Zorin OS 17.2 Review: Best Distro for Beginners?

[@dragonballjiujitsu]

ZorinOS is what Ubuntu should have been. I've been using it on one computer or another for a few years now and its great. Maybe even better than Linux Mint now.

[@Magnetar83]

I think it's much better than Linux mint. There's fever bugs and it looks way more polished.

[@sharkuel]

ZorinOS is a solid option, both for beginners and for people that simply want things done. It was my first Linux Distro, eventually I am on Arch, and I am happy where I am, but Zorin to me is up there with Linux Mint in terms of usability and ease of access.

[@GarryGri]

So what does Arch do for you that Zorin doesn't?

[@sharkuel]

@@GarryGri access to the CachyOS bore scheduler and Cachy Repos, the overwhelming number of packages available, the fact that I can set up the system as the way I like, and up-to-date packages that as a sound-engineer and video editor makes a huge diference.

[@GarryGri]

@@sharkuel Fair enough if Zorin can't do that 😎 Out of interest, what are the sound and video editing packages you use that Zorin can't run?

[@guilherme5094]

It really is a great option, and even for advanced users, it's a distro that just works.

[@ZebedeeBoss]

That was just Ryan and myself trying to give the Team - little panic moments - Extreme Distro Hopping - hahaha 🤣

[@EZBlast]

I run Zorin with KDE Plasma back-porting Kubuntu for Ubuntu's latest KDE. Zorin framework supports it and totally flawless.

[@xelatonivs8691]

Plasma 6?

[@JazeOracle]

Fascinating

[@raderator]

Started with Zorin three years ago because it was the first distro I saw that wasn't ugly. Tried a bunch of distros on Ventoy but see no reason to hop.

[@BobbyM-p2z]

Zorin is my go to also my first linux distro.

[@philpreston3072]

Have been using Zorin 17.2 for nearly a month now running off USB stick and have been pretty happy. Love the different options on how to access and launch apps, which I always wished Windows would do. Very happy that Zorin can also view and open files from my Windows partitions. My CPU fan doesn't run so hard now on Linux. Even managed to setup Vietnamese language input and run Zoom. Transferring photos from Sony Camera and mobile have worked too. Hardly missing out on anything that Windows offers

[@brq034]

Zorin is awesome. It reminds me of the boxed commercial Linux days of Mandrake and Xandros. They also do a good job of marketing to the desktop user while Ubuntu has shifted to marketing to server use (even if its Zorin’s based).

[@michaelbuddy]

Zorin is an Ubuntu derivative it seems. And I assumed it was maybe more stripped down. But what surprised me is it had the drivers ready for a 2014 mac mini wireless that other debian derived distros (including ubuntu) didn't have out of the box. Because of that, I'm using Zorin. I don't know what it doesn't have that maybe Ubuntu or Mint might have, but I needed my main problem solved. That's a huge deal when it comes to rescuing old hardware and recommending to normies.

[@Magnetar83]

Do you know how to get the icons on the taskbar closer together? I find that they're too spaced apart. The same goes for the icons on the left.

[@denyspopovich7668]

What might be the point to choose Zorin over Mint if you need the distro that "just works"?

[@JazeOracle]

Zorin Interface is better and customizable.

[@brq034]

There’s paid support if you need it. For example, if you run a small business. To me it feels more thematically polished, though both are excellent for newcomers.

[@waynebickell1793]

Wow! Back in the day I was switching between Mandrake KDE and RedHat Gnome (Before it became Fedora) trying to decide what to replace OS/2 Warp 4.5 with! Windows anything was never an option! I was glad to see the back of DOS and Windows 3.1 (With PC-Tools to make it usable!)

[@xelatonivs8691]

Zorin OS is very nice, fast, and easy to use. Plus all my steam games work on it.

[@sitaroartworks]

That is in any distro that literally can install all the necessary packages for proton and DXVK, even with Intel ARC GPUs nowadays :)

[@GarryGri]

I never got to the Distro hopping stage. Then again I came from a UNIX administration background (mostly SUN and HP) and had to do the really involved command line stuff for a living. I do not want a personal operating system that makes me do all that stuff to get seemingly simple things to work. I still have SED and AWK flashbacks from my time as a 'Senior UNIX Systems Admin!' I've run various versions of Zorin for at least Four to Five years now (Before that I generally used Puppy). For me it just works and does what I need it to do. I have very rarely had to do things at the command prompt. I really don't understand why people want to do this nowadays!

[@iphorctv6972]

i had the same problem with distro hopping and zorin solve my problem also, i'm a beginer in linux so i just wanna move over from windows cage, my problem was that i have only one game that i play, that being dota 2, i try almost all of them, the only one that i get same result as windows in that game, is zorin, idk how, but it work, and now i stay on this until it brakes or they decide to not make it again, zorin the best :D

[@raderator]

Dash to Panel and Arc Menu are forks of Zorin extensions so they have contributed that to the Gnome community. But Zorin is just nicer. For instance, it's the only distro I've tried where every app respects dark mode. Wayland is the default on 17.2 and I have had no problems with it.

[@DestinationLinux]

We found out the extension contributions shortly after when Artyom Zorin joined us for an interview :D

[@JazeOracle]

Good Show

[@sitaroartworks]

Imagine if Zorin OS gets more independent with Debian repositories instead of Canonical garbage.

[@TJWolf]

Zorin OS is awesome, How dare you put for Beginners as Title? advance users too. Been using zorin 16.2 still on it as we speak rock stable. going to upgrade to 17.2 Only thing about zorin is the price of pro $47.99 is way to high. considering this day and age as Linux is open source. I think $30 would be more far. as everythin you get in zorin you can do in Ubuntu or another.

[@DestinationLinux]

They position it as a distribution for people switching themselves including claiming there is no learning curve. Besides we didn’t say just for beginners. -MT

[@brads2041]

Paying for pro is optional. The free core is just fine. Paying is mostly to support the developers and maybe you need some support

[@TJWolf]

​@@DestinationLinux $47.99 way to much. when you can get same thing in reg gnome or xfce. no real deal breaker. at least if its that steep make it half % off newer upgrades or something. i can get like 15 subs from subway for that even more if go to fast food place. LOL good luck selling these days people want good deals not a crap one

[@sitaroartworks]

Explain me how you can isolate specific packages, updates and desktop environments in Zorin OS without using Terminal, from a GUI. You simply can't. So, that's why is a beginner distro.

[@DestinationLinux]

The pro is optional and mostly cosmetic, it is in no way a requirement for a good experience so the price of it doesn’t matter ultimately since if you don’t want to buy it, you don’t have to. - MT

[@TheDesertBlizzard]

What is the best OS for total god level Linux experts and what does that look like?

[@GarryGri]

What does that even mean? It's an operating system!

[@TheDesertBlizzard]

@ Well. We know what an OS looks like for people new to Linux. Like to know what one looks like for those with loads of Linux experience. Furthermore, I would like to know why those that exists for experienced Linux users exists to begin with.

[@GarryGri]

@@TheDesertBlizzard I must just be stoopid, because I still don't really understand what you mean... The GUI you use makes little difference to the basic operating system fundamentals underneath. But does often make a big difference to usability and accessibility. When I started there were no decent GUI desktops for Linux. Most didn't come with a GUI at all. I used to do a lot with UNIX command line admin, installation and bug fixing for a living because I had no choice. Doesn't mean I want to work like that now!? But I'm not casting stones. I'm sure you know what you mean and I'm just not getting it. That's ok.

[@iamjiwjr]

Lindows/Linspire, not Ubuntu, first made Linux easy. Ubuntu built on Linspire.

[@DestinationLinux]

Mandrake was actually the first because they did it in 1999 vs Lindows in 2001. However, neither of those survived as distros so Ubuntu was the first to do it while also being sustainable. In fact, just a couple years into Ubuntu, Linspire was rebased onto Ubuntu so sure Linspire as a brand started earlier and Lindows earlier than that but Lindows was sold to Microsoft for a cash out and Linspire became a derivative of Ubuntu so I don’t consider their impact greater than Ubuntu. Besides they weren’t the first ultimately either because of Mandrake - MT

[@mansourimohamedlamine]

whey i install linux windows 2077 run better 100000000 more than linux 1987

[@wise-succubin]

zorin os is an obscure wallpaper flip meme distro, luring beginners into it is dooming them to be left alone without any support. just install kubuntu instead, at least you will get something more up to date lol.

[@DestinationLinux]

Zorin offers support and even posted a job to hire someone for support recently - MT

[@brads2041]

Kind of an uninformed opinion. It's actually relatively popular, has a good community, is based on Ubuntu LTS plus is now in the hwe system so the kernel tends to be updated about every 6 months. As for apps, any app that someone wants to keep up to date, use Flatpak. It works out fine. The desktop is based on Gnome 43 with some extensions.

[@michaelbuddy]

Now I'm tempted to convert my installation of zorin gnome to lxde. or xfce whaterver it'scalled.