Back in the old days, Linux used to be a tough cookie to get installed. It was way more challenging than Windows and certainly nothing like Mac OS X. You never really knew if it would work well with all of your hardware until you tried it. Sometimes things went great and other times—well, let’s just say that things didn’t go well at all.
These days, it’s more or less a snap to get Linux working on your computer. Oh sure, you may have an occasional snafu with a particular component, but nothing like what you used to run into. Linux is much better at supporting hardware now, and things have become much, much simpler.
Perhaps a little too simple.
Linux Mint: The Death Knell for Distrohopping?
When they created Ubuntu, the folks at Canonical created a distro that would spawn tons of remastered versions. One of the most popular of those is Linux Mint. It takes generic Ubuntu and adds all kinds of goodies (including multimedia codecs) that make it even easier and more comfortable to use on a desktop computer.
And therein lies the problem.
Linux Mint may have made things too easy and, in doing so, it may have killed the great Linux pastime of distrohopping. For those who aren’t familiar with it, it’s what desktop Linux users do as they seek their ultimate distro. They spring from one to another to another, never quite satisfied with any they land on.
Or at least that’s how it used to be.
Has Linux Mint ruined distrohopping by making Linux too easy and comfortable?
I’ve noticed that some of the folks that used to be dedicated distrohoppers have now settled in with Linux Mint and don’t really bother with other distros all that much anymore. They’ve found that Linux Mint simply does everything they need a desktop operating system to do, and easily: In addition to the multimedia codecs, it provides built-in tools such as mintMenu, mintInstall, mintUpdate, and mintUpload. So why spend the time installing other distros?
(6 votes, average: 4.00 out of 5)
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i was using ubuntu 9.04 since it launched and i have been with ubuntu since version 8
ive never tried linux mint and i never intend to
i used to use fedora 9 and 10 but ubuntu started serving my neeeds more than fedora so for now im sticking with ubuntu
im going to be tring out ubuntu 9.10
it was never about distrohopping… you’re confused.
I have tried many distros and up to recently I liked Ubuntu. But after Ubuntu 10.04 I went to Linux Mint and I think Mint is the best distro.
Linux and Open-source stand for freedom and Ubuntu mean humanity towards others. But even though many people didn’t like the change of window buttons to the left they went on and kept the change anyway.
I know that you can change it back. But if I want my Windows friends go to Linux how do I explain that they must change the way they Max-/Minimize and close. Its like all the sudden you must learn to write with your left hand.
Mark Shuttleworth clarifies: Ubuntu is not a democracy. What????? Maybe Mark and Bil would join a club.
Anyway I love Linux Mint and I’m going to keep using it and I will recommended for my friends and other people. I work at a school and we have 600 computers. We are in testing period of Linux Mint thanks to me. If everything works alright the other schools will change from Windows to Linux Mint too.
I used to Distrohopp until i found Mint.
It sure is fun to disrtohopp. But it’s also refreshing to have the security of an OS that WORKS.
The thing with distrohopping was that people would install a distro whenever a new release was out, then after realizing it didn’t suit their needs, went back to windows.
I was very sceptical about trying Mint cause it was based in Ubuntu (i hate Ubuntu. why? just say the name out loud… yeah…).
When i tried Mint, it was the first time i didn’t went back to windows.
I still install other popular distros once in a while, but only to remember how superior Mint is.
I’m a distro cow, and i like it!!!
Ive tried out several distros (Knoppix, Debian, Fedora, but mostly Ubuntu) and I hopped quite a bit until I found Ubuntu. I downloaded 8.04 and still have it installed on my laptop. I tried upgrading to 9.04 a week after it came out… it was a disaster. I just want something that works out of the box. 8.04 did that (except for my wireless drivers) and I’m hoping now that 10.04 or Mint will as well!
Now you have turned me into a distro hopper. I started a year ago with Ubuntu 9.04 on an Acer netbook, then upgraded 9.10 briefly before plucking up my courage and doing a clean install. I really like Ubuntu 10.04 (with my own custom theme), but after reading this, I have to give Linux Mint a try, damn you!
been a distrohopper since ubuntu 8.04. licked everything : fedora,mandriva,ubuntu,suse…. finally landed on linuxMint9 (tried 7 and skipped 8). best thing i like in ubuntu or mint is that it can be installed within windows, and removed from control-panel clean as-if-it-was-never-there. had headaches with other distros’ removal (especially the grub) and get back to windows nice-n-easy. i have already killed my old compaq notebook
with constant messing around (a disk-format every two weeks) by distrohopping( and pirated-windows-hopping).
currently i have a lenovo notebook with dual-boot windows 7 and linuxMint 9(installed by mint4win and set default using EasyBCD). its been over a month since i last booted win7 (probably won’t because ‘out-of-date’ notifications irritate me).
and now i am locked! check out my screenshots at http://badbodh.deviantart.com/
I now distrohop in VMs!! far more convenient and safe!. Using VirtualBox or KVM on a Ubuntu host – currently 10.04.
Once upon a time, in a galaxy far, far away… I was a major distro-hopper (9-10 years of hopping) and all of that changed about 2-1/2 years ago after trying Linux Mint.
Of course part of that decision was in coming to the conclusion that I had wasted a *lot* of time over the years, bouncing from one distro to another, but LM definitely gave me a place to call “home”.
I recently put the latest version on a relatively new laptop that previously had Vista on it and I’m confident that should I choose to, I can go the full life of the hardware without ever making another change in the O/S. Linux Mint is simply that stable, usable and good for the end user.
If anything, the new Debian version will seal the deal if they continue development on it.
Hi Guys. I am currently a devotee of Fedora 13 on my Msi vr-610 laptop and opensuse 11.2/win 7 premium on desktop.
Fedora 13 is the one distro I would recommend to people on a laptop.
Opensue 11.2 on a desktop, probably asa dual bootg with win 7 premium or vista pro. One thing, if u don’t want grub hell, don’t use windows 7 “ultimate or vista ultimate with linux. It will be just a heartache
On my Msi laptop, f13 works with wifi, webcam, and even Vodaphone mobile broadband!
One f13 is updated, it is unbeatable!. just make sure u update to latest packages id u have a laptop with ATI graphics. Then, suspend and hibernate works perfectly!
tried linux mint, debian(etch) Fedora 12 and 13, and opensuse 11.2 recently.
The best for me were debian(on desktop) and Opensuse 11.2(desktop) and Fedora 13(Laptop).
I have been using F on my laptop since 12 and now 13. f 12 provided lots of faithful service for my java studies.
I used to be a huge distrohopper. But, I have stuck with Opensuse and Fedora of late.
I will try Opensuse 11.3 soon on my desktop.
Might try LM debian
great art!
wasim
uhm wrote:
Talk about confused …. your statement isn’t even coherent. It’s as if I said “many people don’t like brussels sprouts” and you retorted “It was never about not liking brussels sprouts”.
This article is silly. The reason that we use computers is to get something useful done, and unless your job is to test linux distributions, distro hopping is a waste of your mental resources and time.
Diversity is not an unqualified good. If it is, then why not spawn 10 different versions of Mint, each tailored to a certain set of needs and/or wants? Some diversity is good, too much is bad. Personally, I feel that there is already enough diversity there with Windows and OSX present.
Nowadays, the barrier to trying a new distro is dramatically smaller, with VirtualBox. So try new ones if you want, but realize that the time that you spend doing so can never be regained; it could have been spent doing useful work or spending time with someone you love, rather than watching glowing pixels for the sake of watching them.
Perhaps old age has made me jaded.
New column up about distrohopping on Eye On Linux:
The Dark Side of Distrohopping
http://eyeonlinux.com/2011/07/15/the-dark-side-of-distrohopping/
:-)
You know–just because Linux Mint has all this functionality doesn’t mean EVERYONE’S gonna want to use it…or be able to.
For instance–the multimedia codecs are nice, but I really don’t watch TV or DVDs on my computer–I already have a TV and DVD player for that, plus my friend’s got his PS3 he brings to my house. And then we just hook my ethernet cable to his PS3 and we watch Hulu-Plus on my TV.
Besides, my old computer can’t run Linux Mint…the newest versions are, well…too new…
So, my friend and I did some purposeful distrohopping and he found Bodhi Linux for me while I was at work.
Do I eschew distrohopping as a rule? Not really, though I am of the sort that, once I find something that works for me, I usually go ahead and make it a hard install and use it for at least two years…I’m a slow adopter on purpose–the super-new versions of various Linux distros are often too buggy (and therefore beyond my amateur developer skills) for my liking. Plus I’m impatient as *&^%-all and I just plain prefer something to work O-O-B.
But far be it from me to judge those who distrohop for the thrill of the update-chase…;-)