Ubuntu MATE 18.04 LTS Review - Unity Salvation

Ubuntu MATE offers salvation for Unity desktop lovers with their Mutiny desktop. Or you can choose from 7 other desktop layouts

Brisk menu now has a Fullscreen Dash.
Global Menu, and Heads Up Display (HUD) work fine with GTK and QT based apps.
HiDPI support and scaling has significantly improved for high resolution displays.

Please donate and help support my work:

[MartinWimpress]

Thanks for the kind words, I'm delighted to see you liked Ubuntu MATE 18.04. I think we might let you down for 18.10 though, we're going to dedicate most of the next cycle to fixing as many bugs as we can in, 18.04 and only have a few incremental improvements planned.

[MyndAngelic]

I have to agree with you right there. Ubuntu MATE really left a big impression to me how good a linux distro can be comparing to the original Ubuntu.

[alexriggs]

I'm in love, I might make the switch to MATE completely.

[harrytsang]

Ubuntu MATE is arguably the best Ubuntu distro, I just wish they add a color scheme changer since green isn’t everyone’s color. Polish nonetheless

[surjagain]

The Mate desktop is quite a salvation for us who like to stick to the traditional layout and yet try out small incremental upgrades to the UX now and then. It's stable, fast, low on resources and a perfect example of why Gnome should have stuck to the traditional layout. Ubuntu Mate and Mint Mate are both top quality software which are actually enjoyable to use.

[pseudopetrus]

I came back to this video as I am going to upgrade from mate 16.04 to 18.04. I have been a little hesitant as I run a very high quality but old tower with only 4 gigs of DDR2 Ram. This has worked fine for me in 16.04 as I don't edit video or game, my main use is just simple business use. As time moves on I have seen other distros become a little heavy for my rig, but I was so impressed with Mate 16.06 and the way it has worked for me. As of this posting I have installed 38 different Linux distros, not including updated versions, that would mean I have done about 100 Linux installs. I still use Puppy from time to time and some older versions of distros that had a special feature I might need, but my favorite has been Mate. Thank you quidsup for your great reviews and thank you Martin and team for your great work!

[jonathanwarner]

First!

Very useful review - thanks! Currently using Ubuntu Mate 16.04 on my main desktop, and looking forward very much to replacing it with the new LTS release.

[stevesohn]

Moving from KDE NEON to Ubuntu MATE. This is a great bit of Kit!!!! So much customization out of the box. I love the contemporary layout. That is how I had my KDE setup. This is fantastic.

[coegj]

I love the Mate 16.04 and after this review I will certainly give the 18.04 a look. I agree with quidsup, Mate, it is one very very good distribution.

[NoirpoolSea]

Really really great review. I too just discovered this distro and am stunned (and am considering leaving KDE also) but I'm a bit more dissapointed in the accessibility for low vision people. You can expand the screen panels put there is no text size adjustment anywhere in the environment.

KDE has a setting in the OS where you can smoothly scale everything in the desktop environment with a slider, however this doesn't apply to the inside of applications.

Meanwhile you didn't mention a particular trick that Ubuntu Mate *can* do.. Both Firefox and VLC for example are integrated into the theming engine. If you change your interface theme, both of these apps immediately alter to match. This is BRILLIANT! 👍

If font sizes could be integrated into this scheme...

One other thing missing is the full screen zooming really needed by low vision people as is done in MacOS and Windows (and KDE) where an ALT-<mousewheel> will instantly zoom the whole screen in and out and let everyone see even the smallest features on your desktop.

Thanks for letting me vent. 😇

[BlackSpineHorror]

The only thing I hate is that godawful green everywhere.

[shujiling]

Thank you for this video I had downloaded software Ubuntu mate for raspberry pi 4 or 3 b version

[rmcellig]

Oh boy, this distro looks sweet. I am definitely going to try it out! Thanks!! 😀

[NotRealNamesAgain]

I think that's the highest praise I've seen you give in years. I have it on one of my machines and can agree- it's damn good. Still using Gnome on my two more powerful machines though. It's just so nice looking to me.

[tostoday]

Ubuntu Mate - I've heard of this :)

[pseudopetrus]

Just a quick comment, I did a clean install Mate 18.04 on an old laptop and it was a little slow but everything worked. So that test lead me to install Mate 18.04 on my old tower using the upgrade tool. It went well. I had to run a few commands to get back the welcome center and software boutique and was able to get my epson printer to scan with Image scan getting the linux drivers from epson. I could not get my epson scanner working on 16.04 for some reason. In any case, once again I am pleased with Mate, 18.04 has about the same user experience in terms of speed on my old tower, so I would say that I did not lose any ground speed wise with the upgrade! Very good!

[lucidtheming]

Why this isn't the default Ubuntu Desktop, I don't know. This screams usefulness.

[DigitalX]

Can't wait to install Ubuntu Mate 18.04 because I love it.

[layolk]

this is an amazing release and very well implemented

[spongeyperson]

This last statement is true for me too. I'm stuck between KDE and Ubuntu MATE, as how polished it is. 6:49