Linux Mint 11 Katya review - Still the King (Queen)

I'm most pleased to present this very long, enthusiastic review of Linux Mint 11 Katya, with Gnome 2 desktop, including fully functional live session, quick installation and stable and consistent experience; topics include Wireless, Bluetooth, Samba sharing, Multimedia, applications, Compiz, look & feel, package management, system resources, suspend & resume, extras, some pet peeves, suggestions for improvements, future outlook, and more. This might very well be your next desktop, for a lot of good reasons. Do read.

http://www.dedoimedo.com/computers/linux-mint-katya.html


Regards,
Mrk

 

Excellent review as always.

I currently use Mint 10 Julia. What advantages might I find with Mint 11 Katya?

 

I tried Mint 11 but had big time trouble with my Nvidia graphics card on my HP Pavilion 3510nr laptop. I never could get Desktop Effects to enable even though I installed the Nvidia proprietary driver. Everything else seemed to work fine. I eventually gave up and went back to Lucid.

Speaking of Lucid, I think we should petition the powers-that-be in Ubuntu to continue support for Lucid until 2015. Lucid is far and away my favorite of all the Ubuntu releases thus far.

Just a thought.

BTW, nice review, Mrk. .

Later....

Bob

 

Yes , yes

----

@mrk
Nice review as-usual thanks! (esply. I was interested to know if Mint was taking the G3 route, now I knew.)

 

I'm using Linux Mint now for a week. It's working really good for me.
my only problem is the panel objects sometimes not in place when I restart the OS.

very stable and easy to use.



Questions:

how do I make sure that after Bleachbit-ing the browser entries + flash, all traces from my browsing session are gone?



I'm quite paranoid when it comes to tracking browser activities and user profiling.
Any suggestions/comments to kill/cure my paranoia?

 

You could lock the panel once you have everything in place with gconf editor.
apps>panel>global>tick locked down box.

There won't be any traces when "Bleachbitting" flash. Check in ~/.macromedia.
For Firefox I use better privacy to remove those flash cookies.

 

Has it released now? With the complete failure of Ubuntu 11.04 to boot on my system I moved to Mint 10 which worked great. Will read your review soon but I'm hoping the UI is the same.

 

I was scared this wouldn't boot but took the risk and did a fresh install of 11. Boots fine unlike 11.04.

I read the article which was a good read, liking 11 so far.

 

Did you set it up for dual boot or on a separate PC with Mint as the only OS?

 

Neither I've got it installed on a USB stick, or, my "portable work place" with much thanks to this website over the years.

 

I'm going to try out Bodhi which doesn't come with a bunch of stuff pre-loaded. That way, I can install what I want whenever. And, yes, the live USB is the first step. The Bodhi guys recommend something called UNetbootin to make the live USB so I'll be trying that.

 

You can install what you want whenever regardless what linux you choose.
Mrk

 

I'm sure that Mint 11 is a good distro overall. However, as mentioned in another thread, the fact that they install the Adobe Flash Square beta in the 64bit version by default although that beta hasn't been updated since Nov. 2010 and is, consequently, full of security leaks (which have been fixed in the 32bit version) raises my doubts about the wisdom of the Mint developers. Flash is a core application - such things must not happen, period. Considering this, I wonder how many other dumb decisions they have made ...

 

I wouldn't worry much about the security thingie, as you run as user, plus there's some plugin containment in the browser itself. But then, perhaps your concerns are justified.
Mrk

 

Both CentOS and Scientific have updated adobe flash player to the latest .34 version 2 days ago - as it should be. Ubuntu nothing yet !

 

Yes, but .34 doesn't contain any security fixes.

 

Well I can tell you what a smart decision was - not going with unity!

 

Agreed

 

Hi Mrk,

Great review!

I would like to be able to use my browser to Save Page as (your review) for use when I boot up the Live CD on my computer, however, I encountered the following files which could not be read for the download:
show_ads.js
katya-compiz-2.jpg
katya-final.jpg
katya-slide-1.jpg
katya-youtube.jpg
katya-apps-1.jpg
katya-desktop-live.jpg
katya-install-options.jpg
katya-desktop-settings-2.png
custom_styles.css
katya-system-monitor.jpg
ktaya-slide-2.jpg
katya-compiz-1.jpg
katya-desktop-settings-1.png
banner2.png
katya-installed.jpg
katya-software-manager.jpg
katya-menu.jpg
katya-update-manager.jpg
katya-apps2.jpg
katya-nautilus-new-theme.jpg
katya-panel-error.png

Could you possibly make those file readable for the Save Page as - I just want to be able to follow your advice after the Live CD boots up.

Thanks,

-- Tom

 

BTW. Mrk - after dealing with Tom's query, what gives with your 5th b/day party links ?
They just go to index.html
Maybe that's what was intended ?

 

Tom, I just tried what you did, no problem at all.

I never changed any special settings - besides if you can see them in the browser, they are readable, so once loaded in your browser, they are in your cache and available for download.

Ocky, yes that was intended

Regards,
Mrk

 

Hello everyone. Long time no see. I've been on the dark-side again doing research. Now, on to my insult...err...opinion.

Mint is only staving off the inevitable. They'll have to move on to Gnome 3 or Unity sometime or other. Let's see how Mrk and the other Mint freaks, excuse me, fans, here feel then. .

Ocky,
Thanks for that tip about locking down panel objects. . My Dad's hands shake so bad sometimes (essential tremors) that he actually "loses" panel objects (menu button, the clock, etc.). Wish I could find a solution for Desktop icons. He "loses" them, too.

Thanks again.

Later...

Bob

 

Hi Mrk,

I don't know what happened the other day, but just now it worked fine.

Thks,

-- Tom

 

I've installed Mint 11. It comes by default with Firefox 4.0.1 which is then updated to Fx 5. But I prefer to use Aurora. That's easily done. For a second browser, I've just installed Epiphany.

The idea being that I'll do most of my browsing from the comfort of Aurora which I can customize and tweak endlessly. For pages that I wish to save to disk, I'll fire up vanilla Epiphany. I can have both Aurora and Epiphany running at the same time, something that isn't recommended, if I understand correctly, for two versions of Firefox (assuming that neither is portable).

 

Is there an installer similar to Wubi?