Review: Linux Mint 5 - KDE Edition (Page 1 of 1)
Written by
Steve Lake
Posted on: Sep 22, 2008 at 01:41pm
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Ever since I first ran into Linux Mint over a year ago, I've been enamored by it's elegant simplicity, rock solid stability, good hardware support, and excellent user experience. This distribution has continued to impress me time and again, and has really become my number one recommended distro, actually displacing PcLinuxOS in the top slot, for favorite new user friendly distributions. Up until now, Linux Mint has done nothing but go up, and up, and up. But as with anything that goes up, eventually it must come down. So, does Mint continue to impress with it's new KDE version, or does it start the slow and gradual treck back down? (note, Mint 5 standard got glowing reviews, so it shouldn't be too hard for the KDE edition, right? Maybe. Read on to see.)
Live CD
Initial bootup of the LiveCD was pretty standard, with all elements booting as they should. The system booted to the desktop fairly quickly and gave me a desktop that looked beautiful and ran well. The first time I tested it out I got a weird video error (that was a hardware fault on my end) and ended up with a blaze orange desktop. The kind that will burn your eyeballs out of your skull. That was nothing that was the fault of Mint obviously, but ultimately turned out to be my hardware. It did scare me though, as I thought for a bit that Mint KDE had gone to the dark side of pain or something. 
But once on the desktop I found that not much has changed since Mint 4 KDE appearance wise. Mint 5 KDE has as usual a beautiful selection of preinstalled software ready to use in the LiveCD, including Gimp, Inkscape, Thunderbird, Firefox, Scribus, Open Office, Krusader, Mplayer and many others. So every major important KDE and Linux app is there and ready for you to use. The menu hasn't changed from the previous KDE version either, but there does appear to be more tools for those who enjoy using Compiz for 3d effects. Don't expect to get Compiz working until you install the system, becuase for some reason, Compiz hates LiveCD environments.
Speed and performance were very good for the entire LiveCD experience. It had a few loading lags, but nothing terribly bad, just normal stuff. Stability was good and the system did a great job with everything it needed to do. So, other than the initial scare due to a hardware glitch on my end (bad video card), the whole system ran perfect, and did just as good as its Metacity based cousin. But that doesn't mean there weren't a few surprises. The first came in the way the LiveCD handled network shares. I've never seen any Linux distribution up to this point actually detect a network share on my network before and add the icon for it on the desktop.
Mint 5 KDE did. So if I wanted to jump on my samba share, all I needed to do was double click and away I went. That's a nice little added feature, especially for new users unfamiliar with how to get at such shares in a Linux or KDE environment. Also, for those of you who don't like the default Mint "Tasty" menu, the traditional KDE menu is still there and usable. So you can change if you want.
Installation
There's not a whole lot to say about the installation. It was as simple as clicking on the icon on the desktop, answering several questions, and then letting the install do its work. It takes about fifteen minutes to half an hour for it to complete the install, and then after that you can either reboot, or continue using the LiveCD. The whole install process was so painless that there's not a lot to talk about.
Exploring the System
Linux Mint 5 KDE Edition uses the Linux 2.6.24-19 kernel, a newer Linux kernel known for great improvements in power management. That's a nice thing to see. The version of KDE it comes with is 3.5.9 which, even though it's not the latest, is still a great version in the KDE 3.5.x line. Upon booting the installed system, you're greeted with the traditional 3 login options, which is the normal Mint boot, safe mode, and memtest. The system boots up to the login prompt through some very nice eyecandy in the bootup screen and into a very nice looking login screen. The other thing I noticed was that loading times are quite a bit faster with Mint 5 KDE than they ever were with 4. The improvement is such that the speed improvements allow for better than double the previous bootup speed.
From this point everything is pretty much the same as on the LiveCD. The one advantage though with the installed system over the livecd is that Compiz will work here, and it works good. The only catch is that you need to install the proprietary drivers for your video card first, as that's required in order to get Compiz working. One thing you may notice when you first get the system installed is that Mint needs 123 (117 initial + 5 additional) updates right away. That's a lot of updates for something that's just been freshly installed (and recently released). A lot of them seem to be upstream Ubuntu application and core system updates, but nothing that I wouldn't advise against installing.
It'll take you about four minutes to download the updates and half an hour to install them. Once you get all of the updates installed, you should find a few more features available to you. They're not major features, but rather more like tweaks to a lot of smaller ones.
One thing that didn't really show up properly until the installed version was the battery and power management. Mint 5 KDE has a new power management taskbar tool that is different from the old Kpower, and it seems to handle power management better, even though it couldn't seem to detect my processor speed for some reason. Oddly enough, Kpower, the one tool that gave me good power management before is gone. And while the new tool does seem to offer better power performance, it leaves something to be desired in comparison to Kpower. The system also detected and properly installed my video card and wireless drivers, although for some reason it couldn't initialize them, and thus I was left to hacking in the old driver in order to make them work. Not surprising given the wireless card I'm using, but I was at least hoping for a bit more progress in the wireless front.
Conclusion
Overall, I liked Mint 5 KDE, especially with the added speed and upgraded default non-compiz eyecandy. It's good and stable, and works well with everything I could throw at it from a new and normal user's collective standpoints. And it's easily shown again why Linux Mint has become my new number one favorite Linux distribution for new users, overtaking PcLinuxOS with a blast of gusto for the top spot on my list. It's most certainly worth checking out. If you'd like to grab a copy of Linux Mint in any of its flavors, check out their website: http://www.linuxmint.com
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Average vistor rating: 4.6 out of 5 (28 total votes) | |
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