wait Mint was (and still is) out of date?
The kernel is too old for newer AMD gpu drivers to work, but switching to a newer kernel isn’t too hard. I had to when I built a new computer last winter, but I have also used various *nixes for a good long time.
Knowing how to discover you need a newer kernel is a bit tough for recent convert, though.
I wouldn’t call switching kernels that hard. It takes a few clicks and a reboot to do. However, they kicker is that you need to know to do that. You don’t know what you don’t know.
Exactly. As far as Linux has come in terms of ease of desktop use and hardware compatibility, there is still a barrier in knowing how to know which flavor is right for you and, almost more importantly, why that flavor is right.
Because it is stable and works really well. It has GUI apps that are not only not broken but well designed and snappy.
Ubuntu has a lot of “snappy” GUI apps as well…
Laughs in Debian Stable
I think the onboarding and new user experience for Mint could be better, but I think there’s one important thing that I think makes Mint a good intro distro: Its Ubuntu base.
If you look up guides for “linux” it usually gives instructions for Ubuntu, which usually also apply to Mint. Likewise, if you look for software downloads you tend to find Ubuntu debs.
I know flatpak fixes these issues to an extent, but I think we’re not there yet.
I wish it shipped a newer kernel
They have a fairly new version called Edge that ships with a newer kernel (currently 6.5).
IDK, I use Debian sid
Isn’t red hat enough reason to not use fedora?
No, for one Red hat has every incentive to support Fedora. Also Fedora does its own thing separate from Red hat. Red hat does have some control but the community elects leadership and the elected leaders are what control the project direction. Also Fedora has a lot of volunteer package maintainers that would stop working if there was a hostile take over.
Notice that the community has left Ubuntu which used to be the community go to. They no longer have a large community working on projects and maintaining software.
thanks for the clarification. I just recently got into linux and don’t know much, but as i was researching Fedora, that’s what i came across. Which is a pretty big turn off for a newcomer migrating from windows and wanting to get away from big corporations.
The short answer is no, most people are not bothered at all by RHEL’s source situation or IBM as a company.
Not really. Fedora is community run.
As someone who daily drives Mint, wut.
I never recommend Mint! It’s like it became this de facto distro to steer newbies toward just because it sort of kind of looks like Windows? Elementary OS is simple, polished, elegant and in a good way less customizable so the user can just get to work.
Alternatively if they want something more familiar like the start menu there’s KDE on Ubuntu or OpenSUSE, among others.
Mint was impressive like fifteen years ago; it’s still fine, but nothing in particular makes it more appealing than some of the ones I mentioned which have significant advantages.
Linux Mint has a very good track record thanks to their “If it ain’t broken, don’t fix it” mentality and user friendliness. That’s why people still recommend it. With the rapid developments around gaming related software, their mentality works against them.
I’m not sure but, I always recommended Mitm for it’s ease of use, I tried fedora, didn’t like it, will likely never use it again. First impressions are a pain cause if you fail the first impression you lose before you begin. It could be an amazing system but, it was a bigger pain to setup and get going plus had less resources for me to get started while using more lesser known tools that wern’t easily transferrable from the previous systems I has tried.
Why did you post a drawing of a child? Kinda weird
What do you mean? She’s 32000 years old. /s
Linux user moment
What problems?
outdated mesa, monitor scaling, cinnamon in general being outdated
What features were lacking from mesa or Cinnamon generally?
I have 4k 1440, 1080 monitor (120hz or higher) on Mint edge, what would I gain from switch to somethibg else?
Cinnamons compositor doesn’t turn off for games (it’s supposed to but has been bugged for years) which costs you fps.
Playing Alan Wake 2 at launch was only possible with the latest Mesa drivers compiled from the AUR due to some graphics features that it required.
It doesn’t just cost FPS. It straight up breaks some games that run fine on other distros.
Does it still have that feature that kills and restarts cinnamon when memory leaks start getting to be too much? I honestly had to laugh at that when that was introduced.
No clue. Haven’t used it in years. I was done when I went looking for a fix for the compositor thing and found a years-old open bug report.
I assume compiling Mesa is rather difficult to set up? For reference I’ve not bothered to try and compile Lutris or Wine.
With AUR it’s as easy as installing any other package, actually.
You just install the git version from AUR.
plasma has wayland support, tons of customizability, better multi monitor support, a great suite of applications including a text editor with lsp support and much more, and in general looks nicer. cinnamon is sort of the bare minimum
better multi monitor support
I run a 3x1 setup and KDE didn’t handle it any better than Cinnamon did.
Wayland support is coming to Mint. You can actually use it on 21.3 right now but it is unstable.
Rest of what you said is opinion.
Does that include support for variable refresh rate with multiple monitor (Freesync in my case).
Yes
mesa is outdated by default, not supporting rx 7000 cards unless you use the edge iso.
If you have new hardware, why wouldn’t you use the Edge ISO?
It’s because Mint used to be Ubuntu without the fuss. Now Ubuntu is Ubuntu without the fuss and mint is Ubuntu with broken packages.
The funny part is that Mint was always just Ubuntu with broken packages.
Now Ubuntu is Ubuntu without the fuss
Ubuntu is a trojan horse for Snap.
What packages are broken? I haven’t run into any.
P.S. I think Snaps are now the fuss, so I still think Mint is Ubuntu with the fuss.
Idk I never really liked mint it seemed too ui polished without much back end polish.
For some reason its the goto for noobs maybe since it comes with a desktop already bundled with no extra config needed usually. But theres so many distros that have that now as well as up to date packages.
Older packages, but not too old, generally provide better stability. Problems can also come from packages being too new and not having all the standout issues worked out of them.
around 1 year and a half, thats way too long, considering the Pipewire, OBS, Kernel, Gaming and other drivers updates. Not even mentioning all the updates KDE and Gnome just got in the last 3 months.
stay away from debían stable or slackware then…
I generally would for desktop use, and absolutely wouldn’t rexommend them for a new user.
Newer kernels are available, they even have a gui for it. Why would a Cinnamon user care about KDE or GNOME updates? (Some of which are broken on Fedora, like rdp login)
Mint Debian can run 6.7 right now.
And I’m on 6.5 right now running the Mint Edge ISO edition on Mint 21.3
Older packages, but not too old, generally provide better stability.
And worse compatibility. Old packages are a no go for upstream supported hardware like Intel’s and AMD’s.
I like the mint project, but I dislike how it’s done
I don’t suggest mint to anyone anymore. A rather suggest Fedora or PopOs
I tried PopOS and the pop store is not the best, and gnome is too foreign for someone coming from windows.
And also, too fiddly to make it work with a number of third party extensions vs the customization being built in.
KDE is heavier but also seems more streamlined and Cinnamon is fairly decent too.
I think Gnome VS KDE it’s just a POV
Your argument makes sense that KDE and Cinnamon can be welcoming to Windows users. However I can argue that it can also make these newcomers to keep a “windows-like” mindset and that can be frustrating.
If a newcomer comes to Gnome, due to it’s totally different paradigm, it may induce this newcomer to have an open mind and, therefore, be more welcoming to linux experience.
I don’t think one argument or the other is right or wrong. I think both arguments are valid and that’s just a different perspective. I, personally, think that a totally new paradigm is good to newcomers, but be free to disagree, since you understand that there is no right or wrong regarding this topic
PopOS! and Endeavor are my two recommendations for newbies. The former for fresh to Linux folks and the latter for those with some experience.
I don’t recommend PopOS! because I think the Gnome UI is confusing to people who have only used Windows before.
