Mint 16 Petra RC

I may actually upgrade my netbook to 16 and skip 15 based on the performance improvements alone. I also like the fact they added proper support for USB memory sticks/dongles/however you call them nowadays.
 
I've been enjoying 15, but might have to give 16 a shot now, thanks for the information ;)
 
The upgrade to 16 will give me a chance to try the backup tools in Mint. Plus, I've been using the dotfiles method as well for all my configs.
 
I've just loaded Mint 16 mate onto our old HP Q6600 to have a look at.
It's looking good for me so far. No instal or driver issues. It loaded easily.
There's so much not to like with all the free software.
I didn't persist with a version of Ubuntu I tried several years ago, but I like the feel on Mint so far.
 
^^I like Mint better off of a default install. Also it's fairly easy for Windows users to adapt to it.

I like Ubuntu 13.10 as well. That's after I install the restricted extras and then add programs/apps I like.

Personally, I didn't have problems adapting to Unity either.
 
I finally upgraded Mint 15 to 16 yesterday, reminding me why I tend to never do a version upgrade. When I could see messages about "this probably means your system is broken" and various other messages to do this or that over a very long upgrade, I kind of regretted it. lol

I don't have the heart to see if the upgrade was successful yet. I'm expecting problems with at least the binary Nvidia driver, even though it seemed to build fine during the upgrade, and who knows what. Ugh.
 
^^ Best wishes getting it worked out.

When I moved from 15 to 16 I went with a clean install. I played around with different DE off of a USB flash drive. I hadn't done that in a while. I settled on KDE this time for my desktop PC. It's flashy and intensive but I've the hardware to handle it fine. Currently, I'm using the 3.12.8 kernel with nVidia's 331.38 driver without issue.
 
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Hey guys, I really wanted to give this a go since I liked Mint 15 a lot. I'm a linux idiot, so I'm having a difficult time getting it installed like I did last time.

Previously, I had Mint 15 on a 30GB SSD (I still have it and use it as a troubleshooting drive). Now I have way too many SSD's for my own good so I decided to use a 120GB ForceGT for the new install so I could take advantage so SATA III, but on my Rampage IV Formula it seems the UEFI is causing some issues.

I can boot into the livedisk just fine but when I go to install it, it will eventually tell me that it isn't able to create the root and swap partitions and the installer stops. How can I fix this? I did some reading and people were saying UEFI was the issue but nothing on how to make it work, and especially nothing on how to make it work as a dual-boot with windows from a separate secondary hard drive (I have 6 in my machine total).
 
Blacklash said:
^^ Best wishes getting it worked out.
Click to expand...
It booted, but I'm not sure everything works. Kind of torn now between updating non-repository applications and just reinstalling everything. :-/
 
Hmm not sure about the UEFI thing. I'm on an ASRock Z77 Pro3 here. I installed Mint 16 from a USB flash drive to a Samsung SSD 830 that I had used secure erase on from a USB flash drive. I created that and kept it when I was on Win 7 with Samsung's SSD Magician app. I used the Universal USB Installer 1.9.5.2 to create the Mint installation. I believe I've secure boot disabled in the BIOS. I'm using a 3570k @ 4.6GHz for my CPU. I'm using the x64 flavor of Mint.

I should note when I started my system, I selected my USB flash drive with Mint on it from the boot menu as UEFI (My flash drive info here). The USB flash drive appeared on the boot menu twice, one entry was without the UEFI option and the other had it; I booted Mint live and installed it with the latter option. Tapping F11 while my system is posting is what sends me to the boot menu.

BTW for folks who game on Linux, I highly recommend installing CPU Freq, sudo apt-get install indicator-cpufreq, for Mint/Ubuntu etc.

I set my CPU to the performance option with that app before I game. It makes a large difference in Skyrim with the Ultra setting, particularly in cities. Heck, it greatly improves overall smoothness. My CPU doesn't reduce its clock at inopportune times while gaming if I set the performance option with that app.
 
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Blacklash said:
Hmm not sure about the UEFI thing. I'm on an ASRock Z77 Pro3 here. I installed Mint 16 from a USB flash drive to a Samsung SSD 830 that I had used secure erase on from a USB flash drive. I created that and kept it when I was on Win 7 with Samsung's SSD Magician app. I used the Universal USB Installer 1.9.5.2 to create the Mint installation. I believe I've secure boot disabled in the BIOS. I'm using a 3570k @ 4.6GHz for my CPU. I'm using the x64 flavor of Mint.

I should note when I started my system, I selected my USB flash drive with Mint on it from the boot menu as UEFI (My flash drive info here). The USB flash drive appeared on the boot menu twice, one entry was without the UEFI option and the other had it; I booted Mint live and installed it with the latter option. Tapping F11 while my system is posting is what sends me to the boot menu.

BTW for folks who game on Linux, I highly recommend installing CPU Freq, sudo apt-get install indicator-cpufreq, for Mint/Ubuntu etc.

I set my CPU to the performance option with that app before I game. It makes large difference in Skyrim with the Ultra setting, particularly in cities. Heck, it greatly improves overall smoothness. My CPU doesn't reduce its clock at inopportune times with the performance option set by that app.
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I can't boot to the flash drive with UEFI, it just stops at a blinking cursor. If I choose the legacy option it boots right into the live disk setting. I wonder if its an X79 thing or just the Asus UEFI. I'll have to play around with it some more this weekend.
 
LigTasm said:
I can't boot to the flash drive with UEFI, it just stops at a blinking cursor. If I choose the legacy option it boots right into the live disk setting. I wonder if its an X79 thing or just the Asus UEFI. I'll have to play around with it some more this weekend.
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That's odd. It sounds like your BIOS is using legacy mode. That's probably not the case, but something definitely seems off. I'm afraid I don't know much about X79 or your particular mobo. Maybe someone who is more clever than I will stop by.

Have you ever been able to install something like Win 7 or Win 8 in true UEFI mode with that mobo? I installed Win 7 in true UEFI mode from a USB flash drive on this ASRock Z77 Pro3 to my SSD 830 without issue. I selected the flash drive as UEFI like I did with Mint. I was using that before Mint. I should note, I couldn't install Win 7 in true UEFI mode to my SSD 830 with any other disks connected. It had to be the sole disk online at the time. I disconnected my backup disks when I installed.
 
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Blacklash said:
That's odd. It sounds like your BIOS is using legacy mode. That's probably not the case, but something definitely seems off. I'm afraid I don't know much about X79 or your particular mobo. Maybe someone who is more clever than I will stop by.

Have you ever been able to install something like Win 7 or Win 8 in true UEFI mode with that mobo? I installed Win 7 in true UEFI mode from a USB flash drive on this ASRock Z77 Pro3 to my SSD 830 without issue. I selected the flash drive as UEFI like I did with Mint. I was using that before Mint. I should note, I couldn't install Win 7 in true UEFI mode to my SSD 830 with any other disks connected. It had to be the sole disk online at the time. I disconnected my backup disks when I installed.
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Yeah, thats how I did 8.1 and it works fine. I don't have fast boot with it being X79, so the UEFI is kind of just shoved in there as an after thought. Tonight I'm going to mess with it some more, I'd really like to get it working.
 
LigTasm said:
Yeah, thats how I did 8.1 and it works fine. I don't have fast boot with it being X79, so the UEFI is kind of just shoved in there as an after thought. Tonight I'm going to mess with it some more, I'd really like to get it working.
Click to expand...

A few ideas; make sure OS type is set to Other OS in your BIOS, disable SATA controllers that aren't Intel. If that works try to install it. Obviously, use x64 Mint. This guide is for Windows and UEFI but some of it still may be useful to you.
 
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Blacklash said:
A few ideas; make sure OS type is set to Other OS in your BIOS, disable SATA controllers that aren't Intel. If that works try to install it. Obviously, use x64 Mint. This guide is for Windows and UEFI but some of it still may be useful to you.
Click to expand...

Thanks, I originally had the SSD on the asmedia SATA III controller and thought that might be the problem, so I moved it to the Intel controller and disabled that but the problem persisted. I will check and see about the OS type, that might be it. I forgot all about that as Windows doesn't typically have a problem with it.
 
Just wanted to come back and say a big thanks to Blacklash, it was the "other OS" setting in the BIOS. I changed it and had the install up and running in less than 5 minutes. Thanks.
 
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