Greetings, I see these two great distributions, both of which are very fast, but I see that linux mint has more supports of all kinds, even more applications to install. ¿Why should I stay with Solus OS and not change to another? ¿What are the advantages and differences of this distribution?
¿Solus or Linux Mint which to choose?
Kevinsotovalle I see that linux mint has more supports of all kinds
Indeed, you're very perceptive. You should definitely go with Linux Mint. You'll be far happier there than you would be here. LOTS more applications to install!
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Kevinsotovalle even more applications to install
That is because Linux Mint uses Ubuntu Repositories as it is based on Ubuntu, as well as any other Ubuntu based distribution, for me, nothing special but good to have. The difference with them are the community and the DE.
Kevinsotovalle ¿Why should I stay with Solus OS and not change to another?
I think that's a personal opinion, the best I can say is to try it for a week or a month and then you can make an educated decision, nothing is perfect. My experience is very good, simple to update by the software center (gui) or by terminal, with the option to use Budgie, Gnome, Plasma or MATE and they are very stable, I use Budgie and It runs as good as my pc can, no mayor breakages in more than three years of use in my machine. Did I mention Solus install process is fast and boot fast?
Kevinsotovalle ¿What are the advantages and differences of this distribution?
Advantages?
I should mention the curated repo, it's not big compared to Debian, Arch, Fedora or other "mother" distros but it have everything a normal user, developer o "gamer" would need.
At the same time, Solus support Flatpak and Snaps, if isn't in the solus repo I'm pretty sure it is in flathub or snaps.
Kevinsotovalle ¿What are the advantages and differences of this distribution?
Direfences?
The first thing you'll notice, it's no based on Debian, Ubuntu, Fedora, or any other distro, Solus is independent and don't rely on other distribution or company.
Updates are every weekend Friday night depending on your time zone, and as they say, "Install today, updates for ever". Solus is a curated rolling release, kind of what fedora does, every Friday are updates, if there are new kernel release on Sunday, the next Friday will probably be on repos, the same for every other package.
Packages are maintained by the core team (Solus developers) and the community, mostly volunteers on their free time.
You can download solus here: https://getsol.us/download/
Learn more about to who is solus targeted for: https://getsol.us/solus/about/
Solus history (update post): https://getsol.us/blog/
A help center https://getsol.us/help-center/home/
And if you consider to get involved: https://getsol.us/articles/contributing/getting-involved/en/
I'm a very long time Solus user, since the first release.
That's all from me.
Kevinsotovalle When I left Windows, I tried Linux Mint and thought I was using Windows. For a Win user, Solus was not Windows so I parked it here because it was cool and not especially simple to me. Draw your own conclusions.
To me the big one was no set EoL with Solus compared to Mint (which I did have installed at one point, and you'll probably be perfectly content there).
Essentially the ticking time-bomb of W10 drove me to seek alternatives, and I am not looking forward to repeating that process with Linux.
Also "more" doesn't necessarily mean "better". Although I could niggle at some lapses with the repository, for the most part it is a well-rounded list. And the idea of a curated list makes sense since I really have no idea what will work well; offloading that to someone else to manage shouldn't be discounted.
Kevinsotovalle Greetings, I see these two great distributions, both of which are very fast, but I see that linux mint has more supports of all kinds, even more applications to install. ¿Why should I stay with Solus OS and not change to another? ¿What are the advantages and differences of this distribution?
You don't have to stay, you are free of your choices !
I don't find Linux Mint globally fast compared to other distros, but this might just be my personal feeling.
Regarding the support, I think both communities are very helpful. Perhaps I am wrong but it looks to me that members of the Team are more involved with the comunity in Solus than in Mint.
The numbers of applications doesn't mean much, these are just figures (not even mentioning it might greatly vary depending on how the distros split the packages). Bigger doesn't mean better these are two different words with different meanings. The real question to ask yourself is which applications that you need are missing or don't have any good alternative in the repository ? Chances that all you need is already available and should something be missing, there is a package request procedure.
If you are unsure try both (it's very easy with virtual machines) then use the one you like the most!
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Kevinsotovalle Both Solus Budgie and Linux Mint are well-maintained distros, and either is likely to work fine for you. For that matter, most of the mainstream distros will work fine for you. Ask yourself "Which do I like using?" and go with that choice.
The Ubuntu/Debian large software base is both illusory and a two-edged sword.
It is illusory because the Solus repository contains almost all mainstream applications, and unless you have very specialized, niche needs, you are going to find what you need in the Solus repository, the Flatpak repository or the Snap repository.
It is a two-edge sword because although the Ubuntu/Debian community repositories are large, the quality of the applications in those repositories is not assured -- a significant number of the applications in the Ubuntu/Debian community repositories are inadequately maintained, in terms of function (dependencies and all of that), design and security. Because the Solus repository is curated (that is, selected, tested and maintained by the Solus team) you won't have to worry about whether an application is adequately maintained and will work well with Solus.
But, as kyrios pointed out, it would be a good idea to check to make sure that Linux alternatives to your Windows applications are available in the Solus repository. I think that you'll find out that all are -- just about everything mainstream is in the Solus repository -- but you might be using a niche Windows application that isn't in the Solus repository.
I have been using Linux, in parallel with Windows, since 2006, and Solus Budgie since 2017. Solus Budgie is a rolling release (always up to date) and remarkably stable. You won't go wrong with it unless you are using a Windows application that does not have a Linux alternative available in the Solus repository, the Flatpak repository or the Snap repository. I've never used Linux Mint (the Mint DE turns me off, but that's personal) but I think that the same is true of Linux Mint. Don't overthink the problem.
I was using linux mint for quite some time , in fact it was my first distro after I decided to finally leave windows behind for good. Its a great beginner-oriented OS & I still got it around for system rescue purposes. I'd say that mint is the best possible experience of linux for new users, its neither as contained as ubuntu nor somehow technical/complicated as some of the more "advanced" distros. Personally what drove me off of it is apt package manager which I kind of dislike and rather limited choice of native desktop environments. I've been using solus for a year now and it's the distro that I will prolly stay with forever unless something terrible happen to it. Why would you ask? First, it has really handy and intuitive package manager, imho the best from all of them, second is the native support for two of my favorite DEs (Budgie & Plasma), and the third one is stability incomparable with any other OS I've ever used, I literally had like 3-4 issues that could be deemed somehow serious over a course of a year, but those were usually fixed within a few days with a patch, it never stutters and is extremely responsive as well. Important note is that I think a lot of distros (including mint) tend to get a bit laggy after quite some time, so you have to reinstall them every few months (6 or so), its somehow not the case for solus in my opinion. As for apps, well obviously it has smaller repository than debian/ubuntu based distributions, though most of the important stuff is here, and for those which are not - you can use flatpak/snap or search for alternative in the repo, there might be a lot of stuff but you are simply unaware that its there.
Overall I'm very happy with what solus is, even though for some it might not shine as bright.
Kevinsotovalle A thought for you to consider: If you strongly prefer the Budgie desktop to the alternatives (as I do), but you remain concerned about the fact that Solus is an independent (rather than Ubuntu-based) distribution, you might consider Ubuntu Budgie, which is an official flavor of Ubuntu.
I've been using the most recent Ubuntu Budgie LTS (22.04) extensively for several months (starting with the Beta release), and it is an excellent Budgie implementation. If you select the "Traditional Budgie" desktop layout (rather than the default, which is kind of Windows 11-ish), you won't be able to tell the difference between Solus Budgie and Ubuntu Budgie at a desktop level, although the underlying Linux implementations are different, Solus being developed ground-up as an independent implementation laser-focused on desktop users, and Ubuntu being, well, Ubuntu.
Having said that, though, I prefer Solus Budgie because it is a rolling release and always current, and has none of the Ubuntu cruft. Ubuntu Budgie 22.04 is an LTS release, and will age over time, if that is an issue for you. But, in my opinion, Ubuntu Budgie is the best Budgie alternative to Solus that currently exists, and I spent the better part of February looking at every Budgie implementation, so I'm not talking entirely through my hat.
Solus is faster/snappier. I like that everything I install from the repositories seems to work properly. Repositories are limited but I still only need one flatpak and one snap to do what I want.
tomscharbach you might consider Ubuntu Budgie, which is an official flavor of Ubuntu
In my opinion, this is the most polished distro using Budgie, next to Solus. And it has other attributes that you might like, based on your comments, such as a huge selection of software and a package manager you might prefer to .eopkg.
riffer Repositories are limited but I still only need one flatpak and one snap to do what I want.
Reminds me of when we were using cable TV, before we started streaming instead. We were paying to have 400+ channels available, but we only ever watched three of them. Some distributions seem to favor quantity of packages over quality.
When an auto magazine writer begged Rolls Royce to disclose how many horsepower their new model generated, their answer was simply, "sufficient." That's how I feel about Solus' repository.
Kevinsotovalle linux mint has more supports of all kinds, even more applications to install. ¿Why should I stay with Solus OS and not change to another? ¿What are the advantages and differences of this distribution?
I cannot tell you which one you should stay with, but I can tell you why I stayed with Solus, and not Linux Mint (I have used Linux Mint).
- First of all, and the main reason, Solus is the distro that has given me the least headaches, ever. Very few problems, or at least less problems than other distros I have used. I have had kernel panics on Linux Mint. Not on Solus
- Solus is rolling release, which I prefer. With Linux Mint, you can upgrade to a newer version (for example, I upgraded from 18.1 to 18.2, to 18.3), but I read that this may cause problems (maybe this is why I had kernel panics?), and a reinstall is recomended
- Solus usually has more up-to-date packages. For example, when I used Linux Mint, they had VLC 2.xx in their repository. I uninstalled it and installed the flatpak version in order to have VLC 3.14
- Solus offers KDE Plasma, my favorite desktop. Linux Mint used to offer KDE Plasma, but not anymore. I have to say that I enjoyed Cinnamon while I used it.
My advice? Try both distros and use the one that suits you better. It's exactly what I did, I'm using the distro that suits me better.