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MX Linux has been sitting at the top of the DistroWatch page hit ranking for quite a while now. In fact, it is in the number one position for the one, three, six and twelve month rankings, so I wondered, is this a concerted campaign to promote this distribution by its fans, or just the result of flagrant curiosity? The MX Linux users I know are all very enthusiastic about it, so I thought it was time to give it an evaluation and find out what the appeal is.
MX started as a collaboration between the developers of AntiX and MEPIS. That latter distribution had been quite popular but the project stalled and its last release was on 10 August, 2013. When MEPIS development ended the two communities decided to work on a successor and MX Linux was conceived. The “M” is from MEPIS and the “X” from AntiX. The first release of the new MX was on 24 March, 2014, and was numbered MX-14, for the year of introduction.
Since its 2014 introduction, MX has had major and minor point releases every year. MX-21 was released on 18 September, 2021 and the follow-up point release, MX-21.2.1 on 18 September, 2022, was based on Debian 11.5 Bullseye.
The goal of the MX project is to produce a distribution “designed to combine elegant and efficient desktops with high stability and solid performance”.
MX has a lot of support available including good documentation, videos and a forum that is advertised as being “friendly”. There is also a complete set of user manuals in eight languages. The English version is a 192 page PDF file that is found on the MX website, and also provided with the ISO file with a link right from the desktop. I would think that would reduce the forum’s help traffic.
These days, there are six different MX downloads offered: Three have the Xfce desktop in 64-bit, 32-bit, and 64-bit AHS (Advanced Hardware Support) versions. With the 21.2.1 version, the AHS version uses the 5.18 Linux kernel for newer hardware like AMD Ryzen, AMD Radeon RX graphics, or to support 9th, 10th and 11th generation Intel processors. The standard download provides the older 5.10 Linux kernel.
There is also a 64-bit KDE desktop download, plus 64-bit and 32-bit versions with the Fluxbox window manager for older hardware.
The main “flagship” download is the Xfce version which the developers describe as “a midweight desktop environment that aims to be fast and low-resource, while still being attractive and user-friendly.”
Installation
I downloaded the 64-bit version of MX-21.2.1 “Wildflower” from the MX website via HTTP, since there is no BitTorrent option. While linked from the MX website, the downloads are all hosted on SourceForge.
Both MD5 and SHA256 sums are provided so I ran an SHA256 sum check from the command-line to make sure the download was good. The checksums are kind of hidden on the download mirrors page but there are links pointing to them.
The download size obviously will vary depending on the desktop chosen but the Xfce 64-bit version was a reasonable 1.7 GB.
MX is listed as specifically supported by Ventoy, so I dropped the ISO file onto my USB stick equipped with Ventoy 1.0.82 and it booted up very quickly.
System requirements
The MX users manual has some details for the minimum hardware required: A CD/DVD drive (and BIOS capable of booting from that drive), or a live USB (and BIOS capable of booting from USB) A modern i686 Intel or AMD processor 1 GB of RAM memory 6 GB free hard drive space For use as a LiveUSB, 4 GB free
The “recommended” hardware, though, is a bit higher spec, as it calls for 2 GB of RAM, 20 GB of hard drive space, a sound card, and a video card. It also suggests 4 GB of RAM if you are doing more RAM-intensive operations such as video editing.
I found that, with just Firefox open with 13 tabs, Thunar, FeatherPad, and the terminal window, I was using 4 GB of RAM, so I think 8 GB would be better for good performance.
Features
MX Linux is solidly aimed at desktop users, and it has a lot of features for that role, including a large assortment of custom, MX-specific utilities. This is not a stock Xfce desktop like you would find running on top of Debian; it has been modified at almost every level. There are 23 custom MX tools installed by default, including the MX Package Installer, MX Boot Options, MX Boot Repair, and MX Repo manager. The large number of settings would be daunting if they were not all collected together in the Settings Manager.
MX has purposely avoided using systemd as its initialization system, and, instead, employs SysV. This is no mean feat considering MX’s basis in Debian which does use systemd as its foundation. But, before systemd-haters rejoice, you need to know that systemd is actually installed by default anyway, although not activated. It turns out that it is needed to make things work, like Nvidia drivers for instance, so systemd is there, just not used for booting, a compromise that will likely make no one happy.
The standard Xfce4 desktop panel is used, but it is, by default, vertical on the left side of the screen, instead of at the top as is more commonly done in Xfce. This puts the menu button in the bottom-left corner, though, which probably aids the transition for Windows users, as well as for Linux users coming from desktops like KDE, LXDE or LXQt. In the vertical position, the panel actually acts much like the Ubuntu dock. It is user repositionable, too.
MX uses the Whisker menu that Xubuntu adopted as well. This menu is the most flexible on the Linux desktop, it can even be resized. Whisker is well-organized and makes finding applications fairly fast. Looking through the menus shows that for a 1.7 GB download, MX comes with a lot of applications already installed.
MX also comes with 36 wallpapers, which is good, as the default wallpaper may be busier than some users like. MX has 25 window themes, with the default being mx-comfort. All the window themes, even the light ones like Adwaita, seem to retain the same black top bar, though. There are 13 icon sets to choose from, with Papirus-mxbluedarkpanes as the default. So, as far as user customization goes, there are lots of choices, many of them unique to MX Linux.
Applications
Some of the applications included with MX Linux 21.2.1 are: ALSA Mixer 1.2.4 audio controller Archive Manager (file-roller) 3.38.1 archiver Asunder 2.9.7 CD ripper Catfish 4.16.3 file search Clementine 1.4 RC2 music player CUPS 2.3.3 printing system Disk-manager 22.01.02 disk manager Document Scanner (simple-scan) 3.38.1 optical scanner FeatherPad 1.3.1 text editor Firefox 104.0.2 web browser Foliate 2.6.3 ebook viewer Galculator 2.1.4 calculator GDebi 0.9.5.7 package manager Geany 1.37.1 lightweight IDE Gparted 1.2.0 partition editor Gnome PPP 0.3.23 dial-up tool gThumb 3.11.3 image viewer Gufw 20.04.1 Firewall LazPaint 7.1.6 image editor LibreOffice 7.0.4.2 office suite MX Package Installer 22.8.02 software store qtpdfview 0.4.18 PDF viewer Synaptic 0.90.2 package manager Timeshift 22.06.5 system restore utility Thunar 4.16.8 file manager Thunderbird 78.13.0 email client Transmission (transmission-gtk) 3.00 bittorrent client Webcamoid 8.8.0 webcam Wget 1.21 command line webpage downloader VLC 3.1.17.4 media player XfBurn 0.6.2 CD/DVD burner Xfce4-panel 4.16.3 desktop panel Xfce4-screenshooter 1.9.9 screenshot tool Xfce Terminal 0.8.10 terminal emulator
This is an impressively long list of default applications, especially for a 1.7 GB download. Just about everything is here for the desktop user, except perhaps a video editor. More applications can easily be added, of course, from the MX or Debian repositories, or several others which are all enabled.
The default list of applications is a curious mix of GTK and Qt programs. MX seems to focus on functionality for the user first and foremost, rather than adhering to any one toolkit, or even taking applications from any one desktop.
Firefox is the default browser but, of interest, this is not the Snap package, or even Firefox-ESR from the Debian repositories, but the binary version that Mozilla provides on their own website. MX is the first distribution I have encountered that packages Firefox from that source directly.
The custom-designed MX Package Installer is not a true, modern-style software store, but it works well, is easy to use, and offers a selection of alternate web browsers including Brave, Firefox-ESR, Palemoon, Falkon, Microsoft Edge, Vivaldi, Chromium, and Google Chrome. Yes, you read that right, you can not only install non-free software browsers like Vivaldi and Chrome, but even Microsoft products like Edge. I tried out Edge and it installed and worked, although why you would want Microsoft software on your Linux desktop is a whole ‘nother debate.
Being based on Debian, the default package management is APT, but Appimage, Flatpak and Snaps can also be used. However, the user manual warns that Snaps are “unreliable on MX Linux unless the user has booted into systemd” so there is that requirement for systemd, once again.
The MX Package Installer offers some alternative desktop environments too, including Budgie, Gnome, KDE, LXDE, and Mate, but not LXQt or the Unity interface.
The availability of non-free software will not make the free software purists happy, but clearly MX is more focused on giving users a wide range of choices rather than adhering to any doctrinal aims.
Conclusions
MX Linux is an impressive distribution. There is a lot that it gets right and not much at all to find fault with. The clear focus on usability, above all other goals, means users are getting functionality over any other priorities. The result is a pretty flawless Linux distribution that looks good and works well.
While not aimed at total Linux beginners, MX is easy enough to download, install, set up, and use. It never feels intimidating. Being backed up with good documentation and helpful forums will also assist new MX converts in feeling at home quickly.
Regardless of its DistroWatch page rankings, whenever I talk with MX users, they are both dedicated and enthusiastic. Given the number of choices for distributions in the Linux world these days, I think that is the best endorsement.
External links
Official website: https://mxlinux.org/