Running mint12 x64 so far has not caused me any grief. So far I have had no issues with hibernate or suspend yet. An. Instead of installing chrome I installed chromium from the mint repos and no issues with flash or PDF. On Feb 10, 2012 4:07 PM, "Jim March" <1.jim.march@gmail.com> wrote: > OK. So I hate Unity with a passion. Sorry. I'm not going to argue > about it, it just isn't my thing. > > I can deal with Gnome3 set to classic mode - while the menus are a bit > annoying plus there's that whole "hold ALT to modify the toolbar > stuff", there's some quite decent stability enhancements that make the > nuisance parts worth it. > > The question then is, do you want to go with Linux Mint 12 (which is > basically Ubuntu Oneiric tweaked to no-Unity plus restricted > codecs/players) or do you run "real Ubuntu Oneiric" and hand-tweak > Unity out yourself? > > Well the answer to me has come down to "tweak Oneiric". > > 1) Mint 12 just "felt unstable". Hybernate-to-disk didn't work (across > two machines) and other small glitches popped up here and there. > Nothing show-stopper but still, very obviously some unpolished bits. > > 2) The first time I installed Mint 12 (32bit) I got > whole-disk-encryption working via the scripts at: > > http://community.linuxmint.com/tutorial/view/344 > > For reasons I don't understand at all, it stopped working. I tried it > in 32bit, failed, tried again in 64bit when I recently scored a more > potent machine (more memory for starters) and yet again, failure. This > forced me into the "encrypted home folder" plan which is quite > possibly where some of the glitches occurred - possibly including the > hibernation fail. > > A few days ago I backed up and reinstalled clean from an Oneiric 64bit > alternate install disk. I did the "anti-Unity" tweaks at: > > http://www.webupd8.org/2011/10/things-to-tweak-after-installing-ubuntu.html > > ...to get "classic Gnome" running right, and they worked like a champ. > The only thing that went wrong was, on one of the reboots LightDM > failed completely and dumped me to a command prompt. But doing: > > sudo apt-get install gdm > > ...and picking the GDM startup manager fixed that. (The instructions > warn of problems with LightDM and sure enough, he's not kidding! I > ignored that and it bit me in the butt.) > > I now have fastest, most stable full-on setup I've ever run. It starts > up without Compiz but doing an ALT-F2 and "compiz --replace" gives me > the eye candy when I want it. Cool. > > Starting with real Ubuntu you need to do the usual tweaks (medibuntu, > load w32codecs or w64codecs, libdvdcss, flash player, extra gstreamer > stuff, etc. but that's not a big deal. > > Random thoughts: > > For my needs, the breakover point at which 64bit is a good idea is > 3gigs RAM. I need to run WinXP virtualized (VirtualBox for now but > since my latest lappy has hardware virt support in the CPU I'll switch > soon). 64bit code is bulkier so with 2gigs RAM and 768megs assigned to > the XP machine, RAM gets tight. With 32bit code, memory usage in more > efficient. At 3gigs of real RAM I can run 64bit and assign 1gig to the > XP VM with no problems. > > 64bit still has "glitches". For example, to get Adobe Flash going you > end up adding some 32bit libraries. Which is fine until you load > Google Chrome, at which point it wants the 64bit version of said > libraries. Ooops. This is solvable: the solution is to install the > google .deb file at the command line: > > sudo dpkg -i googlesupplieddebname.deb (after CDing into the dir with > the .deb file) > > ...and watch for what it fails on. Load synaptic if you haven't already: > > sudo apt-get install synaptic > > ...and use that to specifically load the 64bit versions of the > libraries it's choking on. (Leave the 32bit versions in there so flash > still works.) > > That said, the "64bit glitchies" are extremely minor and no trouble > for anybody slightly Linux-experienced to cope with. For total Linux > newbies OR those with 2gigs or less RAM I'm still recommending 32bit > and I suspect Precise won't change that. > > Jim > --------------------------------------------------- > PLUG-discuss mailing list - PLUG-discuss@lists.plug.phoenix.az.us > To subscribe, unsubscribe, or to change your mail settings: > http://lists.PLUG.phoenix.az.us/mailman/listinfo/plug-discuss >