The Linux Mint team has just released Linux Mint 22, a new major version of the free Linux distribution. With Windows 10’s end of support coming up quickly next year, at least some users may consider making the switch to Linux.
While there are other options, paying Microsoft for extended support or upgrading to Windows 11, these options are not available for all users or desirable.
Linux Mint 22 is a long-term service release. Means, it is supported until 2029. Unlike Microsoft, which made drastic changes to the system requirements of Windows 11 to lock out millions of devices from upgrading to the new version, Linux Mint will continue to work on older hardware, even after 2029.
Here are the core changes in Linux Mint 22:
- Based on the new Ubuntu 24.04 package base.
- Kernel version is 6.8.
- Software Manager loads faster and has improved multi-threading.
- Unverified Flatpaks are disabled by default.
- Preinstalled Matrix Web App for using chat networks.
- Improved language support removes any language not selected by the user after installation to save disk space.
- Several under-the-hood changes that update libraries or software.
I switched my main gaming computer to Mint after testing it on a laptop. Being away from Windows is awesome. You know how everything always wants your attention on Windows? Your antivirus proudly announces its existence. Windows wants to know if it should remove some printers? Some PDF software needs updated RIGHT NOW. There’s a license change please acknowledge this 20 page document. Animated attention grabbing everywhere. I always think FUCK OFF when presented with this bullshit.
You know what - Mint doesn’t do that. I’ve not been internally shouting at my own computer since I went that way.
It is serene.
Linux Mint was my gateway drug to linux. It’s simple and powerful! Now I’m a happy KDE user, but you never forget the first love
I ran a dual-boot for a month and a half when news about Windows Recall broke, but unfortunately, my Nvidia setup experienced a lot of bugs and proved to just be too incompatible.
So, when I upgrade to a new computer later this year, I’m going to make this machine a Linux-only machine with a different distro, and then have my other PC for all my gaming needs.
Switched to Linux Mint about three years ago after being unable to take my perfectly good laptop from W10 to W11. Dual boot firstly, quickly becoming entirely Mint. It just worked. It was the first Linux distro I’d tried in about 20 years that I didn’t mess up in a week or so.
Recently bought a new laptop and decided to distro hop. Tried various flavours of Fedora, and a few others, but ultimately came back to Mint. None of the others worked quite as well as Mint does for me (though I really liked KDE Plasma, and Gnome surprised me once I finally discovered extensions!)
Linux Mint is just great :)
Agreed. I managed to get my grandpa onto Linux using Mint on his old computer. He said the interface resembled classic Windows and was up and running in less than five minutes. I just had to show him how to use the software manager and that’s it.
It’s also got so many features that just make sense, like extending to separate monitors being automated, or when you download multiple files they’re automatically zipped to conserve space.
I did love Mint.
My old Microsoft Surface is running much better now that it’s running Linux Mint.
I’m curious about these, do the surfaces still require the use of (or benefit from) custom kernels?
AFAIK they still benefit from custom kernels, but don’t require them. I believe support continues to make it into master, so it likely won’t be the case forever.
excellent, glad to hear
I tried Linux Mint on my old XPS laptop and the battery life is, unfortunately, a nonstarter for me. It lasts about 2 hours running Linux versus up to six on Windows (thanks to battery settings). It also doesn’t hibernate properly. I wish it had worked for me
It may be worth doing more distro hoping. It sometimes takes a few to get it right for your needs/use case.
What’s the known good battery management distro? If there isn’t one, that seems like something that should be an area of focus.
I heard even though Pop os is ubuntu based, they use different power management. I’m mainly a desktop user so I can’t quantitativly comment on battery life.
I was recently surprised by Debian 12. Tried it on my Dell laptop and getting better battery life than Pop!_os. Try this installer which makes life so much easier :)
I know for me, at least with gnome, toggling between performance, balanced, and battery saver modes dramatically changes my battery life on Ubuntu, so I have to toggle it manually to not drain my battery life if it’s mostly sitting there. I don’t know if Mint is the same, but just throwing out the “obvious” for anyone else running Linux on a laptop.
For some reason, Mint doesn’t provide access to the power profiles out of the box… no idea why. I just install a Cinnamon applet called “Power Profiles” and it gives me the same systray switcher as Fedora.
Fresh install of Mint was giving me about 2 hours battery life. By switching to Power Saver profile, I can get up to about 6-8 hours. I mostly only need to go to Balanced or Performance when gaming.
I’d try fedora or pop os. I never really liked mint personally
That’s most likely a driver issue. I don’t know if this is something that’s easily fixed. Linux is better on open hardware.
Mint is my daily use OS at work, and will soon be taking over my windows machine at home that acts as a server.
I’m sure it’s a side effect of me being old and being busy all the damn time, but I love that it can literally be easier to install and use than windows, without losing any linux-ness. Big deal if it looks like I have a windows taskbar, I still have my screens taken up by Firefox, VSCode, terminal.
Mint is so user friendly
Just switched after seeing how much of my Steam library I could play on my Deck. Just have to switch back for BF5 sometimes and I don’t miss Windows at all. Very nice experience.
How much does it play and what about a GPU in terms of compatibility?
Short answer because I’m drunk but I have to admit I’m somewhat older so I play a lot of indie titles. And one of the few triple A games that I play (BF5) forces me to boot into Windows but that is a fraction of what I play.
I use Discord, Steam and Firefox mainly and don’t do much productivity wise so probably a biased experience.
My 6750XT was automatically installed and had no work from it whatsoever.
That’s quite similar to me. I have an Xbox for Game Pass (Fortnite with the missus and whatever goes on there that looks interesting); a Mac for work/studies/games which are compatible and not intensive; and a Deck for other stuff, so I can see how much is compatible. Every time I think ohh, I’d like to play that (properly), the thought of going back to Windows makes me baulk. What mid-to-lower-range GPU should I be looking at, AMD also?
Too bad Linux can’t run all my games yet. If it could I’d switch in a heart beat
Ive been willing to skip the like 2% of games I have that won’t play on it, personally.
Which of your games doesn’t work? Do they happen to be multiplayer?
I revived a 15 year old laptop by installing Linux Mint on it (and replacing the hard drive for an old SSD I had kicking around). It does everything a modern laptop would do except play new games now.
What do people use to replace Microsoft Office these days? Have they got wine working well enough to run them yet or are you still stuck with open source alternatives?
There are the FOSS ones, but when I’ve swapped people over from Windows or Mac and they want something familiar, I give them WPS Office. It’s pretty much a drop in replacement for Word/Office.
I want to say I’d put them on LibreOffice, but it’s too fucking weird and buggy for someone coming off of Office.
I ran OpenOffice (Libreoffice) around 2008 for two years (can’t remember exactly, but when I experienced Vista for the first time, I said nope and wiped my drive. It was fine back then, but those little incompatibilities drove me crazy
“Stuck with”? I find open source alternatives far less infuriating to work with than anything Microsoft produces.
After my old notebook died, I bought a $200 old, but refurbished, ThinkPad from NewEgg, put Mint on it, and I’m quite satisfied.
Can it run steam and autocad?
Also amd gpu support. I had to abandon mint 5 years ago because of poor driver support.
Not sure about AutoCAD, but I have Mint installed to the expansion card drive on my Frame.work and have been playing a fair amount of Inscryption, FTL, and Stronghold Crusader on it through Steam, so I would say yes?
I would try to run autoCAD by adding it to steam as a game and set it to use proton and look what happens 🤔
I switched to Mint for my new PC a few months ago. There are a handful of games that don’t work on it, but they’re few and far between.
