Agreed. I was recently prepping a laptop to give to my mom, and planned to put Ubuntu on it since, y’know, it’s “linux for human beings”. I hadn’t used Ubuntu Desktop in years, and was blown away by how unintuitive everything felt in the GUI. nothing behaved how I expected (this isn’t to say it is inherently bad; this is just my experience).
Tried Linux Mint XFCE instead and was instantly relieved that it was a similar user experience to Windows (since that’s typically going to make things easier for beginners).
It’s also my go-to distro if I have a machine lying around that’s in-between tasks and just needs a general-purpose OS for the moment.
My anecdote, granted I’m no Linux master: I recently went into a distro rigamarole, installed openSUSE, Manjaro, etc, before arriving to Mint, because I could not find one that handled my CPU and graphics and drivers setup without significant effort.
Then I installed Mint (avoiding Ubuntu and its Canonicalness), and setup was very simple and everything worked out of the box. I could run Steam with external GPU without going through many workarounds or setup using nvidia prime and launchers and so forth
Stylistically I also like cinnamon, but Mint mainly was just so low hassle and simple I have to give it props for that
It’s just the easiest distro to get into coming from windows/mac. It’s more lenient about the third party/closed source software that people might be familiar with, lots of GUI tools including the Software Center that makes it easy to install things, and plenty of flavors to suit whatever feels most natural to you. It’s got a nice GUI installer and live version that is sure to make people feel more comfortable about installing an OS if they’ve never done it before, and it’s not at all fussy about the hardware it runs on. It’s also rock solid as far as I’ve experienced. And, of course, it has the benefit of accessing the huge amount of software that supports debian. Also, owing to its popularity, the community is very active and welcoming to newbies.
When I was first getting into Linux, I was definitely more experimental and tried out Fedora just to get as far from Windows as I could. Now I’m not so adventurous and just want something that provides as similar a workflow as possible to the workflow I have to use at work with windows. So it goes that, when setting up a new laptop where I want an OS that just works, I reach for Linux Mint.
Software install tool on Mint is so much faster and more intuitive than the abomination I’m using on Nobara. I appreciate their efforts to make a gaming distro and I recommend it but if you want polish and more GUI tools, Mint works.
I haven’t used mint in a while but did for a few years. The out of the box experience (at that time) was better.
Article from 2011:
Linux Mint 11 is a very respectable and speedy distribution and is comparatively very media friendly and easy to use out of the box for newcomers. These qualities likely have contributed to the operating system’s place on the Top 5 Linux Distribution list.
Take a hugely popular distro which alienates some some users with some issues or unappealing GUI choices, Mint comes along and polishes it further and you end up with a distro that is just perfect for that niche.
I think quite a few Ubuntu users migrated to KUbuntu or Mint when Canonical made Unity the default (in Ubuntu 11.04).
I remember trying Ubuntu Unity, back when I was wondering if I could be a good idea to switch Linux. But I had no patience at the time for the buttons on the opposite side of the window. I can’t stop thinking that if it wasn’t for that things could have been quite different.
It has all the goodness of Ubuntu without the noise. A common sense UI with solid default options and great customizability.
I have tried a lot of different distros and Mint is the one I keep coming back to. I run it on my daily driver laptop, my gaming rig and my media center in the living room with MythTV. Could not be happier.
Long time Mint user here. Switched to them ages ago because they didn’t try to “revolutionize” the desktop in the whole Gnome 3/Ubuntu Unity era, and the OS was close enough to Ubuntu that instructions and software for Ubuntu would run on it. Since then, it’s only been getting better, and they haven’t been accumulating drama (Snap, telemetry, whatever Redhat is doing, etc.). like the more popular distros have been.
I’d recommend it to new people because it Just Works, has flatpack support, is similar enough to Windows and the many Ubuntu-specific instructions in the wild apply to it.
When I convicted my dad to switch to Linux it’s what I’ve given him, and he’s been very happy with it, so I guess it’s just that it isn’t a pain for a noob and it works a lot like windows
The best thing about Mint used to be not spending time adding nonfree software and media codecs. I don’t know whether it is still has that advantage over ubuntu.
I never understood the “hype” around mint
Perhaps it’s not a hype, Linux Mint is just the closest thing to what Ubuntu was like once.
Agreed. I was recently prepping a laptop to give to my mom, and planned to put Ubuntu on it since, y’know, it’s “linux for human beings”. I hadn’t used Ubuntu Desktop in years, and was blown away by how unintuitive everything felt in the GUI. nothing behaved how I expected (this isn’t to say it is inherently bad; this is just my experience).
Tried Linux Mint XFCE instead and was instantly relieved that it was a similar user experience to Windows (since that’s typically going to make things easier for beginners).
It’s also my go-to distro if I have a machine lying around that’s in-between tasks and just needs a general-purpose OS for the moment.
Ding ding ding
I’m a Linux veteran and just slapped Mint on my Surface because I want something that just works before I start tinkering.
My anecdote, granted I’m no Linux master: I recently went into a distro rigamarole, installed openSUSE, Manjaro, etc, before arriving to Mint, because I could not find one that handled my CPU and graphics and drivers setup without significant effort.
Then I installed Mint (avoiding Ubuntu and its Canonicalness), and setup was very simple and everything worked out of the box. I could run Steam with external GPU without going through many workarounds or setup using nvidia prime and launchers and so forth
Stylistically I also like cinnamon, but Mint mainly was just so low hassle and simple I have to give it props for that
cool newbie distro that looks similiar to windows and doesn’t do the bad shit Ubuntu does. That’s it, it’s not for everyone.
It’s just the easiest distro to get into coming from windows/mac. It’s more lenient about the third party/closed source software that people might be familiar with, lots of GUI tools including the Software Center that makes it easy to install things, and plenty of flavors to suit whatever feels most natural to you. It’s got a nice GUI installer and live version that is sure to make people feel more comfortable about installing an OS if they’ve never done it before, and it’s not at all fussy about the hardware it runs on. It’s also rock solid as far as I’ve experienced. And, of course, it has the benefit of accessing the huge amount of software that supports debian. Also, owing to its popularity, the community is very active and welcoming to newbies.
When I was first getting into Linux, I was definitely more experimental and tried out Fedora just to get as far from Windows as I could. Now I’m not so adventurous and just want something that provides as similar a workflow as possible to the workflow I have to use at work with windows. So it goes that, when setting up a new laptop where I want an OS that just works, I reach for Linux Mint.
Software install tool on Mint is so much faster and more intuitive than the abomination I’m using on Nobara. I appreciate their efforts to make a gaming distro and I recommend it but if you want polish and more GUI tools, Mint works.
I haven’t used mint in a while but did for a few years. The out of the box experience (at that time) was better.
Article from 2011:
https://pcper.com/2011/11/linux-mint-rising-in-popularity-and-surpassing-ubuntu-for-top-spot/
More contemporary Mint users chime in here with why they prefer Mint:
https://forums.linuxmint.com/viewtopic.php?t=383991
Take a hugely popular distro which alienates some some users with some issues or unappealing GUI choices, Mint comes along and polishes it further and you end up with a distro that is just perfect for that niche.
I think quite a few Ubuntu users migrated to KUbuntu or Mint when Canonical made Unity the default (in Ubuntu 11.04).
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ubuntu_Unity
I remember trying Ubuntu Unity, back when I was wondering if I could be a good idea to switch Linux. But I had no patience at the time for the buttons on the opposite side of the window. I can’t stop thinking that if it wasn’t for that things could have been quite different.
It has all the goodness of Ubuntu without the noise. A common sense UI with solid default options and great customizability.
I have tried a lot of different distros and Mint is the one I keep coming back to. I run it on my daily driver laptop, my gaming rig and my media center in the living room with MythTV. Could not be happier.
Long time Mint user here. Switched to them ages ago because they didn’t try to “revolutionize” the desktop in the whole Gnome 3/Ubuntu Unity era, and the OS was close enough to Ubuntu that instructions and software for Ubuntu would run on it. Since then, it’s only been getting better, and they haven’t been accumulating drama (Snap, telemetry, whatever Redhat is doing, etc.). like the more popular distros have been.
I’d recommend it to new people because it Just Works, has flatpack support, is similar enough to Windows and the many Ubuntu-specific instructions in the wild apply to it.
When I convicted my dad to switch to Linux it’s what I’ve given him, and he’s been very happy with it, so I guess it’s just that it isn’t a pain for a noob and it works a lot like windows
The best thing about Mint used to be not spending time adding nonfree software and media codecs. I don’t know whether it is still has that advantage over ubuntu.