To Do List After installing Linux Mint 17 OS Supported until April 2019. Tutorial updated on Fri. Jan. 2nd., 2015. Linux Mint is a Linux distribution for desktop computers, based on Ubuntu or Debian. Linux Mint is aimed at being a “modern, elegant and comfortable operating system which is both powerful and easy to use.” Mint provides full out- of-the-box multimedia support by including some proprietary software such as Java and Adobe Flash. Mint’s motto is “from freedom came elegance”. No more viruses, no more spyware/malware, and Ubuntu-based Linux Mint OS is free. Netflix now works out of the box via the latest Google Chrome stable and Steam is available for gaming enthusiasts. While at the core Linux Mint is mostly based on Ubuntu, the design of the desktop and User interface are very different. These differences include a very unique desktop theme, a custom Linux Mint menu and the MintTools, a collection of system tools designed to make managing the computer easier for users. A new version of Linux Mint is released every 6 months with new features and improvements. Each Linux Mint release comes with bug fixes and new security updates for about 18 months. If these bug fixes and security updates are crucial to you, then you should keep upgrading your system to latest released. Most differences are on the desktop. Ubuntu and Linux Mint both focus on usability, but Linux Mint offers a different user experience, and it includes a number of applications that are not available in Ubuntu (see aforementioned Mint Tools). Many popular multimedia codecs are installed by default in Linux Mint. Ubuntu, and many other gratis GNU/Linux distributions, do not distribute these codecs with the initial install media due to patent issues. Ubuntu has a vastly larger support community than Linux Mint. However, the majority of Ubuntu help and advice is also applicable to Linux Mint. 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What are the differences between Linux Mint and Ubuntu OS? www.howtogeek.com/115041/ For more specific information (recommended): www.linuxmint.com wiki.ubuntu.com/TrustyTahr/ help.ubuntu.com/community linuxcommand.org/tlcl.php ubuntuguide.org www.psychocats.net/ubuntu/index.php ow.ly/rymzE System Hardware Requirements: Minimum 384 MB of RAM 700 MHz processor (about Intel Celeron or better) 5 GB of hard-drive space VGA capable of 1024×768 screen resolution Either a CD/DVD drive or a USB port for the installer media Recommended 1 GB of RAM Dual Core processor 10 GB of hard-drive space or SSD (the more hard disk capacity, the better) Any graphics card with OpenGL 1.4 support (All GPUs released today by either NVidia, AMD or Intel; GPUs released by NVidia and AMD over the last 5 years; GPUs released by Intel after the GMA 950). If you are building a system avoid NVidia cards. Either a CD/DVD drive or a USB port for the installer media Internet access is helpful Here is a really nice overview video for Mint Mate (use the little gear icon to change to HD quality): Here is a really nice overview video for Mint Cinnamon (use the little gear icon to change to HD quality): Download Mint OS 17 based on Ubuntu 14.04 LTS and supported until April 2019: http://www.linuxmint.com/download.php Linux Mint Free Technical Support Forums: forums.linuxmint.com/ Existing Linux Mint and Ubuntu users can install Unetbootin (or use Startup Disc Creator in Ubuntu or USB Stick Formatter/Image Writer in Mint), and use any of those applications to migrate the above downloaded image to a USB Flash Drive or USB Thumb Drive. Afterwards you can boot from your USB drive, or you can burn it to a disc with Brasero, or K3b, and boot from your CD/DVD drive instead. USB is much faster than CDs or DVDs when it comes to installation time, and less chance of data corruption. Note: If you are using an older version of Linux Mint or Ubuntu you might need to download and install Unetbootin from their website to support the latest ISO downloaded image files. www.ubuntu.com/download/help/create-a-usb-stick-on-ubuntu www.ubuntu.com/download/help/burn-a-dvd-on-ubuntu Existing Windows users can use these instructions on how to install Linux Mint for the first time if you are new to Linux Mint and Ubuntu. You can figure out if you are running 32-bit or 64-bit hardware too. I recommend using a USB Flash Thumb Drive to install Linux Mint. (Recommended): windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/32-bit-and-64-bit-windows#1TC=windows-7 www.ubuntu.com/download/help/create-a-usb-stick-on-windows https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_nB_3mW2CnU www.ubuntu.com/download/help/burn-a-dvd-on-windows If you are currently running Windows: Format your USB flash drive “thumb drive” device using a FAT32 partition. Download win32imagewriter from here. Extract the ZIP archive to the directory of your choice, preferably the download directory the Linux Mint ISO is stored. Run the Win32ImageWriter program, and click the folder icon in the Image File section. In the window to “Select a disk image,” navigate to your download directory the ISO is in, and type “*.iso” without the quotes. The image should appear. Click the Save button. Select your USB device from the list under “Device”. Click the “Write” button to write the image to the USB drive. Tutorial on how-to disable Windows UEFI “Secure Boot” if you have a newer Windows PC: help.ubuntu.com/community/UEFI When you have Linux Mint downloaded, and installed onto a USB Flash Thumb Drive, you will need to boot your computer from the USB Flash Drive. When you turn on your computer there should be an option at the bottom of your screen to allow you to change the boot order temporarily or you may need to select BIOS settings, and then reconfigure your BIOS settings to boot from your USB port first, instead of your HDD. You can change it back to the default when you are done installing Linux Mint. You will need to have your newly created Linux Mint installation USB inserted in your USB port when the computer is booting up. If this is your first time using Linux Mint on your computer, please make sure that you thoroughly test everything with your Live Linux Mint USB drive and to make sure all of your hardware is supported on your computer before installing it to your hard drive. Special Notes about wiping your personal data before installing Linux OS: If you have a hard drive that you need to have magnetically shredded because you are giving your computer to someone else for example, Dban will overwrite everything, even sectors marked as bad. Formatting a hard drive is not the same as shredding. If you have an SSD drive, instead of an ordinary old-fashioned hard drive, that you need to have shredded, make sure to try to use the disc that came from the factory since SSD drives are usually encrypted and for other reasons as will be explained here. Check with the manufacturer of your computer or the company that created your internal SSD drive device to see if they have a disc image they would recommend for wiping your particular SSD drive clean. Now the following method of wiping your hard drive is completely fine for SATA and Ultra IDE old-fashioned hard drives that have spinning platters. SSD drives don’t spin because they are solid state and without moving parts. Here is where you can download dban to burn onto a blank cd-r/dvd-r disc to use for traditional hard drive data shredding: http://sourceforge.net/projects/dban/ http://www.dban.org/ Here is a brief explanation, traditional hard drives store files in physical locations on a magnetic platter, which is then indexed in the file system and accessed using a mechanical arm. This is a very linear way of doing things. While SSD also uses file systems to communicate data storage locations to the host system, and they independently reshuffle data for wear leveling. Those changes are recorded on a separate map. In other words, SSDs do not use any physically indexable locations, and software cannot specifically target sectors on the disk. Okay, if you are using a traditional non-SSD hard drive device here is how you can use your existing live installation flash drive you have previously created with this tutorial to do this task, but only if you trust yourself enough to do this manually (intermediate to advanced users only and please read all the instructions first before issuing them in Terminal): In Terminal copy and paste: sudo dd if=/dev/zero of=/dev/XdY Before issuing that command in Terminal, where XdY is the drive, (i.e.