Linux Mint 21 “Vanessa” Xfce – BETA Release

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This is the BETA release for Linux Mint 21 “Vanessa” Xfce Edition.

Linux Mint 21 Vanessa Xfce Edition

Linux Mint 21 is a long term support release which will be supported until 2027. It comes with updated software and brings refinements and many new features to make your desktop even more comfortable to use.

New features:

This new version of Linux Mint contains many improvements.

For an overview of the new features please visit:

“What’s new in Linux Mint 21 Xfce“.

Important info:

The release notes provide important information about known issues, as well as explanations, workarounds and solutions.

To read the release notes, please visit:

“Release Notes for Linux Mint 21 Xfce”

System requirements:

  • 2GB RAM (4GB recommended for a comfortable usage).
  • 20GB of disk space (100GB recommended).
  • 1024×768 resolution (on lower resolutions, press ALT to drag windows with the mouse if they don’t fit in the screen).

Upgrade instructions:

  • This BETA release might contain critical bugs, please only use it for testing purposes and to help the Linux Mint team fix issues prior to the stable release.
  • Upgrade instructions will be published after the stable release of Linux Mint 21.
  • It will be possible to upgrade from this BETA to the stable release.
  • It will also be possible to upgrade from Linux Mint 20.3.

Bug reports:

  • Bugs in this release should be reported on Github at https://github.com/linuxmint/mint21-beta.
  • Create one issue per bug.
  • As described in the Linux Mint Troubleshooting Guide, do not report or create issues for observations.
  • Be as accurate as possible and include any information that might help developers reproduce the issue or understand the cause of the issue:
    • Bugs we can reproduce, or which cause we understand are usually fixed very easily.
    • It is important to mention whether a bug happens “always”, or “sometimes”, and what triggers it.
    • If a bug happens but didn’t happen before, or doesn’t happen in another distribution, or doesn’t happen in a different environment, please mention it and try to pinpoint the differences at play.
    • If we can’t reproduce a particular bug and we don’t understand its cause, it’s unlikely we’ll be able to fix it.
  • The BETA phase is literally a bug squashing rush, where the team is extremely busy and developers try to fix as many bugs as fast as possible.
  • There usually are a huge number of reports and very little time to answer everyone or explain why a particular report is not considered a bug, or won’t get fixed. Don’t let this frustrate you, whether it’s acknowledged or not, we appreciate everyone’s help.

Download links:

Here are the download links:

Integrity and authenticity checks:

Once you have downloaded an image, please verify its integrity and authenticity.

Anyone can produce fake ISO images, it is your responsibility to check you are downloading the official ones.

Enjoy!

We look forward to receiving your feedback. Many thanks in advance for testing the BETA!

27 comments

  1. The Linux Mint Development team has taken it’s crown jewel (the Cinnamon Desktop) and polished it to a brilliant shine for all the ‘Linux Universe’ to see.
    If you were a fan and daily user of the Mint-X theme you are going to be handsomely rewarded by its looks and performance.
    Bravo, Kudos +++

    Reply

    1. One of the nice things in XFCE is the panel lets you choose to use the dark variation of the theme. That actually works in Mint-X now 🙂

    1. The reason I ask this is that there were special instructions for installing Wine in Mint 20.x Obviously I can install Wine from Software Manager.

    2. The old instructions were:
      To install the stable version of WINE from WineHQ, open a terminal and type:
      • apt install –install-recommends wine-installer

  3. Via software manager, then on exe file righ click open with another application,
    custom command there just type wine.

    Reply

    1. Because most people probably never need it? It’s easy to add for those who do. I’ve not had any need for WINE for many years, and nor have most Linux users I know.

    2. I’ll second the vote NOT to include Wine
      – but (in particular the XFCE release) designed to be “lite.”
      … prev reply ‘not many use it’ – me included, in fact I actively avoid it.
      (still buggy, so much it can’t do and that grows daily as new/upgraded windows apps are released, and development is pretty much only ad-hoc weenies “contributing” their sporadic patches.)

      Badness aside, yeah sure (unlike winduds) bloat can be removed (firefox)
      – but why make more unnecessary work; sigh, just what I want more useless work before I can get down and get back to actual work that pays me (or play time).
      – removing bloat can still leave useless baggage if not careful/fully completed (flatpuke comes to mind), yay, even more useless work to get done before ….

  5. No Upgrade option how i can upgrade from Mint 20.3 ? i do not need a clean install.
    I use Mint 20.3 on 3 Computer a Desktop PC an 2 Laptops my Laptops i can Upgrade they are not in daily use i can use it for beta testing i found no upgrade point in Mint Installer or Boot Menu and Mint Upgrade Tool can not be found or install get a message not exist…

    Reply

    1. this is the beta version. you will be able to update to the stable release when it’s ready.

  6. Wow, the new default kernel can handle the Broadcom WiFi modules! I was able to download the updates on laptop with such card via WiFi. However, even it works, in dmesg report there are a lot of red error referring to this. After installed Broadcom’s closed driver these red lines gone.

    Reply

  7. Hello Clem, first of all, thank you and the team for this release! I have 2 questions:
    1- What happened with the new colors for Mint-Y announced some time ago? They looked awesome, and I’m looking forward to it.
    2- About the Mozilla partnership announced months ago, was said that Firefox icon was changing to follow Mozilla’s usage guidelines. We didn’t see that change, including this beta. What happened?

    Reply

  9. One question: Yesterday I installed it to an older laptop, Acer Aspire 5471G (pure BIOS, not UEFI!). This was the second instance when the installer creates an UEFI partition with “automatic” option (the first option). With “something else” I got “there is no UEFI partition” warning (I created a single partition before with Gpated) . Choosing “install anyway” – installs the Linux Mint without any problem.

    The first instance was a time ago, on another older Core i3 laptop, with LM 20.3.

    So why sees the installer an UEFI system even it is not? Buggy BIOS maybe?

    Reply

    1. My theory is that the installer considers MBR to be old/outdated/deprecated, and tries to transition everybody to EFI. I also ignored it and used “Install anyway” with MBR.

      I recently installed Ubuntu Studio and it did the exact same thing (“no UEFI partition” warning). The default used to be MBR but now they are switching everyone to EFI by default.

  10. I’ve tried the new beta in a VM and it looks great for me. I would still have a question regarding the installation process. Like many of the previous versions, LVM is not available in manual partitioning mode. If I chose the first option (use all available space on first disk, automated partitioning etc.) I have the option of using LVM but if this doesn’t suit me and I need to customize it (choosing the target disk, modify partition size etc.) the process will not allow it. In my opinion it is this option that experienced Linux users will chose so what would be the reason LVM is not offered in manual partitioning mode ?

    Reply

    1. I wholeheartedly agree.

      It would be very useful to be able do LVM configuration during installation, rather than having to modify it afterwards.

  12. Hello! Thank you for Linux Mint, I love the distro. Hypnotix is a great app, but the default playlist is no longer available, so it’s impossible to watch TV, no matter what the country is. Reinstalling libmpv and the app won’t help. I’ve tested the new beta-version of Mint using the live USB-drive. The same problem! Is there a solution to recover Hypnotix? Good luck!

    Reply

  13. good morning, please linuxmint team publish on launchpad the update of xfce 4.17 for thunar due this cve 2021-32563 for bionic beaver (tina, trinity version)

    Reply

  14. Nemo issues: the bug is still there especially with connecting to a ftp share i.e mobile phone and once u move from that ftp location, its impossible to reconnect.

    i have no idea what the ftp service nemo uses to stop and restart.

    filezillia has no issues reconnecting

    You still need to hack the smb.conf to connect to a router i.e.

    [global]
    workgroup = Workgroup
    client min protocol = NT1
    min protocol = SMB3

    Reply

  15. .

    For those people who use a machine that has 2, or more hard drives inside, use one hdd for windows 10. Use the other hdd to run install linux on it; then you can use your bios boot menu to switch between windows / linux.

    Why is this important? Because windows 10 must use Master Boot Record in order to install to hdd and run. MBR has a size limit of 2000Gb.

    Linux can use either MBR or Guided Partition Table in install and run. GPT is not limited by the 2000Gb hdd size limit. So you can have a 8000Gb hdd for linux, and a 2000Gb hdd for windows in the same machine.

    Use the 8000Gb hdd for all you linux distros (mint, kali, fedora) GRand Unified Boot loader can be manually restricted to the 8000Gb hdd. I think this is a benefit, because your machine can default boot to windows with no visual GRUB screen. Then you will be able to manual BIOS boot to your second 8000Gb hdd and use linux GRUB to choose your distro.

    Disclosure: My desktop computer does not have Unified Extensible Firmware Interface on it. Yet it has a functional 6000Gb hdd with 3 linux distros on it (EXT4) and 1 large 4000Gb NTFS partition on it, that windows and linux can read and use.

    Hey mint team, can you include a screen saver than can use movie files (.mp4)?

    Here is a fun one:

    https://gitlab.com/kalilinux/packages/kali-screensaver/-/blob/kali/master/hollywood-activate.mp4

    For reference:

    https://www.kali.org/blog/kali-linux-2022-2-release/

    .

    Reply

    1. “windows 10 must use Master Boot Record in order to install to hdd and run”

      That is completely false. Windows XP x64 Edition can use GPT disks for data only. Windows Server 2003 Service Pack 1, all versions of Windows Server can use GPT partitioned disks for data. Booting is only supported for 64-bit editions on Itanium-based systems. All versions of Vista, Server 2008, and later, can use GPT partitioned disks for data, Booting is only supported for 64-bit editions on UEFI-based systems. 64-bit Windows 11, Windows 10, Windows 8, or Windows 7 can boot from GPT disk and use UEFI boot mode. Windows 10 also uses GPT(GUID Partition Table) and a separate efi boot partition if your hdd is setup using GPT(GUID Partition Table). You simply install Linux in UEFI mode and the bootloader into the efi partition on your hdd and dual-boot windows 10 and Linux off the same drive.

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