LMDE 6 Beta First impressions.
I've been trying out the Linux Mint Debian Edition 6 public beta for little over a day now, and I have no complaints or bugs so far. LMDE is the version of Linux Mint that is based directly on Debian rather than Ubuntu, unlike the mainline Mint distro. LMDE 6, "Faye", is based on Debian 12. The point is to become as similar in features as the regular Ubuntu version. And it exists as a Plan B in case Ubuntu disappears or becomes unuseable as a base for Mint.
And It's good that this safety plan exists, because Canonical and Ubuntu are not that reliable. The Mint devs has had to rebel against Canonical's decisions multiple times, creating work for them. The Mint documentation has an entire page criticizing Canonical's preferred package format, Snap and why it's not included by default in Mint. The version of Firefox included in Mint is packaged by the devs themselves, since the Ubuntu version of Firefox is a snap (and if you try to install it via Apt, it will install a snap package instead). And ubuntu is moving more and more towards snaps, including an immutable all-snap Ubuntu. If that becomes the default Ubuntu release, derivative distros that don't use snap are pretty much finished.
I started my Linux journey with Mint, but moved upstream to Debian for awhile precisely because I was not comfortable with my operating system standing on such unsure ground. And unlike most Ubuntu-based distros (of which there are many), it's smart of the Mint team to realize that and create LMDE as a plan B. And now I'm on LMDE, because well that moves my computer off Ubuntu, while also enabling me to support Mint, which remains such an important part of the LInux ecosystem for being so beginner-friendly.
So how it is as a distro? How does it compare to mainline Ubuntu? and what does it add to its Debian base?
LMDE uses Debian stable, and as such the packages are outdated, but it's rocksolid stable. I'm running the beta, and because it's debian-based, the majority of the packages were well-tested by the time Debian 12 was released. So I haven't found any bugs so far. And Mint includes flatpaks by default, so you can get newer software in sandboxed containers without sacrificing overall system stability.
Mint adds to the basic Debian experience in many ways, the main addition is the many GUI tools Mint has developed. The software manager handles both debs and flatpaks by default with a slick interface. And the update manager handles updates with friendly non-pushy notifications, I've sang its praises before. Mint also provides tools to manage your software sources (to switch to a local mirror for example) and to create a backup of your home folder.
These tools are what make Mint so famously easy to use, as I written about before. For most common use cases, you never need to see the command line. It's similar to what MX Linux adds to Debian, which I've written about here. I think Mint probably has better looking and more intuitive GUI design than the MX equivalents, although the MX tools have more features. They are both great.
KDE Plasma and Gnome desktops does add somewhat similar functionality to base Debian, but I have reasons not to use those DEs. Gnome lacks customizability and forces a particular workflow, while I found Plasma to be a complete crashfest.
I ended up using xfce, which best met my needs, it's lightweight, easy to use and stable. And I didn't want to pollute it by pulling in bits of other desktops with all its dependencies. It did however require me to use the command line for things like installing and updating flatpaks, and i found running "sudo apt update" and "sudo apt upgrade" easier than using synaptic. I had figured out the command line by that point, so I could make do without the functionality of Mint, but the Mint tools are great to have. Having update notifications is great for an absent-minded person like me.
And they are sometimes objectively better than their Debian equivalents. For example the software sources manager that is in the Debian repos has been broken for months with a bug that leaves your apt.sources.list in a broken state that cuts your OS off from security updates, something I discovered the hard way and I had to manually edit my sources.list to fix it. The Mint equivalent works perfectly fine.
There is a lot of polish for desktop users In LMDE compared to base debian. It does add a lot of value that way.
How is it compared to ubuntu-based Mint (LMUE) though? And as someone who used LMUE cinnamon for months, I have to say the majority of functionality is all there. My experience is basically the same.
The only thing missing I could find is the driver manager, which can be very useful as it detects missing hardware drivers and pulls them in from either online or the installation media. The driver manager is to my understanding tied into Ubuntu's repos for additional drivers. Ubuntu has some of the best hardware support in the LInux distro world. Debian however has compromised their commitment to free software in favor of practicality, and now includes non-free drivers with their installation media by default, so maybe that functionality is not that necessary anymore. I've had no problems with wi-fi and blu-ray drivers on this laptop I'm typing this on, even with base Debian.
Another thing missing in LMDE is a choice of desktop environments by default. You only get cinnamon, the flagship DE developed by the Mint devs primarily for MInt. LMUE also offers Mate and Xfce by default. This is because LMDE is a "Plan B", and supporting multiple DEs on a second base would mean a too heavy workload for the devs. The Debian repos does however have Mate and Xfce in its massive package selection, plus several more DEs, and you can install them manually If you want, and still use the MInt tools, I tried it with xfce myself.
As a derivate distro, LMDE does also drag behind Debian releases quite a bit, when a new Debian drops it takes awhile for Mint to develop an LMDE version based on it. LMDE 6 was a quick turnaround by LMDE standards and it still took like three months after Debian 12's release. LMUE's turnaround for Ubuntu LTS releases is far quicker, because it remains a relative priority for the devs.
Still LMDE 6 is here now, and it's a great distro. It proves that Linux Mint is not relaint on Ubuntu, and adds useful functionalities to its Debian base.
