Zorin OS 17: the best Linux distribution for beginners?

👏 SUPPORT THE CHANNEL:
Get access to a weekly podcast, vote on the next topics I cover, and get your name in the credits:

👕 GET TLE MERCH

🎙️ LINUX AND OPEN SOURCE NEWS PODCAST:

🏆 FOLLOW ME ELSEWHERE:

#Linux #ZorinOS #distribution #linuxdistro #linuxdesktop

Timecodes:
00:00 Introduction
01:07 Sponsor: Proton Mail
02:14 Weird, but good GNOME implementation
06:00 The "Spatial desktop"
08:17 Enhanced Tiling & layouts
10:03 Under the hood
12:26 Windows app support & other things
14:34 Does it regain the crown?
17:15 Sponsor: Tuxedo Computers
18:24 Support the channel

Zorin OS 17 doesn't use the very latest, it's based on GNOME 43, not 45. The Software store is the one from GNOME 45, but other apps are the version from GNOME 42, like the image viewer or the file manager.

You still get access to desktop layouts, which let you change how your desktop looks and feels in one click. You also get a Zorin appearance app with accent colors, dark mode, support for other themes, and a few other options to change how the interface looks and feels, but that's all stuff Zorin OS 16 already had.

As per Zorin specific changes, the default Zorin menu now gives you a search box, to find anything you want, it uses the GNOME shell search backend, so you can enable or disable providers in the settings. You also gain an "all apps" category to see everything sorted alphabetically.

Also, Zorin OS seems to default to Wayland now,

It brings back the desktop cube. It can be enabled in the Zorin appearance settings, and it's triggered as a replacement for the activities view: instead of the strip of desktops, you get the desktop cube. You can make it turn with touchpad gestures, and windows are laid out with a nice parallax effect, floating over the desktop.

The alt tab window switcher can also be replaced with a more visual, 3D version of the default, and again, it looks good, but it's not more usable: you don't see all windows as well as a basic alt tab strip of thumbnails and icons, and it makes it harder to actually get to what you're looking for, because you don't have the full list of app icons visible all at once.

Zorin OS added advanced tiling. Again, it needs to be enabled in the Zorin Appearance settings, and it gives you not only quarter tiling, but also a lot of other options. When you tile a window to a screen edge, you get a little pop-up to fill the rest of the space with another open window, and it creates tile groups, meaning that bringing one of the window to the fore will also bring the other one alongside it.

You can also turn on tiling layouts. They're not the most legible or easy to create, as you can't just place your windows how you want them, and save that as a layout, you have to enter relatively cryptic series of numbers to define the percentage of the display each zone occupies.

Under the hood, Zorin OS 17 is Ubuntu 22.04 LTS, so you're getting packages that are close to being 2 years old. It adds snap and flatpak, with flathub enabled.

Zorin uses the Linux kernel 6.2, which, ehhh well it's end of life, and has been since May 2023,

You're also stuck at the nvidia drivers 535, so not 545, the latest ones that fix a LOT of Wayland related issues, and the mesa drivers are 23.0, where 23.3 was released recently, with a lot of improvements for recent hardware.

Zorin OS also still keeps the cool things they add on the side: first you get Zorin connect, which is KDE connect and the GS Connect extension for GNOME shell. You also get an easy one click install of Wine, called Windows app support. It installs Wine, and PlayOnLinux, so you can try and run various windows executables, but both of these are super outdated.

[jacksonreventan]

Zorin helped me take the first steps in this direction and even though it's no longer ideal for my use cases I'll be forever grateful for them. Wonderful distro. Would recommend to anyone who doesn't care about the newest software. Really wish I could still use it myself.

[jefft]

I started with Elementary OS but switched to Zorin 15 as my first Zorin OS. I loved the Windows 7 type layout and for the average user, even if it didn't have a lot of frills, it was just fine. I pretty much only use Internet browsers, watch Youtube and other movies, Libre Office, etc. and it has worked just fine.

[chorba]

This distro looks wonderful for a family PC or for your parents, the font is very easy on the eyes and very comfortable to read. As a matter of fact, I installed Zorin 16 on my dad's laptop and it runs amazing. Also, the windows layout makes it very easy to learn.

[renealbrechtsen]

Zorin is such a gorgeous os. Just wish it was more regularly updated.

[martRT]

Zorin is perfect for beginners and parents PCs. I installed it on my 80 years old stepfathers laptop. He is very happy with it.

[VinylRescue]

Coming from Windows I've found Zorin 17 better to use. I tried Mint after one of your videos ranking it high on your list. I couldn't get it to work for what I needed to get my music to play from my turntable through a USB interface and through a DAC from my computer. So I went back to Zorin 17 and I'm back in business. The extra niceties are not a priority for me, but useablility for my needs. I'm trying to move more to Linux from Windows since it may become a subscription OS in the near future with Windows 12. That's not confirmed from MS, yet! I'm using Zorin 17 on a WD Elements SSD via USB 3.0 and it runs great. I recently upgrade my CPU to a Ryzen 7 5700x and a new graphics card nVidia 1050.

[博麗靈夢-el]

Paying for a linux distribution is not terrible, it is just a way to sponsor and encourage people to make better distributions, they are also people who have to eat and live (it has a free version, and there is an emphasis on this being sponsored, paid and not The biggest difference in payment is the number of desktops)

[Lon]

I have a soft spot for Zorin, when I was distrohopping on VM trying to learn more about linux and how different distros worked Zorin was the first one that really worked without any noticeable bugs or glitches for me. It was stable, smooth and fast, easy to customize to look how I wanted (with some weird artifacts from their own customization tools that I mostly ignored) and I was easily able to install just about every app I could think of. It's too bad they didn't hold off long enough to implement gnome 44 because that's a dealbreaker for me now. Maybe Zorin 18 will be the one to make me change distro.

[nodak]

I recently changed to Zorin and I'm liking it so far. I couldn't care less about having cutting-edge crap. I just want a distro that works. The only hiccup I've encountered was when installing the Brave browser, it hung up at 99% and just sat there forever but it finished after a restart. Updates seem to install super fast, compared to other distros I've used recently.

[jolynele]

i used zorin before and it's convenient. i can just double click windows executables to get them running. but i was a beginner back then, and now with more experience i've moved on. but if i had to recommend a distro to a friend for basic use it's definitely zorin

[frankhuurman]

love Zorin and am a donator to the project because I see it as the perfect "modern-looking" step away from Windows if I ever need to recommend a Linux distro. But I do really hope they keep a more recent updating schedule in the future.

Also I'm sure that a lot of work went into the upgrade tool that would make upgrades from 16 to 17 seamless, so perhaps having those tools in place will pave the way for staying more recent in future releases :)

[cameronbosch]

As much as I was interested in Zorin OS 17, they really should have delayed it to be based off of Ubuntu 24.04, which is the next LTS and next release of Ubuntu. In literally 5 months, 22.04, which is used for Zorin OS 17, will be very outdated.

[Bareego]

Just tried it, and it even made my hdmi sound on monitor work, which no other distro has done until now. Much impressed.

[dragonballjiujitsu]

Sponsor ad starts at 1:07 and ends at 2:14 As for Zorin OS. Its the best Linix distro out there at the moment other than maybe Linux Mint. It may actually edge out mint a bit. Most people do NOT need the latest kernel or the latest version of Gnome and I love than Zorin release their OS when its ready instead of a releasing a half bakes beta every few months on some ridiculous cycle. Most people just want their distro to work. I've had the least amount of problems from Zorin than almost any other distro. (with the exception of mint).

Currently running Zorin OS on my MacBook Pro and my 2010 Mac pro. It works great. Installed the needed WiFi drivers right out of the box. You can install any software available for Linux in any format you like. Snaps, flatpak, app images, .debs It is the best implementation of Gnome I've seen right out of the box.

[AdamWarner]

I think Zorin OS 17 ahows just how much improvement there has been in the Linux desktop space over the last few years.

I bought Zorin OS 16 Pro because I found it to be the best all round Linux distro at the time.

But now, there there are so many more good options, im not sure i'd recommend it straight away anymore. Expecially as its already a bit dated upon release, and Gnome has been receiving meaningful and rapid updates, which i doubt we will see in incremental updates to Zorin OS 17.

[gotamd]

I think Zorin OS truly is the best option for true beginners. It's just so easy to use and includes all the basics software-wise. As far as following Ubuntu tutorials goes, it actually does work at least some of the time. On version 16, I was able to follow an Ubuntu tutorial to fix an issue with the Citrix client installation (which also impacted Ubuntu in the same way). There are a lot of people who don't really care about the latest and greatest, and just want something that's nicely packaged and easy to use. For those people, Zorin is great.

[BillyNoMates]

I think some people miss the point of Zorin OS.
Old crap like a Packard Bell laptop from 2011 runs Zorin OS 17 sweet.
Ok it has 6GB ram but having eye candy on an old out of date laptop is a win.
Windows 10 runs ok-ish on it but Zorin OS makes this laptop fly.
This laptop would have ended up in the bin otherwise.

[HaveSomeRubicon]

Started off with zorin 16 lite, tried arch when i got a new pc but eventually ended up going to the zorin 17 core beta and i havent regretted one bit of that decision

[matthewsjardine]

I owe a lot to Zorin OS. I played with Linux a couple times over the years. It wasn't until Zorin OS 15 that I started to adopt Linux as my OS of choice. With a kernel update, I think it would be excellent for new users and those who just want a reliable PC with little to no hassle.

[galactustales]

ZorinOS has to work a lot on this release to make it up-to-date. Frankly there isn't any need to revamp the OS for 24.04 base. Just update the internals and they are gold.

But it is BY FAR the best foot forward to dive into Linux. It does things so effortlessly which would take user effort elsewhere.