LMDE 6 has been officially released. The big deal about this is that it’s based on the recently released Debian 12 and also that being based on Debian LMDE is 100% community based.
If you’ve been disappointed by what the Linux corporations have been doing lately or don’t like the all-snap future that Ubuntu has opened, then this is the distro for you.
I’m running it as my daily driver and it works exactly like the regular Mint so you don’t lose anything. Clem and team have done a great job, even newbies could use Debian now.
Personally I think LMDE is the future of Linux as Ubuntu goes it’s own way, and this is a good thing for Mint and the Linux community. Let’s get back to community distros and move away from the corps.
EDIT: LMDE is 64bit only. There is no 32bit option.
Nice, thanks for the explanation!
I did have really good experiences with LM, notably
- timeshift backups
- unobtrusive updates
- fully automatic LUKS unlock and mount
But it broke for me. Also it wasnt fully Ubuntu, which was a hassle too.
I wonder why it broke? Did you reach out to support? They would have helped you.
I also used to use full Ubuntu but I’m fed up with the snaps nonsense.
I even went so far as to uninstall the snap system, yet somehow on doing apt update, it freaking re-installed it 🤬
That’s when I understood what Mint was about and why it’s so great.
Moving to LMDE I’ve taken a full step away from Ubuntu all together.
Random screen freezes afaik.
I dont know the exact package Differences between Ubuntu and Debian, but I think LMDE will be pretty outdated soon, right? Ubuntu is also not really bleeding edge but way better. Until they stop packaging APT packages I guess it should be fine?
Random screen freezes sounds like a graphics card issue. Do you have an Nvidia graphics card by any chance because Nvidia doesn’t supply any open source drivers so getting them to work is huge pain on Linux?
Actually LMDE currently has newer packaged and kernel then regular LM because the Ubuntu base is from 22.04 whereas Debian 12 came out with the latest kernel and packages.
For whatever reason Ubuntu never released an LTS this year so Mint has to wait until next year February. I suspect it will use the same kernel and packages as Debian, because it’s an LTS, which never includes the very latest stuff.
So we could be looking at a scenario where both LM and LMDE will have the same kernel and packages for at least one year, until the next Ubuntu LTS (25.04?).
But even though LMDE will have the same kernel and packages for 2 years or so, Cinnamon desktop and the Mint apps will still be updated to the latest as far as I know.
If your need the very latest packages then LM is probably what you should use but if don’t need that and want stability and not having to update often then LMDE is the way to go.
