Selecting a Linux distribution can be really hard
because there’s so many similar choices.
In this Versus episode,
we’re gonna take a look at Linux Mint and Ubuntu Linux,
and see which one’s right for you.
Before we get started on this Versus video,
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Alright, let’s dive in.
There’s a lot of distributions out there
but in this Versus episode,
we’re gonna focus on two of the most popular:
Ubuntu Linux and Linux Mint.
Now, these two have a couple of big differences
that we can highlight real quick here with some background information.
First off, Ubuntu uses a different Desktop Manager than Mint.
In Ubuntu, we have the Gnome Desktop Manager,
and in Linux Mint, we have the Cinnamon Desktop Manager.
That gives them both a very different visual feel
that we’ll see a little bit later.
Also, they’re both available in different flavors,
so you can get them with different Desktop Managers, if you choose.
And that starts to bring them closer in line,
and now they look very similar again,
but their origins are very different.
Ubuntu was released in 2004 by Canonical.
It’s got a corporate entity behind it,
so there’s actually a lot of people
that worked to put that product together.
Versus Linux Mint,
which was created in 2006 by an individual person
and has grown into a volunteer team,
so much more grassroots than corporate.
Now, the origin of each of these, they weren’t created from scratch.
They were both forks of previously existing operating systems,
mostly Debian.
So you’ll see where Ubuntu is actually a fork of Debian,
and Linux Mint is a fork of Ubuntu, which is a fork of Debian.
So these are all really related,
and again, that makes them appear to be very similar.
But we also have another huge difference,
which is the target audience.
With Linux Mint, they really focused on the desktop experience.
So for the desktop users,
what can make it the easiest for them to use?
But Ubuntu is a little more flexible,
they focused on not just one area,
but: servers, desktops, IoT’s, supercomputers...
really, really flexible way that you can use that operating system.
Alright now, I mentioned the user interfaces are different.
Let’s take a look at each one and get an idea of what that means.
Let’s get started with Ubuntu.
What I’m running here is a default install of Ubuntu Linux 20.04,
and you’ll see the Gnome Desktop Manager.
It’s very unique compared to other operating systems.
You’ve got a Task Manager,
or taskbar over here on the left.
I can see some default applications
like Firefox, and Thunderbird Mail,
we’ve got a Music Player, their App Store, and so on.
And then I’ve got an Application Library button here.
If I click that, I’ll see all of my Applications come up,
and I can start to pick and choose what I want to run.
And we even have multiple desktop support,
if we wanna have virtual desktops to lay things across.
Gnome is designed to be a very efficient,
user-friendly operating system.
And the folks at Canonical have made a few minor changes to it
to make it a little more tablet-friendly as well,
so that’s why we see nice large,
well-defined buttons over here.
They’re easier to touch with your finger when you’re on a touchscreen.
So, all things they’ve kind of taken into account.
We also have Power Management,
our login and log off options,
those are up at the top right of the screen.
So, they’re very designed to be a user interface
that’s kind of out of your way.
Applications get the primary focus.
When I’m running an Application,
it will get most of the screen,
all the other controls are out of sight, out of mind.
Now let’s take a look at Linux Mint.
Linux Mint uses the Cinnamon Desktop Manager,
and it’s very different than what we saw on Ubuntu.
First off, you’ll notice that things are pretty small.
It’s not focused on the touch interface at all.
They expect a mouse and a keyboard,
so all the controls are rendered smaller on the screen.
And I don’t have a taskbar on the left side,
I have a taskbar down here at the button.
I see a button for Linux Mint,
with their little logo I can bring up to get to a Menu.
And if you’re coming from the Windows world,
this should look really familiar to you.
Linux Mint wanted to make a desktop
that was easy for people to switch to.
And back when Windows 7 was being end of life,
they knew a lot of people would be switching to Linux,
and they wanted to give them a similar environment,
something they were used to,
so they wouldn’t have to be retrained.
So that’s what we’re seeing here,
is basically the equivalent of a Start Menu.
At the bottom left, we’ve got our File Explorer
and other options right here in the taskbar;
at the bottom right,
I’ve got my clock, my volume, my network,
and I’ve got desktop icons very, very similar to Microsoft Windows.
So that’s the primary goal here of this desktop environment,
is to make it easy for users to switch in
without having to be retrained;
completely different design dynamic than what we saw over at Ubuntu.
So we just saw the desktops which is a pretty big difference.
Let’s talk about some of the similarities:
First, the App Store.
Both Ubuntu and Linux Mint
are forks down the road from Debian,
and that means they run pretty much the identical set of applications.
So you’re not going to see a huge difference between the two.
Ubuntu does have their own App Store
where they do curated software.
In Linux Mint, we have the Software Manager
which is basically the same thing, curated software.
There’s some minor differences
but most people will never notice them.
Upgradability.
Both of these are fully upgradable
and because they’re effectively free for most people,
there's no reason not to upgrade.
You’ll see updates come out every six months,
and the upgrades are typically automatic.
So there is a Software Update Manager
that’s running in the background
that will take care of updating your packages,
as well as the operating system itself.
And then lastly, Installation.
They both use the same Installation Wizard.
So it’s really just clicking Next a bunch of times,
maybe you want to customize your harddrive layout, maybe not,
but it’s done the same way in either one.
So if you know how to install Ubuntu,
you know how to install Linux Mint, and vice versa.
So those are basically interchangeable.
Now, let’s talk about the differences.
There’s a couple of things that can really jump out
that identify where one distro will be better over another one.
The Desktop Manager is probably the big obvious one.
In fact, that’s going to be one of the major decision points here.
If you like that Cinnamon interface,
then Linux Mint may be right for you.
If you prefer the Gnome interface,
then Ubuntu may be right for you.
But those are interchangeable,
we can actually change out the interface.
So, some of the other differences start to come into play.
Let’s talk about System Requirements.
With Ubuntu, they recommend you have
a minimum of 4 Gigabytes of RAM to do a basic install.
In the Linux Mint world,
they recommend a minimum of 2 Gigabytes.
And that means that Linux Mint
is a little bit more friendly on lower end hardware.
If you have older computers, old laptops laying around,
Linux Mint may run a little bit better there than Ubuntu,
although Ubuntu can be scaled back if need be.
Cost and Support.
Linux Mint is completely, totally free.
There’s no way to pay for it, it’s just free.
But you get basically no support.
There is a community that’s available,
you can post questions, but it’s not real support,
so you’re on your own with Linux Mint.
Ubuntu on the other hand has a whole commercial arm.
You can pay for commercial support.
They don’t sell Ubuntu, the operating system is free.
You can download, install and run it,
it doesn’t cost you a dime.
But if you wanna pay, then you can get support,
you can call them on the phone,
or open up an email ticket,
and they’ll help you through your issues,
which makes it a lot more friendly for business use.
And that’s that next icon there.
On the business side, Ubuntu is a very viable option.
Linux Mint really isn’t,
because there’s no chance to get support,
you typically don't want to use that in your business.
If something goes wrong, you’re on your own,
you’ve got to fix it, it’s not supported.
Also, Ubuntu is a little faster at getting updates
because Mint is building off of what Ubuntu has done,
so it’s a little bit slower on the update side,
which makes Linux Mint a little less attractive for business users.
The Release Schedule.
I mentioned six month updates, right?
So every six months,
both Ubuntu and Linux Mint do releases.
However, there is a difference in long term support releases.
You don’t want to have to upgrade every six months,
that’s a hassle,
especially in an enterprise where you might have thousands of computers.
So, what Ubuntu does is,
every two years they do what’s called an LTS,
or a Long Term Servicing branch.
And a Long Term Servicing release is supported for five years.
So that means you really only have to upgrade every five years.
Yes, you need to do security updates
but a major upgrade is every five years.
In Linux Mint, it’s every two years.
So they have a more frequent update schedule.
For an individual user on their desktop at home, that’s fine.
In an enterprise, that’s a bit of a headache.
Backup Systems.
Well, they both have support for basically the same backup software,
so not a huge difference from that side.
But one thing Ubuntu does shine at
is they directly support the ZFS File System
which has some really neat snapshotting and backup utilities
that can piggyback off of it to make it easier to backup software.
So Ubuntu definitely gets a bit of an edge on that side.
Customization.
Well, Ubuntu is constantly used as the basis for other distros,
like Linux Mint.
There are literally hundreds of distros that are based on Ubuntu.
You can customize it however you want, and release it,
and know that it’s going to be stable and secure.
And a lot of people do that.
Linux Mint on the other hand,
really only has a handful of forks off of it.
But most people would go back to the Ubuntu side.
So Ubuntu is considered to be heavily customizable
for creating your own distro.
But both are customizable, just in terms of your own machine.
You can tweak just about any setting that you want
and you have a lot of flexibility.
Now, Gaming.
This is gonna be a big deciding factor for some of you out there.
I’ve mentioned some of the business case stuff,
but let’s talk about personal.
When you talk about video games,
the number one store for buying video games right now is Steam,
and Steam directly supports Ubuntu.
You can go to Valve’s Steam page
and download a deb package which will install in Debian.
It will actually install in Linux Mint as well.
But some little things may not work quite right.
At Valve, they are only testing on Ubuntu.
And so if you want to do video gaming
with something like Steam’s library,
then you’ll want to run Ubuntu for that.
So it’s got better gaming support.
In Linux Mint,
there’s a few games that are packaged with the distro.
They’re kind of older, it’s really an afterthought there,
it’s not a primary design decision.
Although it’s not really a primary design decision for Canonical either,
it’s just that Valve has chosen that one
as the distro they want to support.
Alright, so the bottom line.
The bottom line here is,
if you are working in an enterprise or a business environment:
IoTs, servers, desktops, supercomputers,
Ubuntu is going to be the better choice for you.
It gives you the most flexibility and consistency.
If you're an end user or a home user,
then Linux Mint might work better for you.
It’s a more user-friendly desktop environment
that helps people switching from Windows 7 into the Linux world,
and it’s just kind of an easier adoption cycle.
However, I’ll tell you,
as somebody who works on Linux every single day,
I like to have a consistent environment.
So if I want a consistent environment between my work and my home,
Ubuntu really is the best choice for that.
It gives us the most options and flexibility.
And once you learn it in one method,
it applies to the other,
so it gives you a consistent environment to learn.
Well, that’s about it for this Versus episode.
Hopefully, I helped you decide between which one is right for you:
Ubuntu Linux or Linux Mint.
And if you’re interested in more Linux training
from the great folks at ITProTV, or even myself,
be sure to check us out on our website at: itpro.tv.
You’ll find tons of Linux courses available for you.
I look forward to seeing you there.