GNOME OR KDE MINT?

[shane]

I have Mint with Gnome and, after having stopped using it, I have also another distrib in dual boot with KDE. More I use KDE more I like it!
Btw Qt is better than Gtk+... And Gnome got contaminated with Mono

Some things written here are extremely debatable…:roll:

Xfce? Not for me, thanks. It is not even able to have transparent icon labels... Having opaque labels reminds me of Win95! And it is became slower, e.g the slower speed of Xfce 4.4 versus 4.2.3.2 or "compare 4.3.99.2 to 4.2.3.2 on a modest platform (Celeron/850, 256 MB RAM), and you will notice the difference: 4.2.3.2 feels as fast as WindowMaker, for instance, where 4.3.99.2 feels more like GNOME!" (http://www.beranger.org/index.php?page=3k&article=2051)

i'd have to disagree with some of what you said... i began my Linux experience with Mandrake 10.0 and KDE and onto Mandriva 2006 with KDE... on my 256MB laptop things used to run really slow... when Dapper came out I switched to Ubuntu and GNOME... my computer worked slightly faster but the more stuff i kept piling on it the slower it ran... it is probably my fault for not keeping the services in check... I went thru the Dapper>Edgy and Edgy>Feisty upgrades (not reinstalls) and things broke and got even slower...

Finally, when Mint XFCE Beta came I decided to hose my laptop and I dont think I'll ever go back! boot times are something like half of what it used to be with Ubuntu, applications launch much much faster. and about the desktop icons... I like a clean desktop only with conky on it so I dont even notice the opaque icons... XFCE edition looks just as sweet... the only thing it is probably missing is a Mintified menu but this is only the first release... so I hope it is in the pipelines...

As for the speed of previous versions of XFCE... i dont know because I have only just started using XFCE. what I can tell you is that XFCE is definitely faster than GNOME in my experience.

here are some screenshots of my XFCE desktop. keep in mind: no beryl or compiz here... i only have a SiS graphic card with shared system memory... and check out the RAM usage at startup... 34% of (256-32)MB RAM... you do the math

http://img168.imageshack.us/my.php?image=mint1na8.png

http://img521.imageshack.us/my.php?image=mint2uo2.png

http://img410.imageshack.us/my.php?image=mint3ul9.png

p.s. no violins were meant to be hurt in the writing of this post...

[linuxviolin]

shane, I said just that certain things disturb me in Xfce but I did not say that it is bad. There are several good things, Thunar for example is a very promising file manager.

But it is not also light and fast than previously and the opaque icons... Xfce 4.4 is much heavier on resources than 4.2. It is not anymore a "slim" alternative.
No really, for the moment, not for me. Of course that is only my personal and maybe subjective opinion.

keep in mind: no beryl or compiz here

Great! Very good!

p.s. no violins were meant to be hurt in the writing of this post... Laughing

hahaha... thanks

[blogger]

Hello everybody,

What can you say about CELENA now. I think that this basically Gnome distribution is tops! Steady as a rock and as fast as any Linux can be.

Greetings,
Blogger

[npap]

Well,
Lots of goodies from Linux Mint lately. Daryna KDE has made me reconsider my preferences.
It looks so good and behaves so well. And yet, I love Daryna Gnome.

I'm confused again my friends.
Cheers

[kenetics]

So Blogger likes Gnome and Npap has a preference for KDE. I can see why there is some confusion here!
Variety is the spice of life, as they say. And two heads are better than one.

Personally, I prefer Mint Gnome because its so easy to use, but I occasionally switch to Mint KDE. Either one is very usable.

[npap]

Hello Ken,
It's a split personality problem.
I agree that Gnome is much easier to work with. I don't know if you tried Daryna KDE yet. It's really fast.
The desktop loads in a few seconds. The overall looks and performance rate high in MHO.

I had to reconfigure the xserver-xorg manually though. Had some problem with the system reverting to the low 640x480 setting.
This has been a problem with Ubuntu/Kubuntu for a long time.

Cheers
Blogger (Oops!)
I mean Npap

[npap]

Sorry guys but I had to ditch the KDE beta version. Too many problems have been inherited from Kubuntu. It's mostly the screen resolution configuration problems, which is the reason that made me switch to Mint in the first place.
Mint KDE is great, but it needs quite a bit of work yet.
I just installed Daryna Final. It's a charm for newbies like me.

Cheers,
Npap.

[npap]

Hello fellow Minties,
So far so good. The pros and cons of both KDE and Gnome Mint have been expressed here. But now there is some talk of a Debian based version.
Really, what could be different here from the Ubuntu based version?

Just to get a taste of a Debian based distribution, I downloaded Mepis 7.0. Believe me, I could not see any drastic changes except for the fact that Synaptic shows all packages in the Debian repository.
No problem with that IMHO.

So what do you fellows think?
Cheers

[npap]

Hola amigos!
We've now got another desktop! Mint E17 Enlightenment is soon to come out.
I have been checking a couple of E17 distributions and I can only say that they look impressive.
Daryna E17 Beta is coming out soon; it's good news and I think it will be worth trying it out.

Cheers,
npap

[molom]

Hola amigos!
We've now got another desktop! Mint E17 Enlightenment is soon to come out.
I have been checking a couple of E17 distributions and I can only say that they look impressive.
Daryna E17 Beta is coming out soon; it's good news and I think it will be worth trying it out.

Cheers,
npap

To tell the truth, I haven't seen any impressive E17 distro. That is why I joined to help out the the Mint E17 project.
What I'm aiming to have in the Mint E17 project is a distro that is the most polished, stable and 'out of box' experience E17 distro that will ever be released.

Cheers,
molom

[deki999]

somehow on all distros Samba works ‚‚out of the box‚‚.
untill now I prefered Gnome, but I am thinking...a lot...

[yamawho]

I had always used Kde in the past with Mepis 6.5 and 1st used gnome trying out Ubuntu last year ... didn't think much of it. However my impression for gnome changed after trying MInt 4. Although I had only run the livecd to test a system, I kept thinking about it afterwards and decided to install it while waiting for Mepis 7 to become final. There is something about the look and feel of this distro that I really like.

[GoustiFruit]

Well, I used to like KDE more: I've been using PCLinuxOS for years
KDE is a lot more configurable, as a simple example it is very easy to change the background image automatically on a regular basis. With Gnome you have to write some script or install an additional program (which I did: wallpaper-tray)...

But I must say that the way it is done in Mint makes Gnome very attractive... There are maybe more little things to setup to have the desktop work exactly the way you want, but once it is done, the system is really pleasant to use. And Gnome is quite a bit lighter and faster than KDE, I must admit: when I switched my parent's laptop from PCLinuxOS to Mint, my mother even asked me what I did to the mouse because it went so much faster (in fact, applications were scrolling smoother)

So for now I'm sticking with Gnome (and Mint !), patiently waiting for a final KDE4... which may require 2-3 years alas

[Rob Brill]

Well, I used to like KDE more: I've been using PCLinuxOS for years
KDE is a lot more configurable, as a simple example it is very easy to change the background image automatically on a regular basis. With Gnome you have to write some script or install an additional program (which I did: wallpaper-tray)...

But I must say that the way it is done in Mint makes Gnome very attractive... There are maybe more little things to setup to have the desktop work exactly the way you want, but once it is done, the system is really pleasant to use. And Gnome is quite a bit lighter and faster than KDE, I must admit: when I switched my parent's laptop from PCLinuxOS to Mint, my mother even asked me what I did to the mouse because it went so much faster (in fact, applications were scrolling smoother)

So for now I'm sticking with Gnome (and Mint !), patiently waiting for a final KDE4... which may require 2-3 years alas

Hi

I make my option for the 2 - kde and gnome. I prefer Kde 'cause is a lot more configurable but i admit i am
running Mint 4,0 Daryna (portuguese Brasil language) and i got astonished how Mint Gnome is quite very
good. Gnome for me only on Debian/Gnu Linux or Mint. Ahead: if Mint Kde 4.0 comes based on Kubuntu
i am afraid it will be a heavy desktop weight ( pentium 4 - 2,40 ghz - 512mg ram) my micro hardware

Guys anyone else out there could explain how Mint is better than Ubuntu? Ubuntu 7.10 is a desktop
heavy-weight for me. Kubuntu lets de Kde intolerable. Mint not! Mint is well balanced on everytning
when we talk about gnome desktop environment

I used to be sincere and most programs for Gnome don't have the same good quality comparing
them with the Kde programs. I know i can install them on Mint 4,0 (not all of course)

Man, i hope Mint soon will have a whole repository programs of its own. I knew other distros based on
Ubuntu (lot of them now) and Mint 4.0 only justifies and still good than Ubuntu

Mint Gnome version - Mint Kde Version, my personal choice

Best Wishes
Rob

[linuxviolin]

Gnome is quite a bit lighter and faster than KDE, I must admit: when I switched my parent's laptop from PCLinuxOS to Mint, my mother even asked me what I did to the mouse because it went so much faster (in fact, applications were scrolling smoother)

Gnome "lighter and faster than KDE"? Maybe but on my PC it is rather the reverse...
I have Cassandra Gnome and another distro with KDE in dual boot and even without MintMenu, Mono apps (Beagle, Tomboy...) and with the same configuration (swappiness=0 and vfs_cache_pressure=50) the system more often uses the swap with Gnome than with KDE (rare under KDE)...

Ubuntu heavier than others?