MX Linux XFCE Review (2021)

The most painless distro I’ve used over the last 20-something years. I choose MX over all other options mainly because it works without massive tweaking. It’s not perfect, but it sure comes closer to closing that last mile than nearly any other distro, and has the power to get things done as well.

The open source journey is really excellent whether Linux,BSD,whatever. Always discovering things I didn’t know were there,even really little things. For example:

jeremy@hppav:~ $ ls -ld /bin/dash -rwxr-xr-x 1 root root 121464 Jan 17 2019 /bin/dash jeremy@hppav:~ $ ls -l /bin/sh lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 4 Mar 20 2021 /bin/sh -> dash jeremy@hppav:~ $ dash $

Another shell,dash. I think this may be strictly a Debian distro thing. Not the bulk that is bash,some people say. Maybe not as convenient,either. I’m giving the dash shell a go just for kicks.

Hello, I made a video test about Systemd vs SystemV on MxLinux 19.4 : https://youtu.be/tt4fFlwfokQ

I would recommend MX Linux just for the low impact of the OS for older hardware. I have a 8 year old HP Elitebook that really isn’t fully supported in Windows 10 and obviously HP has long since made it a legacy device. In my opinion the MX developers seemed to notice that a lot of Linux desktop users have older hardware that need a low impact stable release.

MX Linux is great. I installed it earlier this year on this old laptop. I have 3 laptops on my desk,now,3 different OS’s. The latest I acquired no charge. Dell Inspiron 3737 17”. Quadrupled RAM from 4 to 16. All the open source OS’s I’ve installed,I like. I don’t install anything else. Two big Universities in the tri-city area I live in. One of them is tech orientated. I’ve seen the mirror from that Universities computer science club appear on ALU’s install video’s in the past right up near top of list even though that mirror is on other side of Atlantic Ocean from where he is. They don’t support everything but everything Ubuntu is there,MX Linux is really popular,well maintained and outside of Linux,FreeBSD. Curiosity led me to install GhostBSD on latest laptop. All is well and it’s different. Some more to learn as to command line in terminal. Things are a bit different. That’s OK. Reading documentation,lately FreeBSD,the young people at these tech Universities around the world are really brilliant. Students have significant contribution as to how all these open source OS’s work. R&D on wireless security is very impressive. A lot of conceptual or hypothetical idea is being accomplished. Some students out of this Tech University up the road from me have documentation published in major worldwide tech community publications. Very impressive. ,

I have been using Linux for 20 years and have switched distros numerous time. Years ago I loved spending hours tinkering with systems but I no longer have the desire to do so. Instead, I look for a distro that will do 90% of what I want right out of the box. MX LInux fits the bill for me, install to complete setup, the way I like it, can be done in less than 30 minutes. Actually Linux Mint comes in at about the same time but so far MX seems to be less buggy.

Linux in general needs to get its wifi shit together all distros suck in that department.

Average Linux User. One of a few who introduced me to the world of Linux with excellent tutorial video’s and documentation. For that,I’m always grateful. Since them,LinuxMint 18.2 Cinnamon has been the distro on this old HP Pavillion dv6700 Special Edition laptop. WD Blue 250 SSD installed a few years ago made huge difference to performance.Other than that,all hardware original. I’m convinced this machine has never run better considering the OS installed upon it’s release and another dud OS that was on it when I bought the machine from pawn shop in early 2017. Blowing out that OS and installing Linux was the fix. LTS has run out on my beloved LinuxMint 18.2 Cinnamon. I’ve never advanced from it because I really like it. Now,it’s time to move on. MX Linux caught my interest a while ago. Blowing out LM18.2 for MX Linux 19 has me wondering about “things to do” regarding ‘reducing writes’ to the SSD ,settings for Mozilla Firefox,etc… Those ‘hacks’ to the system were documented clearly in times past. I’m not referring to ‘swappiness’ settings but other stuff that were once included in ‘things to do’ vids and documentation to accomplish reduced writes to SSD. I’m looking for those. Your feedback would be much appreciated.

Arch Linux with KDE… best of both worlds, savvy and non-savvy, all apps guaranteed latest and working.

Your opening statement “we’ll take a look at MX Linux’s desktop and try to figure out what makes MX Linux the most popular distro according to DistroWatch.com” immediately rang alarm bells for me. DistroWatch.com go to great lengths to explain how the page hit ranking is not now, nor has it ever been any kind of indicator as to the popularity of one distro compared with another. Further more, MX Linux frequently repeat this same information to any newcomer who might consider the page hit ranking as some kind of popularity rating. I’m therefore disappointed this article starts with a false premise within it’s first sentence. Reading on through the review I got the distinct feeling that rather than this being an objective review, instead it came across as a comparison to an as-yet unmentioned distro. As an example, you place in your Cons list single-click and the theme, I’m guessing you hadn’t intended to convey these two as failures or faults but rather as two default settings that are not to your personal liking, and yet there they are in your Cons list. Perhaps renaming your lists to “What Does And Doesnt Match My Personal Taste” The lack of objectivity finally was confirmed by your closing statement “If you really want to learn Linux, install vanilla Debian XFCE. Debian XFCE is still my number one XFCE distro.” The general body of the review does provide useful information in a concise manner overall, so it’s not to be discounted out of hand but some objectivity in future reviews would not go amiss.

Marcus Mikhailov Operatsii s otkrytym iskhodnym kodom

Looking at the screen shots it looks as though it does not provide a decent graphical experience? Was the author using a fractional scaling setting? Because it sure looks bad in every screen shot. This has been my frustration with Linux, terrible support for anything but native resolution or integer scaling. All Linux desktops seem to be baked with the same recipe although slightly changed to call it different.

Thanks for all nice reviews! Your time is really appreciated.

Since you like the KDE desktop, I propose that you review the MX Linux KDE edition. It has a newer kernel (64bit only), and a much better look and feel. I personally use MX KDE in my desktop, and the XFCE 32bit version in my very old laptop.

Merry Christmas!

Just installed MX linux on my old xubuntu Hp laptop 32 bit …wow everything that did'nt work under xubuntu now works ….like samba config….folder sharing …..and so on and on Thanks Guys and gals ….great job

xfce panel should be a pros for me.

The reason I held off using MX is I got the impression its developer base was pretty small whereas that for debian is the motherlode. Maybe not benign dictator mode like Slackware, but illness or other non-engagement of one or two key individuals and with MX will the maintenance even for security continue? That's why, with the help of your guide on installing debian, I did a dual boot install a few months ago using its x32 non-free, Stable 10, Xfce. And as you say, you will need to learn. The learning such as it has been has not been the problem. The issue for me is the bizarre package selection for the Xfce distribution which if memory serves has four terminal applications but nothing I can see that replicates the likes of basic system utilities and common applications like the following. So the neophtye has the additional work of finding out what is missing (time consuming in itself) and then learning to install it. Examples: clementine doublecommander gparted gpg keepassxc meld package-update-indicator part timeshift vlc wine

(And compared with the MS Windows equivalents in the case of meld (e.g. for Windows: Directory Compare) and doublecommander (e.g. for Windows: FreeCommander XE) the Linux equivalents don't rate though doublecommander is pretty much there now).

Plus the Xfce desktop is visually quite poor and the Thunar file manager is like a basic Windows Explorer whereas the multi-functionality of FreeCommander XE has led me to using it in Windows almost as a substitute shell.

I'd like to make some representations to whoever compiles the Xfce Stable package over this but where are they? Asking at http://forums.debian.net/ looks unlikely to provide an answer even in the Beginners' Questions section as some responders there seem to spend more time drafting reasons why the question should not have been asked in the first place than in actual providing a substantive reply. (It would be better if they remained silent imo). Alternatively maybe post here and risk unintentionally starting a flame war: https://lists.debian.org/search.html

So I'm now veering back into cognitive dissonance mindscape. Do I persevere with finding and adding all the basic missing stuff into debian Xfce, or do I strike out and go with Xubuntu as something supposedly more suited to the beginner/intermediate, on the premise no familiarity with it means I have no contempt for it yet? ( I will say however that Xubuntu does seem to be the best 'buntu for stability and performance based on the Distrowatch user reviews). At least debian and Ubuntu each have resources that seem more likely to assure ongoing maintenance and development.

hej super recenzja , bardzo dziekuje za pokarzanie wad , : conky ale i resta tez pozdrawiam dziekuej