using its Windows 10 surveillance-and-sales software. On systems with a UEFI/legacy BIOS, Win 10 changes the BIOS to set it to UEFI boot.
88 • windows 8/10 (by nolinuxguru on 2016-01-27 16:29:14 GMT from Europe)
@87 I had this problem with an ACER laptop with Windows8 which would not allow any linux install [couldn't even get a boot prompt], and I have read that Windows10 is worse. I usually by HP, but I would be interested to hear of other experience of RECENT computers.
89 • @88 UEFI is the culprit (by Ben Myers on 2016-01-27 19:03:30 GMT from North America)
UEFI is the culprit, and dual boot with Win 10 (or 8/8.1) is problematic with most brands sold in the last couple of years. Best one can hope for is to install Windows and still get it to boot after changing the BIOS setting to boot legacy instead of UEFI. I'm sure that someone somewhere will eventually come up with a not-too-complicated workaround. For now, the best solution is to invest in two hard drives and swap them back and forth, too complicated for most laptops (but some 15" and 17" "desktop replacements" have two hard drive bays), not too bad for a desktop with two drive bays.
And, y'know who pushed for the UEFI BIOS mess? Apple and Microsoft!
90 • Live Linux distros, and Linux Mint (by eco2geek on 2016-01-28 03:34:25 GMT from North America)
I've really enjoyed using live Linux media for years now. The first live distro I encountered was DemoLinux, which, if you're so inclined, you can still download and try. Its web page is still active at
www.demolinux.org
and you can download the ISO at Softpedia. It's of French origin and I think its last version came out in 2003.
Then Knoppix came along and I was hooked.
Mint is a class act. It comes the closest of any Linux distro I've seen to letting the average user control the OS through the use of GUI-based tools, rather than having to learn how to use the CLI. Assuming that the average user is more interested in getting things done with their computer than dinking around with the underlying OS, this is a good thing. (Personally, I like dinking around with the OS, but that's another story.) The only thing I haven't found a way to do using a GUI-based tool is to delete packages from the cache, post-installation, so they don't needlessly take up disk space. (Someone will probably point out a way to do that as soon as I post this.)
91 • #90 bleachbit(root) (by zykoda on 2016-01-28 07:24:14 GMT from Europe)
"The only thing I haven't found a way to do using a GUI-based tool is to delete packages from the cache, post-installation, so they don't needlessly take up disk space."
I thought "bleachbit" under root can do that..... when configured appropriately.
92 • Wher is THE average user? (by dbrion on 2016-01-28 08:09:20 GMT from Europe)
May be his skin color is zebra like (averaging apples and oranges can be funny, too). And I bet many users do not want to control THE OS -whatever the meaning- just listen / save som videos, browse the web ... (other prefer cross compiling for interesting, non PC HW : can that mess into an average?)
93 • Live Disk (by Ari Torres on 2016-01-28 08:52:07 GMT from North America)
I use them all the time just to check out the new distro's releases and for data recovery, as per Synaptic, wth is that?
no man, what's wrong with the terminal?
sudo apt-get update && sudo apt-get upgrade && sudo apt-get dist-upgrade && sudo apt-get autoremove && sudo apt-get autoclean all in one shot as copy and paste and that's it. I AM DONE! next time you want to do it just open the terminal and use the Arrow Up to repeat :)
94 • @89 UEFI (by greg on 2016-01-28 09:58:00 GMT from Europe)
UEFI=/= Secure boot. Linux was on of the first if not the first system to actually support UEFI. Secure boot is another matter.
95 • RE:Junkware in most Linux distributions !! (by Hungarix Suleiman on 2016-01-28 13:46:48 GMT from North America)
@85- Greg Zeng:
I feel truly empowered to read your outstanding comment.
What you had pointed out, is, indeed, such a seriously lingering shameful issue that i too and a number of other Linux users frustratingly talk about it often, both online and, face to face, myriad times.
Although comparing with mammoth language pack junkware you mentioned is a peanut; Ubuntu also carries lots of junk code for legacy hardware, such as floppy, parallel and serial ports peripherals and more.
Why does Ubuntu refuses to drop all that junkware code??
This is really strange!
It's no brainier!
Does anybody have a logical answer or an explanation for it??
Anyway regardless of what the answer might be, I have the feeling that if Ladislav or Jesse (or some other dudes with similar Linux credentials and respect they confer) were to name and shame Ubuntu (and its sidekick Mint) by bringing up and talk about this issue publicly, then, hopefully, Ubuntu will, finally, be forced to clean up its acts and therefore make, once again, Linux lighter and speedier.
96 • @89 switching between two hard drives (by Thomas Mueller on 2016-01-28 13:57:40 GMT from North America)
An easier way to switch between two SATA hard drives is to buy an external hard drive with eSATA. Only manufacturer I know that produces this is Micronet Fantom (micronet.com). You can also buy a hard drive enclosure with eSATA in addition to the more usual USB 2.0 or 3.0. My limited experience is that the computer/motherboard sees this as another SATA hard drive. You can boot into a boot menu that lets you choose between SATA hard drives and USB sticks that are connected.
97 • @95 (by Ari Torres on 2016-01-28 14:07:03 GMT from North America)
great comments, I myself have been praying that ubuntu return ti its senses
nothing appeals me more to a distro than a clean distro,rid of useless apps and features not needed for today's common computer world that is why I keep coming back to elementary os and it's beauty :) althou after each installation I clean it even more.
I wish Flash was Gone till then Here I Chrome!!! (Ari Torres)
98 • one user's bloat is another user's need (by Tim Dowd on 2016-01-28 15:18:43 GMT from North America)
@92 This is a great comment. I do think it's important that we recognize there is no average user. Even the "newbies" can't be averaged out- their reasons for coming to Linux might range from curiosity to learn it to having a specific hardware requirement (like a Raspberry Pi) to being sick of Windows, to wanting an older computer to keep working. Their experience level differs too- I've found that people that used MS-DOS in the 1980s are completely comfortable using a command line again.
As such, there's not ever going to be a universal "perfect" distro- not for newbies or anyone. The thing that seems to have mattered the most in my learning and getting things to work is the community. I'm really happy in the Debian/Ubuntu/Mint/Raspbian world because when I was learning, the Ubuntu forums and the helpfulness and friendliness there kept me going. Someone else who stumbled into Manjaro or Arch probably feels the same way about that world. When I needed a server that ran ZFS I found FreeBSD to be a helpful place to get going.
@85, @95, @97
The general purpose Linux distros are built to support as wide a range of people as possible. If you go to any university, there's probably old scientific equipment that interfaces with computers via serial or parallel. Any car repair shop or other dusty environment probably is still using a dot matrix printer. More importantly, most desktop computers sold to businesses even today contains serial and parallel ports. Just because you find this stuff useless doesn't mean people don't need the support- or that it's junkware.
I seriously doubt that this is slowing down your computers that much, but if you don't need it, and you are really bothered by it, this is why Gentoo exists.
99 • @98 (by jadecat09 on 2016-01-28 15:40:14 GMT from Europe)
And not to forget the growing retro market.
100 • @98, @99 (by James on 2016-01-28 20:05:27 GMT from North America)
@Tim Dowd:
[i]I seriously doubt that this is slowing down your computers that much, but if you don't need it, and you are really bothered by it, this is why Gentoo exists[/i]
I think there's a third way compromising solution in the form of simply checkmarking a box whether you want all that junkware (yes JUNKWARE) to be installed when you start installation.
The other solution (which i think might be even more popular) is to release 2 different versions of the distro;
1- The Fat Old Ubuntu
and
2- Forever Young Dynamic Ubuntu
101 • @98 @100 (by Diegox on 2016-01-28 20:58:43 GMT from North America)
As a rule, I normally just like to read and, almost, never bother to post comments here on this forum. However after I had read Tim Dowd's comment (#98) and response to it by commentator #100, I could not resist to break my above-stated rule in order to share this perfectly fitting BBC news article which I had just came across only few minutes ago.
It reports that the Barbie toy maker is adding "tall, curvy and petite body shapes to its line-up of the fashion dolls."
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-35432314
Let's hope this sets an example for Ubuntu, and, accordingly, code legacy-free light/fast, and all-in-one chunky distro(S) so as to accommodate everyone.
Enjoy :))
102 • bloat vs need (by M.Z. on 2016-01-28 23:26:52 GMT from North America)
@95 & 97
I have to second the comments of #98, what the hell are the mainstream Linux distros being discussed bloated compared to? The only other significant players in that space are other Unix clones like the BSDs & various lightweight Linux distros, & of course MS Windows. Of course only the light weight distros fit the bill you all seem to want, but they allready exist. If you want a light weight distro then chose one & stop complaining about the average distros, or chose something that lets you customize.
It's like saying 'your F-150 is big & fat, & I wish they made a version that was light & could accelerate faster, use less gas, & go around corners like a Focus ST hatchback'. Well that's what the other vehicle is there for, why the hell are you complaining when you already have the option? There are some minimal install disks available from some main stream desktop focused distso like PCLOS mini-me if you want something in between those two options & there are others like the afore mentioned Peppermint as well. Download one of them & go nuts, & stop all the inane complaints:
http://www.pclinuxos.com/get-pclinuxos/kde/#PCLOS%20mirrors
http://peppermintos.com/guide/downloading/
103 • Mint, PCLinuxOS (by anymouscoward on 2016-01-29 00:50:48 GMT from North America)
Does Mint still mess with the Firefox search engines? That always annoyed more than it should for some reason.
My complaint with PCLinuxOS and the other Mandrake/Mandriva descendents like Mageia is that their dependencies are a total clusterfuck. I took a look at the PCLOS Mate edition last month. Comes with OpenSSH which I don't use so I removed it. Surprise it takes GDM with it. But no biggie because then it defaults to XDM. What, what? Is their another DM behind door #3?
104 • @69, a Debian-fanboy.. (by Spacex on 2016-01-29 03:13:34 GMT from Europe)
"It seems that those who really like Debian and use it frequently don't realize anymore how much setup and configuration steps they perform when installing a fresh system (I'm talking desktop here - not server or such)."
==> It takes me 15-20 minutes to do a custom Debian netinstall, and set it up the way I want it. That's how much work it is...
Also, Debian provides ISO's with non-free included. And you get live-cd's with the desktop enviroment of your choice all configured. Just like Ubuntu or any other distro.
105 • Ubuntu has a minimal ISO image available as well (by eco2geek on 2016-01-29 03:39:08 GMT from North America)
There's an official Ubuntu "minimal ISO image" (Google it if you want to find it), similar to a Debian network install image, that contains only a text-based installer. That ISO is around 40 MB in size. If you think desktop *buntu (i.e. Ubuntu, Kubuntu, Xubuntu, etc.) is too "bloated," you can always go "roll your own."
106 • of Ubuntu, junkware, bloatware and robo-fans (a.k.a fanboys) (by R. Nicholson on 2016-01-29 08:16:20 GMT from North America)
@M.Z #102
And i wanna to second #:85, 95, 97,100 and 101 for their highly informative and insightful statements filled with nothing but hard to swallow bitter truth about increasingly bloated, slow and tragic state of Ubuntu, Debian that's LINUX.
Listen M.Z, no need for you to be angry, defensive and offensive to any of us, We are also linux fans and care about Linux as much as you do. Otherwise we wouldn't be on this forum. It's just that we have been frustrated since many years as Ubuntu and Debian people do not care to take feedbacks as they used to years ago.
We want Linux to return to its noble roots as an elegant, light, speedy and forward-looking alternative OS it was once upon a time.
That's all.
Peace!
107 • Bloatware workaround (by Stan on 2016-01-29 10:27:35 GMT from Europe)
So many complaints about bloatware... hopefully there are some DYI distros like Arch, Gentoo, LFS, Slackware. Use of of those, pull down what you need and move
Regular users won't ever notice the bloatware until they get to know the inner working of their systems.
108 • @104 Precisely my point! (by Why should I? on 2016-01-29 10:30:19 GMT from Europe)
So it takes YOU 15-20 min to do a "custom Debian netinstall" - and you obviously know exactly what you're doing. A newbie would probably take 3 to 4 times as long, provided they actually knew what a "custom netinstall" was and could figure out what they need and what they don't need etc.
Considering that you perform the same configuration steps each time and are by now so experienced that you only need 15 mins for the whole procedure, I think there is a VERY strong case for automating this for the average user - which those distros that are generally accepted as user-friendly (e.g. Mint) actually do.
Of course, if you don't see that the configuration steps are a (generally unnecessary) hassle, then - for you - there really is no need for anything other than Debian. But not every user thinks that way.
109 • netinstall debian (by peer on 2016-01-29 11:10:07 GMT from Europe)
The last time that I installed Debian (netinstall + lxde) it took me about 45 minutes.
I would not know how I could do this any faster.
110 • @109 (by Spacex on 2016-01-29 12:58:45 GMT from Europe)
But that's fine. It depends on the download speed you can get from the repos, and also, whether you are on ssd or a regular hdd. You shouldn't compare yourself to me, as I use a very minimal setup, a lot less packages. No DE, I really hate every DE there is :)
111 • @108 (by Spacex on 2016-01-29 13:20:18 GMT from Europe)
But the whole point of Linux is to do your own configs and personalize your system. If people just want something that works ootb, they might just as well use Windows. Or Ubuntu/LM. Which to me contradicts the whole purpose of open-source. No point unless you are going to take benefit from it.
Anyways, I have my own semi-official "distro" and live-cd, based on Debian, so I'm not having to do all that stuff anymore. It takes me app. 10 minutes to do a fresh install with everything included and configured. But it's still 99% stock Debian :)
There are several derivatives out there, which makes Debian accessible even for newbies and noobs..
112 • Purpose of open-source? (by frodopogo on 2016-01-29 15:33:09 GMT from North America)
@111 Spacex,
"But the whole point of Linux is to do your own configs and personalize your system. If people just want something that works ootb, they might just as well use Windows. Or Ubuntu/LM. Which to me contradicts the whole purpose of open-source. No point unless you are going to take benefit from it."
That's a possible purpose of open source... FOR YOU. I notice a tendency for a lot of Linux users to project their needs onto other users.
There may be as many potential purposes for open source as there are versions of Linux and BSD.
"they might as well use Windows."
Windows was designed broken, security-wise. And that brokenness creates a need for third party virus checker companies whose behaviour is almost as annoying as malware writers. Linux Mint "just works"... 99.9% of the time. And, it boots faster than Windows, and shuts down faster than Windows. None of that is trivial stuff. More peace of mind, less wasted time!
When I used DOS in 1991 to 1997, I edited autoexec.bat and config.sys files. I can't really see any benefit gained from that.... well, it does make using Terminal less intimidating when I need to use it every couple of years. But it's really picky kind of stuff.
But I like the Linux Mint default settings well enough I have little desire to mess with them. Why reinvent the wheel? More time to do other things.
113 • 2 arguments (by Tim Dowd on 2016-01-29 15:40:06 GMT from North America)
There's two completely opposite arguments going on currently and their juxtaposition shows why we have different Linux distributions and why complaining about "someone else's" is a waste of time.
Some people want Debian/Mint/Ubuntu to drop support for "legacy" hardware or offer an option to not support such. The problem of course is who gets to decide what is "legacy?" And how would you even put that option in a Mint or Ubuntu install? As far as I can tell you're discussing compiling separate kernels. Is a new user supposed to know what a kernel module is or be able to pick which ones they want? What if they have need for a serial port but not a parallel port or a floppy? Are we going to compile custom kernels for everyone? Note that Gentoo lets you do that... it's ready, well documented and waiting for you if that's what you want.
Others are complaining that Debian is too hard for new users to install because you have to tweak things, and there should be things that just work without custom configuration. This is the exact opposite argument. The way things "just work" is if they're set up to support everyone's hardware. That means some code that you're not going to use.
@102's comment is perfect to describe how silly these arguments are. We have different cars on the road because people need cars to do different things. Same with Linux and BSD. It's absurd to call Debian too complicated because those of us that know Debian can get a system exactly how we want it in about 20 minutes after a base install. But it's also absurd to call Ubuntu or Mint bloated because they're designed so that users don't have to make choices that they're not experienced with. Gentoo lets you compile a custom kernel with everything missing that you don't want. Slack or Arch or FreeBSD let you put things in one piece at a time. Some of these distros need users and talking about why they're awesome is much more productive than criticizing one that isn't meant for you.
114 • Whole point of Linux (by linuxista on 2016-01-29 15:47:18 GMT from North America)
@111 says: "But the whole point of Linux is to do your own configs and personalize your system. If people just want something that works ootb, they might just as well use Windows."
I also have to disagree. That's only one point of GNU/Linux, and if that were the whole point I wouldn't be using it. I also have to vehemently disagree with the statement that if you want something that works ootb, you might as well use Windows. Lord have mercy, that's so far from my experience. For me Linux is the OS that works ootb and is like driving a lean and mean sports car vs. the diesel dumptruck experience of Windows. And though I use Arch and Manjaro, even Ubuntu is still very streamlined and hassle/virus/spyware free relative to Windows.
115 • @104 - Debian non-free live cd iso (by Hoos on 2016-01-29 16:40:48 GMT from Asia)
"...Also, Debian provides ISO's with non-free included. And you get live-cd's with the desktop enviroment of your choice all configured...."
Yes, I know. That's what I downloaded to try - the Debian non-free live-cd MATE version of Jessie (see post 39 above). Sound did not work OOTB, and IIRC there were a few other problems.
In contrast, Debian derivatives MX14, MX15, SolydX, even Bunsenlabs RC1 - didn't have that issue.
The difference is that little bit of extra spit and polish that those developers put on the Debian base, which saves time for me.
You are more knowledgeable than I am, so you probably don't need or want that, but I certainly appreciate it.
Different strokes - or distros - for different folks.
116 • Mint & the 'point of Linux' (by M.Z. on 2016-01-29 18:54:26 GMT from North America)
@103 - Mint search
All that you need to know about Mint search in Firefox is that it still works the exact same way it always works with Firefox, which is to say someone gets some money for ad clicks after you search & you can easily change the default search the same exact way as all other versions of Firefox. There is some minor redirect of money involved & Mint may change the default search engines between releases, but it's the exact same process you get with vanilla Firefox, only the money goes to Mint which is a smaller project than Mozilla & could use the support more. I always switch the default search to Duckduckgo & have installed other search engines in the past without noticing a single difference from regular Firefox, so I don't understand what there is to dislike.
@106
I just don't get it, why not download a smaller more targeted version instead of complaining? It makes no rational sense to complain about distro A being fat when there are hundreds of other options even after you look at distros B through Z.
@113
Very well put.
@108 -'point of Linux'
As other have well pointed out claiming that there is one particular 'point of Linux' is kind of absurd. There is only one real universal point of Linux & that is to provide a quality free & open source OS, full stop. All the other individual reasons for Linux are entirely subjective & based on the preferences of Distro makers. Of course if there is a point in the GPL license of Linux its to allow all those contradictory versions of Linux to coexist happily by letting people do whatever they want with Linux so long as they let they next person do the same.
That point of the GPL is why things like Gentoo & Mint coexist, precisely because the GPL ensures that the point of Linux is what you make of it. If you want complex & heavily customizable you chose Gentoo, it you want dead simple & ready to go for most users you chose Mint. Want a super light desktop? Download something with openbox. Want a convoluted DE that tries to reinvent the wheel for no reason? Pick a distro with Gnome 3. And of course there is KDE for those that like something feature rich & highly customizable along with dozens of other DEs, & there are literally hundreds of different takes on how to package these DEs or even if they are needed & what the goals of a particular Linux Distro should be. Its a free & open OS that can do whatever people want it to do, be that easy & familiar or more complex, that is the point of Linux.
117 • @111 - Are you serious? (by Ben Myers on 2016-01-30 00:14:27 GMT from North America)
"But the whole point of Linux is to do your own configs and personalize your system. If people just want something that works ootb, they might just as well use Windows. Or Ubuntu/LM. Which to me contradicts the whole purpose of open-source. No point unless you are going to take benefit from it."
First, I benefit from open source by using whatever Linux distros I please out of the box, all set up very nicely by the development teams responsible for this. And I am thankful to Mint, Ubuntu, Fedora, the numerous system recovery and maintenance distros, the several open source firewall, and numeros other distro teams. They do great work (even if I am critical of some now and then), something I will never be able to match.
The assertion quoted above implies that everyone else, just like the person who stated it, has a lot of time on his or her hands, plus the motivation and the know-how to dig into the details. I do not know about anybody else, but I have a limited time left on this earth, and I have prioritized how I spend my time. Hint: It does not include doing my own configs and personalizing my system.
118 • 8 • Live Disks -- other by Andy Figueroa. (Mint iSheep are happy). (by Greg Zeng on 2016-01-30 00:43:35 GMT from Oceania)
> "Note: I think a live disk that is guaranteed to not run is actually a dead disk. I've never experienced that. (Ref: comment by Greg Zeng)"
Watching these Dw-Comments very carefully, for the last year, I'm looking for others who have enormous trouble with Mint installations. MINT (top ranking, according to Dw) does not offer a Live Disk. It does not dare to. Otherwise you would know that it is really a dead disk.
"Mint" is mentioned 220 times in this Dw Comments, until my comment here. Mint used to be installable on my popular Dell notebook (Intel i7 CPU, instead of AMD; 16gb DDR3 memory; both standard spinning HDD & popular SSD on board; standard bios; standard IO ports. Last few years: not installable, by deliberate mal-design, either by UEFI older BIOS methods. Practically every other Linux distribution can install, easily & reliably on my Dell XPS-15 L521x notebook, with all updated BIOS.
Not until @21, do I know the truth about Mint: " Clement is aware of this issue with the 7xxx chip sets and the recommended driver." @24: "the Nvidia bug which causes Cinnamon to crash with the 304.xx driver install"
iSheep hate Ubuntu & those distributions based on Ubuntu. Except Mint, the other Ubuntu derivative.
Why? IMHO, iSheep follow fashion. It does not matter if fashion does not offer Live Disks. It does not matter if fashion does not work. Hooray for Fashion & its iSheep.
119 • Mint live CD (by M.Z. on 2016-01-30 02:44:04 GMT from North America)
@118
"MINT (top ranking, according to Dw) does not offer a Live Disk."
I just booted into an old Mint 17 live disk, somehow. Also of note from the weeks DW:
"The Xfce edition of Linux Mint is available as a 1.4GB download. Booting from the media quickly brings up the Xfce desktop environment. "
Does this not imply a live disk? I'm also fairly certain that some if not most of the multitudes of reviews of Mint that are linked to on the DW page will mention the live disk comes up by default, but feel free to poke around & prove me wrong:
http://distrowatch.com/table.php?distribution=mint
If you can't even get the basics right why would anyone believe the rest of your arguments?
120 • Frustrated with dwendling 32-bit support (by RollMeAway on 2016-01-30 03:44:45 GMT from North America)
I believe a poll, here on distrowatch, a few weeks ago, showed about half of visitors still use 32-bit computers. A smaller percentage use ONLY 32-bit, but I am one of those.
OpenSUSE has quit supporting 32-bit without announcing it. I had -current and still have tumbleweed installations, but the missing packages make them unusable now.
At least Fedora has announced they quit, so I won't waste my time there.
A big surprise this week was Zenwalk ! The distrowatch info page states Zenwalk supports i486 and i686 only. Now the new release is ONLY 64-bit and is focused on "desktops have to be able to be synced with smart phones." Obviously the old developers have been replaced.
What about all those old computer that ran XP (many still do).
Trash them all, along with the 12 or so I maintain.
In fact, trash all the computers ! All you need is a smart phone !
121 • @118 Live Mint (by Ben Myers on 2016-01-30 03:54:33 GMT from North America)
Are talking issues with semantics here?
I have a flash stick set up with YUMI. It has 3 different flavors of Mint 17.3 ISOs: 64-bit Cinnamon, 64-bit Mate and 32-bit Cinnamon. The flash stick has other bootable ISOs on it, too, but that is beside the point. My point is that I can boot up and run any of these three Mint distros on any compatible computer. And I do, regularly, as one of my quick tests to see if an otherwise unwanted computer here is in almost-good working order. From booting Mint live, I can also install it on the hard drive of a computer. And I do. With all my use of Mint, I have had no problem whatsoever using it. Same with previous Mint distros.
So what is the problem? What is a so-called dead disk? I dunno. My copies of Mint downloaded from the web site work just fine. Is the problem a desktop other than Cinnamon or Mate? Is the hardware used to boot Mint in good working order? What are the factual reasons for these allegations about Mint?
It's better for all of us if one sticks to the facts, rather than simply opinions not reinforced by the facts.
122 • #8, #118 Live mint (by zykoda on 2016-01-30 08:15:44 GMT from Europe)
I find Mint isos default to live boot. For me, booting problems began with the introduction of cinnamon and Gnome 3. At Mint 13 Removal of the ubiquity sildeshow before installation was necessary for installation to complete successfully. The problems are now rectified with Mint 17.3, except for the GeForce 7xxx chipsets which I noted in #21. I have not ever used Dell hardware since it is reported to have some non-standard proprietary features with lock-in. I have a good mix of 20 desktop machines from the 1995 to 2012 all of which can be persuaded to boot and successfully install a linux distro. For comparison Mac OS X, MS Windows or Unix flavours are not nearly so versatile on raw metal.
123 • Away_with_words_and_egos... (by k on 2016-01-30 11:57:24 GMT from Europe)
@120 • Frustrated with dw(i)ndling 32-bit support by RollMeAway
... instead trust and truth:
Using Distrowatch's Search by Distribution Criteria (Simple Search Form) and simply selecting "Old Computers" from pull-down menu of Distribution category listed names and summaries of 21 active distros, including the really well resourced, fast and secure antiX "MX-15 (code name Fusion) based on...Debian Jessie (8.2)", running live off a flash drive, used to post this comment with the Tor project's latest and EFF/Panopticlick-validated browser.
Not sure why Tails was not listed but, anyway, we have so many really fine options for old computers and, if you need something more or different, certainly plenty of readily accessible resources, expertise and advise, enabling anyone with such need and motivation to innovate their own.
124 • isheep???? (by frodopogo on 2016-01-30 14:59:27 GMT from North America)
I don't own a single Apple device, never have owned one, and suddenly, because I use Linux Mint, I'm an isheep????
Give me a break! You're stretching pretty far there!
While Mint may be popular enough now to have a FEW fanbois, I don't think I'm one of them.
And I wouldn't call it trendy.
If I had a computer that wouldn't run Mint, but would run Ubuntu, why yes, I'd run a flavor of Ubuntu.... probably not the main edition with Unity, though. While the variety of Linux distros can be confusing for a noob, it does have that advantage that you nearly always have other options.
I'm sorry for your problem with Mint, and I admit it's not PERFECT, but it's run fine for me on five computers so far. No failures. And it must run fine for most users. But occasionally people DO show up in the Mint Forums with hardware problems... some get solutions, some don't.
125 • There is a distinction between being user-friendly and installer-friendly (by dbrion on 2016-01-30 16:05:09 GMT from Europe)
Many times, users and installers are not the same person (I doubt a full install of W$ would be that comfortable). I install sometimes GNUlinuxen for friends of mine, and I tell them there nothing else to install, once they are satisfyed (else, they ask me for). As some of them cannot read, it was the wisest way I found. If I could find netbooks with GNUlinux configured according to my wishse, I would buy it (I.E : vim + Arduino+ cross compilers for nice electronic cards) as life is too short to worry with already made wheels. http://www.ordissimo.com/fr/ is a PC+debian meant for old people (and more expensive than the Windows + same HW). Debian is preinstalled, without users being given (not even sold) root access -> therefore, installer/maintainers do not suffer that much.... This solution did not go bankrupt.
126 • Deepin 15.1 (by Wwas on 2016-01-30 16:25:45 GMT from North America)
Lately Deepin is only releasing installable isos. Would you guys like to have a live installable deepin iso?
127 • 32bit (by Tim Dowd on 2016-01-30 20:42:21 GMT from North America)
@120
I hear your pain. I understand that computers get obsolete as technology advances, but until about last year, my 32 bit computers did fine as daily drivers with use of office software and the www. As far as I can tell, no content improvements have happened on the web to justify me switching my machines, but every site from newspapers to blogs have started using obnoxious advertisements that crash the browser on an older computer. Thus I gave up, and I suspect many others did too, which is why support is being withdrawn (if the users are going, why support it?)
That makes me angry because it's such a waste of precious minerals and resources to constantly need to update things for such a stupid reason as "now my newspaper article has to come with an interactive advertisement with sound and Flash that I have to hope my speakers are off for."
One box became a file server, and the other the cat spilled a soda on, so now my desktops are 64 bit only.
The only truly ancient computer I run is my 2002 iMac G4, with NetBSD. A trick to keep such an elderly device useful is to use its X-server to access a home server over ssh. The results are pretty acceptable. The iMac sits on my counter and displays recipes as I cook and if I need the web I ssh to my home server and open Google Chrome.
128 • Goodbye 32 bit! (by Poodles on 2016-01-31 08:01:12 GMT from North America)
It is time to dump those 32 bit computers at the recycling center and start a new collection of 64 bit computers.
129 • @79 Mint, #104 Debian and live distros. (by imnotrich on 2016-01-31 08:40:37 GMT from North America)
@79 When I did my in-place upgrade from Mint 17.1 to 17.2, I started getting the "ACPI PCC PROBE FAILED" error too. I also started having intermittent sound problems (sometimes days it worked, some days not) that were not related to the hardware because this was a dual boot Windows 10 and Mint machine so I know the sound card was ok.
Remembering that Mint doesn't screw with your kernel version when you upgrade so I took a chance and upgraded to 4.2. The ACPI error message disappeared. I still have sound issues, but now it's garbled audio using SFLphone. I'm still tracking that down - it might be by VOIP provider's fault.
Also - Mint's version of Grub doesn't see my Windows 10 install even after several update-grubs. But my W10 install is still there, it's just mislabeled in the Grub menu as Windows 7 recovery partition.
@104 wrote, " It takes me 15-20 minutes to do a custom Debian netinstall, and set it up the way I want it. That's how much work it is..."
Basura. Even if you have 1TB of download speeds, an SATA3 SSD and type over 100wpm there is no way possible a Debian install can be completed this quickly. My experience with Debian goes back to version 5. I've never seen a net install of the base system in less than 2 hours, and then it takes weeks of fighting with CUPS, HPLIP, scanning, setting up network printing, pulse issues/sound, acroread, fonts, proprietary NVIDIA drivers (because the open source drivers are not compatible with NVIDIA), firewalls, and tracking down programs like armory, bfgminer, cgminer,flash, java, and other stuff that is not supported in the debian repos. In some cases that means installing .debs or PPA's intended for Mint or Ubuntu and yes I know that can be a little reckless but Debian's repos are not all they're cracked up to be.
Plus I have yet to see a version of Debian that has stable support for wifi either so forget about using Debian on your laptop. Trying to get wifi to work alone can take a week or two, and on most hardware I've attempted wifi and Debian were a lost cause.
Debian kinda screwed the pooch for me when they abandoned Gnome 2, now there are no decent DE's in Debian's repos.
I'm not saying that Debian isn't worth the effort, like LFS and other distros Debian is a very instructive, educating Linux experience but it's NOT really designed/intended for people who need to get actual work done on their computer. No, Debian is more a hobbyist's distro for people who have endless hours to experiment with everything until they can get it to work.
I use live distros, mostly Puppy for troubleshooting systems, data recovery, and partitioning/virus scanning etc.
However, for the legal scholars on this board my Mint install is on an SSD. With 16gb of RAM and an OS running on an SSD would that be considered a live distro? There is no spinning HDD. LOL.
130 • @129 A lively distro? (by Ben Myers on 2016-01-31 13:56:26 GMT from North America)
Mint on an SSD is not a live distro. It is a lively distro. I have it installed on a Lenovo Thinkpad with an SSD and on an old and large 3.5" SSD that moves around from system to system to motherboard to motherboard. Definitely lively. Boots up in less than 30 sec.
131 • 32 bit vs. 64 bit (by frodopogo on 2016-01-31 19:30:42 GMT from North America)
I sympathize with the desire to keep old hardware going. But at some point a major new feature will become dominant, and the fact that it's major means it pushes the previous generation technology to obsolescence MUCH harder.
Computers were once 16 bit (XP- anything else?). At some point, they were put out to pasture. They day had to come eventually for 32 bit too.
Someone gave me three HP computers a year ago December. One was 32 bit, a top of the line computer from about 2004. 2 gHz speed, and the BIOS would autodetect just about any drive. The chassis was a thing of beauty inside. I was sorely tempted to keep it, but then I would have had four HP computers, and that's a bit much for my level of interest. A neighbor got his computer stolen, and he was happy to have it, probably as an interim solution. Off it went.
132 • Live CD to evaluate Window Managers (by discord on 2016-01-31 20:27:43 GMT from North America)
I'd like to evaluate multiple window managers, to decide if I want to switch from my current. However, I feel it would be easier to make this evaluation from a live cd that provided multiple managers out of the box. I'm mostly interested in trying out tiling managers, but would also not mind seeing others also. Has anybody made a distro or live dvd/cd with multiple tilinig managers to select from? Seems like this would make a great live dvd/cd, and I'd be shocked if there isn't already such a project.
133 • #132 mutiple WMs live cd (by denethor on 2016-01-31 21:07:35 GMT from Europe)
http://linuxbbq.org/cream.html
the best there is out there....
134 • recycling? (by Tim Dowd on 2016-01-31 22:41:11 GMT from North America)
@128, the problem with your comment is that you think we actually "recycle" computers. We actually send them to a dump in Ghana called Agbogbloshie where they poison kids with crude open burning and dangerous mineral extractions that are banned completely in the west. There's another place in china called Guiyu that's similar. If you do a google search you'll see heartbreaking pictures.
At the same time all the tantalum we need for the capacitors in new products gets mined by rebels in Congo that employ slave labor to get it.
Last and least, western consumers loose thousands of dollars a year because the tech industry depends on making the old thing not work right so that we buy the new thing. First time users of Linux are shocked when a computer that's been taking 20 minutes to load a web page under Windows starts right up and works like new again with Linux. That's not an accident. Computers that are still fine machines regularly get thrown away because they're no longer making Microsoft, HP, and Dell any money.
So it's easy to be flippant about "get a new computer," but those of us who try not to as much as possible have some really good reasons to keep our old tech alive. I'm not pollyanna that time marches on and that some things are too obsolete to be useful. I'm not trying to play 3D games on my ten year old computers. But what in the past year has changed about how we view the web, other than obnoxious flash-based ads? It's a really dumb reason to have to move on and it's fair to be pissy about it.
Number of Comments: 134
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Subgraph OS was a Debian-based Linux distribution which provides several security, anonymous web browsing and hardening features. Subgraph OS uses a hardened Linux kernel, application firewall to block specific executables from accessing the network and forces all Internet traffic through the Tor network. The distribution's file manager features tools to remove meta-data from files and integrates with the OnionShare file sharing application. The Icedove e-mail client was set up to automatically work with Enigmail for encrypting e-mails.
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