Linux Mint 18 'Sarah' Review : Improved Features With Better Experience

Linux Mint 18 "Sarah" Review : Improved Features With Better Experience :
The Beta version of Linux Mint 18 code name "Sarah" was released few days back. The final release is expected to come out by end of this month.
The Linux Mint 18 is going to have Long Term Support until year 2021. It has gone through some major updates and improved the overall user experience .Linux Mint 18 features Cinnamon 3.0, MDM 2.0, a Linux kernel 4.4 and an Ubuntu 16.04 package base.

Some of the features of Linux Mint 18 are as follows:

1) Cinnamon 3.0 :
Cinnamon 3.0 has received many new features like - improved tiling, Animation effect to menu, Improved touchpad and sound settings, Panel launch now includes application actions.

2) X-Apps :

A new project called "X-Apps" was started and its goal is to produce generic applications for traditional GTK desktop environments.
The idea behind this project is to replace applications which no longer integrate properly outside of a particular environment

3) Update Manager :

The update manager received many improvements, both visual and under the hood.

The main screen and the preferences screen now use stack widgets and subtle animations, and better support was given for alternative themes (toolbar icons are now compatible with dark themes, application and status icons are now themeable and dimmed text is now rendered with dynamic colors).

Two new settings were added to let you see and select kernel updates. Even though these aren’t really updates, but the availability of packages for newer kernels, the manager is now able to detect them and to present them for installation to you as a traditional update. These are level 5 updates but the new settings let you configure them independently.

4) Mint-Y theme :

Linux Mint 18 introduces "Mint-Y", a brand new theme based on the very popular Arc theme from horst3180 and Sam Hewitt's beautiful set of Moka icons.

Mint-Y looks modern, clean and professional. It embraces the new trends, but without looking too "flat" or minimalistic.

5) Art-work improvement :
New Wallpaper and Desktop Backgrounds.