Unfortunately, I am a little disappointed. I think I had very high expectations, as many of us did, because Mint 11 was a difficult act to follow and since mint has improved with every new version. So I was very excited about the release of Mint 12 with high expectations.

However,I became frustrated with Gnome3 in M12 like many of the other post-ees. Now don’t get me wrong overall I like the look of mint 12, and I think that the MGSE significantly improved the car crash of G3 and it is worlds ahead of unity. Clem and the team must be congratulated on this work so far. However, unfortunately it didn’t go far enough. Now, I realise Clem and co did all they can – considering they grappled with g3 and mate at the same time- so much respect. So I think that MGSE is promising and hope work will continue to tame and minitify G3 further. Mint has always been a force for good in that repect and so I have no doubts

As I said I became frustrated when I tried to get it set up – to the way I work -as close as I had it mint 11- So, of course I experienced the same difficulties in customisation etc…rather akin to putting a square peg in a round hole….I also found that my work flow was significantly affected. Now that is not the fault of the M12 team but of G3. I remind people that the mint team ameliorated many of the potential problems- but acknowledge that too many still remain. Thus I feel that it Lisa is a valiant effort or should be viewed as work in progress. And I will watch this space with interest.

I should add it was stable for the most part. Though it has crashed a couple of times- but am not sure if that was me tinkering or the OS. Ill work that out and let you know if it is a bug.

Turning to Mate: as Chris@LAS said in his review its like returning home. I liked the look and feel- as this is something I’m more use to- it certainly allowed me to work without trying to figure out a new way of doing things. Although like many others I experienced difficulties trying to modify themes. I also experienced problems when adding a auto-hiding panel at the top with applets- It froze and crashed. When I got back in- there were two panels at the top and no mint menu. So its a bit buggy yet- but that is to be expcted i guess. I haven’t looked at the patches/fixes for mate yet and when I have time I will investigate this. But I think Mate is promising and am pleased Clem is involved in that project- which reassures me that it will probably be a future feature/DE candidate in Mint.

OK lets address a few things posted above: I suppose people are conservative with a little c- and people tend not to like change. Yes granted but I also agree that we cope with change with the denial, discovery stages etc. People are inherently adaptable when they need to be. That said a paradigm shift for the sake of it can be counter productive if it offers no advantages and is indeed an impediment to using the tool (computers). As an archaeologist I deal with technology at the other end of the historical scale to this (PCs) but there are parallels. Some technological paradigms persisted for many years (thousands) because they worked and were only replaced when the new technology offered definite advantages. That is not to say other innovations did not come and go. With Gnome 3 we are at an important transition. I suppose most would not deny G2 was great. We accept that Clem and the gang had g3 thrust on them – if they were to keep using Ubuntu as a base for the main edition. But as some post-ers have noted when g4 comes it should be more stable and customisable. If not the gnome project will die. Survival of the bet fit and all that….So I think we have to be pragmatic. Lisa is promising as it shows that Clem and the team are progressive-making m12 the best g3 distro out there. They problem solved in the greatest tradition human technological innovation.

I understand this is emotive for many but look at it in context. The mint team improved a bad situation. Not perfect granted. Personally I will keep using Katia, but will continue to play with Lisa- hoping that either Mate matures or G3 shell and MGSE becomes more like we are use to with that definite technological advantage I mentioned – for m13.

So well done team impressed what you achieved – keep up the development. Also i note that just because g3 was thrust on you for the main edition- I realise that you don’t have that impediment for LMDE so I am watching with interest what will happen there. Thanks Mint Team and Community

The notifications are not so irritatig as in the previous Ubuntu/LM releases.

GNOME 3 is not so bad as many people take it to be. It’s not hard to get used to it.

Linux Mint 12 works fine with Intel hardware, CPUs and video cards.

I saw just a couple of complains about Nvidia cards in the Russian-speaking community at vk.com.

Generally, Linux Mint 12 is a great success.