Zorin OS 8 Review: A very good distro for beginners

Zorin is definitely one of the easiest Linux distros to use, IMHO. Most of the things ship pre-installed and pre-tweaked to make life easy for a new Linux convert. Further, it looks quite similar to Windows 7 and it really helps.

From Zorin OS 8 http://mylinuxexplore.blogspot.in

Zorin has a commercial and a non-commercial line of release. For this review, I downloaded the free Zorin OS 8 Core 64-bit ISO (about 1.6 GB in size). It's final version was released on 27th Jan 2014 and is based on Ubuntu Saucy Salamander with support till July 2014. Zorin 8 ships with a tweaked GNOME 3.8.2 desktop and Linux kernel 3.11.0.

I used Unetbootin to create a live USB on a 4 GB USB drive. I booted it up on my Asus K55VM laptop (2.3 Ghz Core i7 Processor, 8 GB DDR3 RAM and 2 GB NVIDIA GeForce 630M graphic card) and then installed it on a 50 GB partition.

From Zorin OS 8 http://mylinuxexplore.blogspot.in

Read more!

Pardus Linux 2.0 "Community" Review: Most efficient GNOME 3 distro!

I wanted to write this review for quite sometime. To begin with, Pardus is a Turkish distro, jointly developed by Scientific & Technological Research Council and National Academic Network and Information Center of Turkey. Before 2012, it used Gentoo as base. However, in 2012, it shifted to Debian and for good reasons. Pardus 2.0 "Community" GNOME edition was released in Sep-2013 and I am using it for last 3 months. The current review is based on my experience with Pardus 2.0.

From Pardus Linux 2.0 http://mylinuxexploreblogspot.in

The 64-bit ISO English version is about 1.7 GB in size. It ships with Linux kernel 3.10 and GNOME 3.8.4 (with GNOME shell 3.4.2). As per release note, Pardus Linux comes with multimedia codecs and Adobe flashplugin pre-installed along with a host of utility applications: 

"Pardus Community 2.0 GNOME has been released. Linux kernel 3.10.11; 3D Ironvolt icon set; simplified installation; GNOME 3.8.4 (with GNOME Shell 3.4.2); pre-installed NVIDIA 304.108 and ATI 13.4 drivers; all multimedia codes and firmware; LibreOffice 4.1.1; Firefox 24.0; Thunderbird 24.0; Chromium 29.0.1547.57; Adobe Flash player 11.2.202.310; VLC media player 2.0.8; Skype 4.2.0.11; TeamViewer 7.0.9377; Wine 1.4.1; GIMP 2.8.6, Scribus 1.4.3, Inkscape 0.48."

I used Unetbootin to create a live USB and then did a live boot followed by installation on my Asus K55VM with 2.3 Ghz Core i7 3660QM processor, 8 GB DDR3 RAM and hybrid graphics with NVIDIA GeForce 630M 2 GB graphics in addition to the default Intel 128 MB one. Mint Image writer didn't work with Pardus.

Read more!

Ubuntu GNOME 13.10 "Saucy Salamander" Review: With improved GNOME 3.8 and performs better than Unity 7

When GNOME switched to the 3rd version, initially it was plagued with a whole lot of controversies. Ubuntu came up with Unity DE and gave up pure GNOME 3 momentarily to again be back with a GNOME 3 spin in the Raring Ringtail release. There was no LTS release earlier but this time the Ubuntu GNOME team is gearing up for the 14.04 LTS release. I guess that is a great news for all GNOME lovers.

From Ubuntu GNOME 13.10 http://mylinuxexplore.blogspot.in

All these happened due to incremental improvement in functionality and stability of GNOME. Ubuntu GNOME 13.04 was released with GNOME 3.6 and the new release (Saucy Salamander) ships with the much improved GNOME 3.8.4 along with Linux kernel 3.11.0. As the release note states:
"The Ubuntu GNOME team is proud to announce the release of Ubuntu GNOME 13.10. Ubuntu GNOME aims to bring a mostly pure GNOME desktop experience to Ubuntu. Keeping in coordination with the Ubuntu Desktop team, we have decided to stay with GNOME 3.8 for the 13.10 release. Features: most of GNOME 3.8 is now included; many artwork improvements including new boot loader theme, Plymouth theme, wallpapers, installer slideshow and completed branding with our new logo; the new GNOME Classic session is included, to try it choose it from the Sessions option on the login screen; Ubuntu Online Accounts is no longer included by default."

I used the Ubuntu GNOME 13.10 distro for a week after installing it on my Asus K54C laptop (2.2 Ghz Core i3 processor, 2 GB DDR3 RAM, Intel HD 3000 graphics).

Read more!

Linux Deepin 12.12.1 Review: Amazingly beautiful and soothing Ubuntu GNOME spin from China!

I have used Deepin Linux earlier but never got time to actually pen down a review. It is based on Ubuntu but uses the GNOME shell rather than Unity and comes with great support for Chinese language. I am no expert in Chinese and hence, downloaded the 32-bit English version of Linux Deepin for this test.

From Deepin 12.12.1 http://mylinuxexplore.blogspot.in

Originally, Linux Deepin 12.12 was based on Ubuntu 12.10. However, the present release 12.12.1 is based on Ubuntu GNOME 13.04 with same Linux kernel 3.8.0 and GNOME 3.8 as desktop environment (though heavily tweaked in Deepin). Files 3.8.1 is the default file manager and possibly it is the best file manager available now for Linux.

Read more!

Fedora 19 Review: Not flashy but very dependable, KDE being the best of the lot!

2013 has been an exceptional year in a sense that Ubuntu, Fedora and Debian, the three major Linux distros, had their releases this year. Debian 7 finally got released, Ubuntu came up with a better Unity along with more social integration and it is now turn of Fedora to showcase it's latest offering. I was really interested to know Fedora 19 - whether the latest Fedora is able to live up to the other two illustrious counterparts plus what's brewing in RHEL stable.

From Fedora 19 http://mylinuxexplore.blogspot.in

With the Fedora 19 release note coming out on 2-July-2013, I was quick to download the 32-bit versions of all available variants - KDE, GNOME, XFCE and LXDE. The release note states of incremental improvements for developers, like:

"The Fedora Project is delighted to announce the release of Fedora 19. What's new? Developer's Assistant is a tool for new developers that helps you to get started on a code project by offering templates, samples, and toolchains for a variety of languages; 3D modelling and printing are supported with OpenSCAD, Skeinforge, SFACT, Printrun, RepetierHost, and other tool options; OpenShift Origin makes it easy for you to build your own Platform-as-a-Service (PaaS) infrastructure; MariaDB offers a truly open MySQL implementation and is now the default MySQL option in Fedora...."

I am no developers and my review is from an ordinary Linux user perspective. I first created live USB using Unetbootin for all the variants and then installed each of them in my Asus K54C with Core i3 processor and 2 GB RAM, one by one. I tested each, for a day or two, for this review. Fedora 19 has Linux kernel 3.9.5, which gets upgraded to 3.9.8 post installation. Major differences between them are the desktop environments and some applications (e.g. LXDE was loaded with primarily lightweight applications), with essentially the basic structure remaining the same. The DEs used in Fedora 19 are:

• GNOME 3.8 with Files 3.8.2 as file manager
• KDE 4.10.4 with Dolphin 2.2 as file manager
• XFCE 4.10 with Thunar 1.6.3 as file manager
• LXDE with PCManFM 1.1.0 as file manager

Read more!

Ubuntu 13.04 "Raring Ringtail" GNOME Review: Upgradable to GNOME 3.8 and performs reasonably well!

Ubuntu GNOME (formerly Ubuntu GNOME Remix) is right now an official flavor of Ubuntu and their first official release came with Ubuntu 13.04 "Raring Ringtail". The unique USP about it is pure GNOME experience, devoid of Unity. Given it is the first official release with vanilla GNOME desktop and upgradable to GNOME 3.8, I was naturally inclined to try it out - to see whether it is more efficient than GNOME with Unity or not. The release announcement states briefly about the enhancements:

"The Ubuntu GNOME team is proud to announce our first release as an official Ubuntu derivative - Ubuntu GNOME 13.04. Ubuntu GNOME aims to bring a mostly pure GNOME desktop experience to Ubuntu. Keeping in coordination with the Ubuntu Desktop Team, we have decided to stay with GNOME 3.6 for the 13.04 release. What's new? Firefox has replaced GNOME Web (Epiphany) as the default browser; the Ubuntu Software Center and Update Manager have replaced GNOME Software; LibreOffice 4.0 is available by default instead of AbiWord and Gnumeric. For those excited about the latest version of GNOME, we do maintain the GNOME 3 PPA to catch an early look at GNOME 3.8."

From Ubuntu 13.04 Gnome http://mylinuxexplore.blogspot.in

I downloaded the 1 GB 32-bit ISO for testing. The system used for testing is Asus K54C laptop with 2 GB RAM and 2.2 Ghz Core i3 processor. I'll take you through my experience while using it for last 5 days, as my main operating system.

Read more!