Well with the passing of XP I have been looking at a alternative to Windows 7 and so on for our computers at the school. We have a lot of good old working Dell Machines that just won't cut it on Windows 7 or even 8(if we could get the teachers to go for 8 even). So I looked into Linux. Mainly I started with Lubuntu a trimmed down version of the very popular Ubuntu version of Linux OS. While I am having trouble with getting Networking down I like using it so much I bought a used Laptop and put another type of linux on it for more powerful computers.
I have been using a distribution(a set of programs and software that make up a Linux package) called LinuxMint 17 Cinnamon. I have been using LinuxMint a little over a week now and as a Computer Tech I would like to do a little review. Over all I really like it. It is very different but yet the same. I have set mine up to look like my favorite interface so far which is Mac OS X. I have a dock at the bottom which works the same way and I am still looking for a menu back to act like Mac. The menu they have work a lot the same way as a start menu which you don't get with Windows 8. All my hardware works with Linux and didn't take much to get working other than my Wifi card which required a extra install that came from Ubuntu side of things. I didn't have to do much to get it working though. I installed on a HP Compaq 6715b by the way. I did have to download my brother printer driver and install it via a debian package but I didn't even need a install disk to find my printer on the local wifi. It picked it up very easily.
As far as every day use most everything works good. I get on facebook watch youtube, and surf the web in most cases faster than my Windows 7 Laptop with better specs. LinuxMint is a little different as it has extras installed for helping with Flash video which is not fully supported by Ubuntu.
The main problem I have had and it hasn't hurt me to too much is installing software. The Software Manager is great for installing most anything you need such as office programs and what not. I haven't been able to get Open office to work because I don't know how. Installing software other than that on the manager is not easy for New to linux people. There are things called .deb packages that are easy to install, just about any one that worked on a mac or windows computer will be able to do but files with a .tar or .gz must be done with help from the command line or some packages you don't even download the file the traditional way you do it via the apt-get command in the terminal.
That is a big thing in my opinion just for the fact new users and users with little idea of how to even use a command line will steer away from Linux unless installing software becomes easier.
Other than that I really love my little Linux Mint computer. It is fast even on my lower hardware and can work with just about anything. I would really recommend it to any one looking for a linux alternative and if you can have some patience to learn the commands which aren't that hard after you use the a a few times. I hope this helps some one and I hope to be doing some updates on this later on.
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