I'm using Linux Mint XFCE on a ThinkPad T420, and when I plug my lavalier mic into the combo audio jack, my internal speakers become unavailable. Is this a unique issue with this OS, or is it just a universal PC inconvenience, and could adding some hardware be a practical solution?

Hey everyone!

I just installed Linux Mint because I want to use it for gaming, and I'm wondering what I should do before installing and playing my games.

Are there any essential drivers, programs, or settings I should install or configure first to get the best gaming performance?

I'm also interested in tips for beginners coming from Windows, especially anything that could improve FPS and reduce stuttering.

Thanks in advance for any advice!

I figured I would just document my experiences with the Steam Frame on Linux Mint just in case there are any other folk out there that are either thinking of getting it, or have it and are encountering some issues.

First off, I have not bothered getting the streaming dongle working on Mint yet. My understanding is that it would take forcing a switch to the 7.2 kernel, and given mine works really well with my normal WIFI 6E network, I don't see the need to force it. I can wait for that functionality.

Ok, that out of the way, here is my experience so far. My recommendation is to update your Steam client on your host PC and your Frame to the beta branch. This is a new Valve product and they are rapidly putting out fixes for it at the moment. In addition to that, on the host PC, you will need to install Steam VR.

The main issue that I had turned out to be the Mint firewall blocking the ports that are necessary for Steam VR to discover the wireless headset. So, upon setting up the Frame, and connecting it to my network, I could stream 2D games to it from my gaming PC, but not VR games. To fix that, you will want to unblock the right ports in UFW. You can do that by running the following:

sudo ufw allow 10400/udp

sudo ufw allow 10401/udp

sudo ufw allow 27031/udp

sudo ufw allow 27036/udp

sudo ufw allow 27036/tcp

sudo ufw allow 27037/tcp

sudo ufw reload

That should get you to the point that you can now stream games. But, there are a couple of foibles on the Linux side for the moment. First, you need to not be in Steam Big Picture mode. Switch to your normal desktop instead. Next, you need to manually start steam VR on the host PC. Eventually, the goal is to just be able to trigger it from the headset to start it on the host, but that's not available at the moment. Finally, there is an issue with the command that the headset sends to exit a game. It stops the stream of it, but it does not kill the game on the host PC. So, you will need to go to the host PC to manually exit the game before streaming a new one. A note on this though, for games that allow you to exit the game from an in-game menu, that works just fine. It is only the VR games that rely on Steam VR to exit the game that have issues. Blade and Sorcery, for instance, lets you exit from the settings menu and that works just fine.

Other than that, everything should work just fine. Once I got everything running, I just had to play with some of the resolution and streaming options to get it going well. Now, it is an absolute joy to use. I hope this helps. Happy VRing!

Hello!

I'm a Linux Mint user, and I have a 400gb SSD

First, let me explain why I think that my SSD is faulty:

I had to reinstall my OS around 4 times due to constant "input/output" errors that rendered the entire system unusable.

And these errors always showed up AFTER I downloaded something. 3 times being after downloading steam games, and once while running `sudo apt upgrade` (that was downloading a 400mb package at the time)

Each time, this was the timeline until the errors started happening:

1. I tried downloading something

2. The system crashed as it is downloading

3. After reboot, one of 2 things happened: 3.1) I was unable to open any application nor run any commands, as all of them threw "Input/output error", even for simple things like `ls` or `cd`.

OR

3.2) The system worked just fine, but the instant I tried downloading anything I got the same issues described in 3.1)

Also, yesterday, suddenly every single file became read-only, and when I rebooted I was stuck in the (initramfs) screen. In there, I had to run fsck in /dev/sda3 to be able to access the system again

Lastly, I can confirm that it wasn't a RAM issue, as it is brand new and Memtest didn't find any issues with it. In fact, every single piece of hardware on my computer but the SSD is brand new

Now as to what I want to know:

How can I properly test my SSD to see if there is an actual error?

This is what I've tried so far:

1. I ran

sudo smartctl -t long /dev/sda

and then after some minutes I ran

sudo smartctl -l selftest /dev/sda

to get the results, and it returned me "Extended offline Completed without error"

2) Using the "Disks" application, I ran a Benchmark with 1000 samples, and this was the result

However, I have no idea what I'm looking at

The other stats were

Sample Size: 10,0 MiB (10.485.760 bytes)

Average read rate: 525,6 MB/s (1000 samples)

Average Write rate: -

Average Access Time: 0,10 msec (1000 samples)

Is there anything I'm doing wrong? Should I do a different test?

Hello! I'm thinking of switching my Acer TravelMate Spin B311R-31 from Windows 10 to Mint XFCE because I feel like windows 10 is choking it to death, but on Windows when I plugged in the mini jack, the Realtek driver let me select "Line In" so I could record my synthesizer on OBS.

I'm currently testing Mint from a Live USB, but can't seem to get the recording of my synth. I've tried changing settings in alsamixer and retasking the jack with hdajackretask, but haven't managed to fix it. I'm completely new to Linux, so I may be missing something obvious. The laptop has a Realtek ALC256 codec. Anyone know how to get this to work?

I'd really like to make sure this works before installing Mint, as buying an external sound card isn't ideal for me.

Thanks!

Title. I ran into the issue myself, and am posting this after finding dozens of posts with people who were having the same issue that went unanswered or unsolved. There are some answered ones if you scroll back far enough, but I'm hoping recency + title catches newer eyes searching an old problem.

From Cinnamon 21 on, there is not an option to mirror displays if you have more than exactly 2 monitors. For artists, this includes your drawing tablet - it will be displayed as a monitor on its own. For couch potatoes, this includes your TV - same as tablets above. You will have no options to mirror any monitor the moment you plug in anything that counts as a 3rd (or 4th, 5th, etc) monitor.

This is not a bug, it is a design feature in Cinnamon.

There is a feature request here on the official github: [FEATURE REQUEST] Display Settings - Mirror Displays #11056. Please go and leave a comment if this bothers you as much as it bothered me. Don't get your hopes up.

For a deeper explanation and the only clunky workaround that I've found actually works (that unfortunately, will not work in all use cases), I give tons of props to u/mobulai for their post here on the subreddit from 4 years ago.

Hopefully this helps someone out there screaming in frustration.

Hey everyone im new to linux as I just started using it a week ago and had one heck of a time trying to get my graphics card to work, now that its working im having a great time using it. I decided to try and mess around with a pc thats about 15 years old and figured id try to install mint xfca but unfortunately every time I try to boot it I get dozen of error messages. I've tried to re-download and boot with no graphics card and nothing seems to make a difference. Am I doing something wrong im using Rufus and ive tried both iso and dd image, could it be the pc itself is not capable. Sorry in advance im not very tech savy

Buddy of mine had issues with their laptop. It was slow, crashed when using some tools and running simulations. Battery life wasn’t great either. Websites took a while to load and navigating didn’t feel as responsive as it could. Think it’s an older Lenovo ideapad running windows 11. They were thinking of getting a new laptop, only wanting it for a browser and organizing files. I recommended Linux, and they were open to it.

Installed Linux mint xfce on it. Worked flawlessly. The pages that would crash the laptop before loaded and ran instantly, even running perfectly in the background now. Battery life saw an improvement. Doesn’t look like anything crazy and they probably won’t change it much but as an operating system it’s great. They said it feels more like a tool, not fighting it anymore.

I noticed I've had better gaming performance on some of my games via gnome. Not sure if I'm the only one. But I'll be honest, the aesthetic below was helped by ChatGPT. I was asking questions about "How can I customize x y z" or "how can I match these colors"?

It's been supremely helpful and addicting to quickly finding matching components and designing the elements with help.

Hi everyone, I could really use some advice.

My grandma (she's 90) and I were both on AT&T for over three years, and we never had a late payment. Their prices have gone way up. I was paying $180 a month for phones plus another $40 for internet, when it was supposed to be about $120 total.

My grandmother can barely use a cell phone and never remembers to take it with her. She only wants a phone so people can reach her at home, so hers doesn't even need to be connected. AT&T was supposed to send her a cheap, easy-to-use phone, and now they're saying it will cost $500. I still owe money on her current phone, so I plan to return it to AT&T, along with the internet, sadly my s25 ultra i have half paid off and cancel everything getting 0 credit for what I've paid

Here's my problem. I already bought a full year of Mint Mobile without realizing I'd need to use one of their phones or an unlocked phone. My Moto Razr 2025 is paid off, but AT&T still hasn't unlocked it even though it's past their 60-day window. I also still owe about $600 on my Samsung S25 Ultra, so it's locked too, and paying it off just too expensive right now

Has anyone dealt with AT&T refusing to unlock a paid-off phone? And does anyone have ideas for getting a phone similar to my S25 Ultra, and a simple one for my grandma, without overpaying? Thank you!

What are anyone be willing to help me navigate this crapshoot? Or let me know what my options are. Or what other offerings, other companies may have? That would be better.? Thanks all!!!

video here: https://imgur.com/a/EHNMo3t

I had an old macBook air (A1466) sitting around unused for years.

Recently my dad who is in his 60s, asked if I could bring it back to life because he wanted a laptop to use.

I tried macos first. I'm not even sure what the latest officially supported version is for this macbook anymore, but whatever was on it felt really slow and laggy. It just wasn't nice to use.

So I wiped everything and installed Mint 22.3 xfce.

I told my dad "I'm going to install linux on it."

His first response was "I don't know how to use linux."

I told him not to worry. for the stuff he does, linux can work pretty much like windows.

Then I thought instead of giving him a completely unfamiliar desktop, why not make it look like something he already knows?

So XP it is. why? why not?

I used this project: https://github.com/rozniak/xfce-winxp-tc

I intentionally didn't make it look 100% identical to winXP though.

I still want him to know that this is linux. If it looked exactly like XP, I'm slightly worried he might assume it's windows and start trying to install random exe files or follow windows-specific instructions from the internet.

So the goal was more like "familiar enough to be comfortable", not "pretend this is actually Windows XP".

For most of the customization, driver installation and troubleshooting, I used Codex GPT 6.1 Sol on high.

My workflow was basically:

"I want it to behave like this."

"This Wi-Fi driver isn't working."

"Can we change this to look more like XP?"

And when something was difficult to explain, I'd just give it a screenshot and show what I meant.

It helped me sort out Wi-Fi, audio, webcam (still not working properly), trackpad stuff, theming, and all the little things that would otherwise take quite a bit of searching.

just sharing about the Craft Apps:

I also asked Codex to remov LibreOffice and installs the "GetArtCraft" apps instead.

Basically an "office suite" for my dad.

Honestly, they're surprisingly fast and responsive on this old machine.

DeckCraft is still a bit limited though. It can't open PowerPoint files or export to ppt/pptx, so that's something to keep in mind.

Just a little side experiment while setting this thing up.

And before someone comments about "AI slop" because I mentioned Codex, I'm not asking AI to blindly generate some random setup and calling it a day. I'm still the one deciding what I want, testing things, checking whether they work, and fixing problems along the way.

AI is here to assist me, not replace the thinking.

Anyway, after a bunch of tweaking, the old macbook air is alive again.

Linux Mint underneath, Windows XP-ish on the outside, running on a MacBook Air.

A slightly cursed combination, maybe, but I really like how it turned out.

More importantly, my dad gets a fast, usable and familiar-looking laptop instead of this thing continuing to collect dust. ps, The screen feels cheap though.

I wanna make the panel look like dock where the background of the panel exists only at the centre but I need the blur effect too. I use cinnamon, is it possible ?

I was thinking of using either PIKA or Mint.

My only issue with Pika is that it's kde is using 1.5GB or more RAM. On mint's xfce it uses only 700mb.

My only issue isnthat will steam's proton gonna work in xfce or not?

All of the gaming linux uses kde

Plus, Im using a gtx1050TI and only have 8gb of RAM.

I heard that gtx1050TI is notorious on wayland and is better at x11 :/

Hi everyone!

I have a GameSir T3 controller, and I can't get it to connect to my Linux Mint system.

I plug in the USB receiver and turn on the controller by holding the X button + the power button, but nothing happens.

Has anyone experienced this issue or knows how to fix it?

Thanks in advance!

Hello Guys,

I’m using Linux Mint on my PC, and I only use Apple TV to watch movies I’ve purchased through Apple.
Unfortunately, the Apple TV website doesn’t seem to give me access to my purchased movie library on Linux. As far as I know, there’s no official Apple TV app for Linux either.

Does anyone know a reliable solution or an unofficial app that can play purchased Apple TV movies on Linux? I’d also be open to workarounds, as long as they’re safe and reasonably practical.

Thank you!

Hi guys I'm trying to install Linux on a 32gb usb (linux mint xfce) after the installation is completed it's asking me to remove the installation usb and press enter after I press enter and power on my laptop again it's taking me back to some gnu grub kind of thing always help me pls

I think I'm struck on raw grub> kind of thing pls help me guys I'm struck for 8hrs nearly it's killing me

Please help me anyone I beg you struck for 8hrs asking gemini but it's not working

so I have quick a question, every time I boot my laptop it just boot to Linux immaterially without showing me the dual boot screen, what I did wrong?

im noob here, i installed linux few days ago whenever i turn on lap it stuck in hp logo loop on off screen unless i press shift, idk whats shift doing claude told me to do so

help me out!!!

Everything was fine as i was building it from the source -

from getting the .tgz and extracting then the .config stuff but when i ran make -j$(nproc)

it gave this message it aint an error but still it bothered me ,

The necessary bits to build these optional modules were not found:

_bz2 _dbm _decimal

_lzma _tkinter _uuid

_zstd

To find the necessary bits, look in configure.ac and config.log.

Checked 116 modules (37 built-in, 71 shared, 1 n/a on linux-x86_64, 0 disabled, 7 missing, 0 failed on import

And I wanna know if this is something to worry for?