Linux Mint 13 - Mate Edition

Ubuntu has served me well for many years. It was stable and feature rich. I loved the interface and easy access for these compared to Windows. When I upgraded and was then provided Unity I gave it the benefit of the doubt but was just not able to enjoy it.

Linux Mint 13 Mate

I missed my places menu to easily load my common directories. I missed a menu to look through my installed applications. This was all minor issues. I was able to adapt and make the new UI work for me. My main issue was that I found the new UI slow. Things were just not as quick as in Gnome2 and it seemed to consume more resources as well.

I'd had enough and decided it was time to try something new. I eventually settled on Linux Mint 13 Mate. The great thing about Linux Mint 13 is it can use any Ubuntu packages as it is based on it.

The Mate version runs Mate, which is a fork of Gnome2 so it is the interface I, and most other people, are used too. It also then has all the plugins and applets available for it that were there for Gnome2. What I like best about it is it is fast and responsive. It doesn't consume a lot of resources and require a 3D graphics to run the UI.

All the popular games and applications run just fine on it like Dropbox, Chrome and Linux Tycoon. LibreOffice comes preinstalled along with Gimp. You do of course have access to the entire Ubuntu repository so you can easily add any application you want from there to personalize you install.

Running Linux Mint 13 on my HP DV2 runs great. I have a OCZ Vertex Plus in the laptop and it boots up quickly and all my applications load quickly. I am very happy with Linux Mint 13 Mate Edition and plan to stick with it as long as I can.

Unfortunately the future of Mate is a little uncertain. Hopefully things get worked out and all the future UIs  run as well and are feature rich as Mate.