Difference between Linux Mint Mate and Cinnamon Desktop

[Genesee]

I am on Linux Mint using Mate as the default desktop. I found it comfortable using it. But there are less themes available for the same. Also when add or modify the default Wallpapers, my desktop tries to behave weirdly. It is being couple of months already and now I am thinking to bit change my existing interface. I am sure this is not going to affect Mint at all. I want some help to decide that whether I must go for Cinnamon or should stick with Mate. Is anyone using Cinnamon on Linux Mint. If yes then what are the changes you found.

[Alexise]

It is not at all bad to test out. You can try the same through Software Manager. Go in the same and search for Cinnamon. It is officially available for Linux Mint and it looks that there will not be any major issue related to the same.

Give a try, this is not going to cost you much. I think the download size is around 40mb something. Once done with the same then you can also download Cinnamon theme to get some additional benefits.

[Visala28]

I would recommend you to stick with Mate. Linux Mint still is not completely stable. I had transferred to Mate and when I configured on LAN I found a bit instability with this operating system. You can test that by adding your own wallpaper. You can find some parts of desktop is getting affected. When you add your own wallpapers the Mate starts to behave improperly.

It looks the screen becomes a bit unresponsive and the right click context menu is also affected. If you want to work properly do not makes changes to the desktop settings of your existing system. If you need a bit flashy effect in your system, then you can try Ubuntu LTS 10.0. This has some enhanced view which can give you eye popping graphic output. And to some extent it is stable also. First of all it is not complicated to add a new desktop, but to some extent it becomes a issue to modify the settings and then work on it.

[Wajeeha]

If you want to you can test the same. It is not going to affect your system. For that go on Software Manager and download Cinnamon. Then once you are done add some themes. You can locate the same inside Software Manager. Once you are done, logout from your Mate desktop and then click on Session. From there you can load to Cinnamon desktop.

[Patricia-USA]

Mate And Cinnamon both are new. I do not find any better difference. But compared to Ubuntu desktop this gives you a more stable and simple version. It is love to find that there are people how are working on simple desktop environment to enhance a open source platform. Both have similar options. But there is a good conversion among people based on the difference between this two.

Now we all know that for Linux Gnome is the default desktop used mostly. Because of its widespread the same is being modified and enhanced to make Mate or Cinnamon. This desktop are just other enhanced version of Gnome. But compared to Mate, Cinnamon is new and better. It has more additions. Mate lack some issues when you try to play with theme or wallpapers and the same you will not notice in Cinnamon.

It is just the new version of Gnome. It mostly depends on your usage what you want. If you are ok with traditional desktop that looks cool enough then you can stick with Mate. The choice of using the same is on you.

[Suprakash]

I had tested that out. After installing Cinnamon I am facing a error which says that Gnome not found something. I am bit stucked at this place and wonder that there is some problem with the installation. Hope there will be some way.

[The#Danger]

Try removing the same and then re-installing it back. I thought Cinnamon will come intergrated with Mint DVD. But that was not the actual scenario. It is worth testing it out. I had checked both desktop and did not located quiet great difference. Cinnamon is more responsive and smoother compared to Mate. But still the developer has added Mate, which means this will work quiet nicely with the operating system.

There are a bit lack about desktop customization, but you can stay happier with that you have. Expectation too much from the same can make your system a bit slow in performance. Mate is not an outdated version, but a bit older. While Cinnamon is Gnome 3. Anyhow I am sure you are not so interested in adding themes or wallpapers if you love to use the system for work purpose only.

[OLIVER d'souza]

I got the disc which came with Cinnamon desktop and that worked really well. But to find what is the difference I had also configured Mate. I find Mate a bit lowerone. I thought this might be good, but still I am not really satisfied with the same.

[Akau#]

Cinnamon is new and better. I had ignored that last time. I was working on Mate. My friend notified me that my desktop is a bit traditional. But it took me a bit complicated time to configure Cinnamon properly on existing Mate installation. I think that was done better on the disc that you download. Cinnamon is Gnome 3 Shell. It is better and responsive. It works more smoother and to add that desktop over Mate is a bit complicated. Your installation must not be affected to some extent. Cinnamon 3 is better according to me.

If you need some additional stuff and stable system then try that once. It is necessary that you must configure that properly through MDM. This is the Display Manager of Mint which his replaced with Gnome Display Manager. When you launch that you can simply provide what Desktop you want to load on the screen. The default things which is configured on MDM is XClient Script. This are the modification done by you to make the Desktop comfortable on your screen.

[Indulal]

If you face issue in configuring the desktop I would rather tell you to avoid using the same. Because there are certain sessions which are affected and to troubleshoot that is not easy cup of tea. You might spoil your existing installation also.

[Triple JJJ]

I had tried my best to run Cinnamon on the startup but that did not worked at all. I am fed up with the same. I thought it was better when I was working on Ubuntu 10 LTS. I had not faced such things. To test something on linux based system is far more complicated.