xfce vs. gnome

[RChickenMan]

I have traditionally been a gnome user, however I recently decided to give xfce a shot. I have always heard it is supposed to be a more minimal, less resource-intensive DE than gnome and kde. I am not sure whether I have experienced any performance gains, as I never really found gnome to be particularly sluggish. However, what I did notice is that there is really no reduction in functionality when compared to gnome. Also, the user interface is almost identical, and I would even say it looks a bit more "polished" in xfce. At this point it looks like I'll be making a switch. Of course, it's not like I absolutely have to commit to "switching" to one of them like one does with an operating system.

Can anyone else here relate to what I'm talking about? It seems to me that if gnome doesn't necessarily have anything to offer over xfce, and xfce is lighter on system resources, xfce would simply be a superior DE and therefor should be equally as popular (note this is not intended to be flame bait... read on!). I would like to hear from those of you who have had a similar experience to me, and also some of you who could inform me of what gnome has to offer over xfce that is worth the supposedly heavier resource usage. (it sounds as if gnome is foreign to me, but like i said, I've been a solid gnome user up until now. And yes, Linux is my only OS).

Either way, this is sparking a curiosity about desktop environments and I think I am going to play around a bit with what's out there. There's so many combinations of window managers, desktop environments, etc. that the right combination for me is out there somewhere and I'll probably never actually find it!

[doobit]

I really like XFce and It does work noticeably faster on my under-1 GHZ machines. As you play around with it you will find that it's a more transparent (to customization) desktop than Gnome. I like that because it makes it easy for me to customize. One problem is that it is also more modular than Gnome so you may need to open more menus to get the customization you want (i.e. user interface settings, desktop settings, window manager settings, panel settings).

[Koori23]

I like XFCE fine, My only problem with it is it's theme-ability is limited. For example, I can get Alphacube GTK controls in XFCE, but cannot use the Alphacube Window borders.

I know it's a dumb reason but, it's my reason.

[fuscia]

i'm a big fan of scrollable desktops and right-click menus, so that gives an advantage to xfce.

[doobit]

i'm a big fan of scrollable desktops and right-click menus, so that gives an advantage to xfce.

I agree!
After using Fluxbox, Enlightenment and Xfce, I keep trying to shut down my WinXP machine with a right click. Then I remember where I am...

[reacocard]

I like XFCE fine, My only problem with it is it's theme-ability is limited. For example, I can get Alphacube GTK controls in XFCE, but cannot use the Alphacube Window borders.

I know it's a dumb reason but, it's my reason.

Actually, you can. Just use metacity (or beryl+heliodor) instead of xfwm4. Of course, that negates some of the lightness of xfce, but its an option if you really want it.

[IYY]

I've traditionally used Gnome, KDE, IceWM and Fluxbox, but recently I see XFCE rapidly improving and becoming a solid desktop environment.

[happy-and-lost]

Maybe someone can enlighten me here.

My laptop (1.73ghzPM, 1gbRAM) runs and boots Xu and U in the same time, so there's no advantage to using Xfce on the resource front.

However... my desktop (3ghzP4HT, 700ishmbRAM) runs/boots Xu much MUCH (About half the time) faster than U. So I use half and half. I love them both.

[fuscia]

I agree!
After using Fluxbox, Enlightenment and Xfce, I keep trying to shut down my WinXP machine with a right click. Then I remember where I am...

if you kept right-clicking on your xp desktop, i bet it would shutdown eventually.

[hizaguchi]

Neither is really faster for me either. I prefer Gnome though because I think it looks nicer and I really like Nautilus. Plus, I've never found a really good icon theme for XFCE... not one that I like anyhow.

[doobit]

Neither is really faster for me either. I prefer Gnome though because I think it looks nicer and I really like Nautilus. Plus, I've never found a really good icon theme for XFCE... not one that I like anyhow.

Xfce will use the same icon themes as Gnome.

[zaratustra]

xfce is much better, faster, less dependencies... And it could be even nicer, but it isn't imortant anyway

[Crooksey]

I always have been and probably always will be a gnome user, why?

1) I don't need my desktop to be configured for hours
2) Gnome has never crashed on me, always found it stable, fast and reliable.
3) When I have big college assignments to work on, I don't want to be navigating my DE to find things, I just want them running.

Allot of people dislike Gnome, but I love it.

Prefer it over KDE for the speed, prefer it over XFCE for usability.

If however I am on a programming assignment, Ill just run Openbox and 7 or 8 urxvt sessions.

[FyreBrand]

I love xfce. I've started using it at work on older machines AMD 900's with 256MB RAM and older PIII laptops. It's fast, clean, configurable, and, for me, represents a perfect combination of minimalism and usability. So far it's been really stable.

Gnome on the other hand has been sluggish compared to xfce or kde on machines I installed. The boss wanted to test all three (even though the idea of DE's and WM's kind of confuses him).

The boss is a hardcore windows user this is some of his feedback on the xfce and gnome:
1. Liked Ubuntu's default color scheme. He liked that it was different colors from Windows.
2. Thought Gnome was sluggish in comparison to xfce and kde
3. Didn't get the mouse thing in xfce.
4. Likes the ease of configuratioin in xfce and it's interface.
5. Likes the xfce panels.

[obocho]

hi guys,

i just wanted to say that xfce might be good if you would have time (and patience) to install all small things (app.'s, icons, etc.) you need...

However, after you installed all those things, you have again Gnome (or maybe KDE) on your computer : )

at least according to my own experiences...

(sorry for my eng.)

[Tuna-Fish]

well, not really. the difference is that unlike gnome i can still customize my xfce :)

I tried xfce for one day and instantly switched, it is pretty much exactly what I want from a DE. my only gripe is that it's not very well programmed. you can't notice it if you reboot often 8like every day or so), but both the menus and the desktop leak memory like there's no tomorrow. After 4 days or so they are both around 100 MB and desperately need to be killed.

This on both 4.4.0 and the one that originally shipped with xubuntu.

[hizaguchi]

Xfce will use the same icon themes as Gnome.

Is that new? I didn't think it would before. I still prefer Gnome's look (especially the panels), but that's nice for XFCE anyhow.

[antenna]

I have been very impressed with Xfce lately, 4.4 is a major improvement over 4.2, everything seems incredibly well thought out to me and the number of options for everything seems perfect.

I've got to have scrollable desktops and some of the features Xfwm provides that are lacking in Metacity and i'll take Thunar over Nautilus any day (though smb support would be nice one day, maybe.) I would also say Xfce is now more polished and consistent than Gnome overall. Of course, it's also faster.

[graabein]

I've been a GNOME user for the last couple of years and I just recently tried Xfce. It is snappier on older hardware, it looks pretty good plus I like the right click menus. So Xfce is now on my old laptop and I'll install Xubuntu over the previous version of Ubuntu on my parents machine next time I visit them.

xfce is much better, faster, less dependencies... And it could be even nicer, but it isn't imortant anyway

Come on entertain us with your views and ideas for a nicer Xfce :)

I tried xfce for one day and instantly switched, it is pretty much exactly what I want from a DE. my only gripe is that it's not very well programmed. you can't notice it if you reboot often (like every day or so), but both the menus and the desktop leak memory like there's no tomorrow. After 4 days or so they are both around 100 MB and desperately need to be killed.

This on both 4.4.0 and the one that originally shipped with xubuntu.

Do you know if the Xfce devs are aware (http://bugzilla.xfce.org/buglist.cgi?quicksearch=memory+leak) of this? They should be informed if they're not... Strange that such a large bug is not taken care of...

[Quillz]

I prefer GNOME.

[rai4shu2]

XFCE is making rapid improvements lately. I'm definitely giving it a shot once Feisty is stable in April.

[shrimphead]

i'm a big fan of scrollable desktops and right-click menus, so that gives an advantage to xfce.

^This. Desktop menu's rule. Which is why I Like fluxbox :)

[shrimphead]

4. Likes the ease of configuratioin in xfce and it's interface.


This is probably my *only* criticism of Xfce, I love how in gnome you can just drag an app from the menu to a panel to get a shortcut to that, wheras in Xfce you have to create the shortcut manually, giving it the path, the path to the icon etc etc.

If anyone knows of an app or something that I've missed that gives you greater drag and drop in Xfce that would be awesome

[rai4shu2]

I use AppFinder and the add a launcher dialog. You can drag from AppFinder to the launcher (if it's in the AppFinder).

[shrimphead]

I use AppFinder and the add a launcher dialog. You can drag from AppFinder to the launcher (if it's in the AppFinder).

Thanks, I'll give that a go :)

[doobit]

This is probably my *only* criticism of Xfce, I love how in gnome you can just drag an app from the menu to a panel to get a shortcut to that, wheras in Xfce you have to create the shortcut manually, giving it the path, the path to the icon etc etc.

If anyone knows of an app or something that I've missed that gives you greater drag and drop in Xfce that would be awesome

There are people who are using Engage in Xfce. I haven't tried it yet though.

http://www.enlightenment.org/Applications/Engage/

[SunnyRabbiera]

XFCE is pretty nice, but it lacks the "sleekness" you can get in gnome and in KDE, plus I have always had issues with screensavers in it

[Dragonbite]

They are both good but I feel like Xfce is a little more responsive on my 500MHz machine though I haven't gotten the transparency working right.

One setup I keep going back to is panel-less. I bind the Main Menu key to the windows key on my keyboard and the desktop list menu to my list key on the keyboard and remove all of the panels from the screen. Sometimes I would only have the 'lil icon box to pop-up when programs are opened.

[Sunflower1970]

I've tried XFCE a few different times on my PII 400 Mhz computer, and I really don't see a difference in response time between Gnome or XFCE (lol both slow, but usable) I also found I was frustrated trying to customize the taskbars, and I also never have found a theme I've liked for it.

I keep trying it out from time to time just to keep on getting used to it, but I find I keep going back to Gnome or IceWM. (and even Enlightenment from time to time)

[manmower]

Xfce and Gnome are on par IMHO.

[izanbardprince]

It really REALLY depends on your hardware.

If you have gobs of RAM and one of these new dual core 64-bit processors and a beefy video card, nothing you throw at it will put much of a dent in performance.

Xubuntu would be noticeably faster on systems with 512 megs of RAM or less and a 1-2 Ghz processor.


I'm dual booting Windows 98 SE and Xubuntu on an old HP system I hacked together out of spare parts.

550 Mhz AMD K6-2
320 megs of RAM
40 gig hard disk

I also managed to scrap up a Geforce 5200 PCI video card.

[DirtDawg]

After using both in Dapper, in the end I like Gnome better. Little things, like the ability to change panel colors, and neat-o scroll bars make all the difference to me.

Of course, on my little imac g3, Xfce is the bomb. People who don't think there's any kind of speed difference between the two may be using Gnome applications in Xfce. In which case, no, there would be no significant speed increase. It's the combination of Xfce and GTK apps where the benefits become real apparent.

[jotagab]

It really REALLY depends on your hardware.

If you have gobs of RAM and one of these new dual core 64-bit processors and a beefy video card, nothing you throw at it will put much of a dent in performance.

Xubuntu would be noticeably faster on systems with 512 megs of RAM or less and a 1-2 Ghz processor.


I'm dual booting Windows 98 SE and Xubuntu on an old HP system I hacked together out of spare parts.

550 Mhz AMD K6-2
320 megs of RAM
40 gig hard disk

I also managed to scrap up a Geforce 5200 PCI video card.

Hum, you're sure about the 550MHz? I thought that the K6-2 maxed out at 450MHz...
Anyway, one small note: check the maximum amount of cacheable memory on that motherboard, because if it is 256MB (quite usual in those days...) you're probably better off with only 256MB!

[graabein]

People who don't think there's any kind of speed difference between the two may be using Gnome applications in Xfce. In which case, no, there would be no significant speed increase. It's the combination of Xfce and GTK apps where the benefits become real apparent.

This might sound stupid but I'll risk it -- how does one see which apps are GNOME or not?

Another thing -- I just marked changes in Synaptic and went ahead and updated and it looks like it's installing lots of GNOME stuff even though I don't have gnome-desktop at all, just Xfce that came with Xubuntu... Hope it cleans up after itself and don't install unnecessary GNOME stuff because I'm strapped for disk space on this old heap of junk (90's laptop).

Anyone got links to stripping packages and freeing up disk space btw?

[DirtDawg]

This might sound stupid but I'll risk it -- how does one see which apps are GNOME or not?

Another thing -- I just marked changes in Synaptic and went ahead and updated and it looks like it's installing lots of GNOME stuff even though I don't have gnome-desktop at all, just Xfce that came with Xubuntu... Hope it cleans up after itself and don't install unnecessary GNOME stuff because I'm strapped for disk space on this old heap of junk (90's laptop).

Anyone got links to stripping packages and freeing up disk space btw?

Nothing stupid about that. I think I've been doing this long enough to take sooper nerdy things for granted. :oops:

I'm not sure of a good way to find gtk apps. I thought there was a thread or two with lists of applications, but I'll be damned if I can find them now. What I generally do, when I need an app, is search for said app in Synaptic, then look for a gtk version.

For example, Thunderbird was way slow on my Xubuntu box, so I searched Synaptic for 'email', or something close, and found sylpheed-claws-gtk2. I tried it and it totally rocks. In other words, I look for a mention of gtk in either the name or description. Just remember, as a general rule, to always choose gtk2 over gtk if there's an option.

As far as getting rid of all your Gnome bits, try this link (http://www.psychocats.net/ubuntu/purexfce). It might be just what you're looking for.

[manmower]

This might sound stupid but I'll risk it -- how does one see which apps are GNOME or not?

Another thing -- I just marked changes in Synaptic and went ahead and updated and it looks like it's installing lots of GNOME stuff even though I don't have gnome-desktop at all, just Xfce that came with Xubuntu... Hope it cleans up after itself and don't install unnecessary GNOME stuff because I'm strapped for disk space on this old heap of junk (90's laptop).

Anyone got links to stripping packages and freeing up disk space btw?

The fact that they are sucking in a bunch of Gnome dependencies basically makes them Gnome apps. Just look through the packages' dependencies and see if they need Gnome libraries to run. Before installing, preferably. :)

You can uninstall Gnome apps and the dependencies that came with them just fine though.

[lhtown]

I prefer Gnome over XFCE since it is supported much better by Ubuntu (try getting XFCE specific help on these forums).

Also, I like brown better than blue. I know it is customizable, but I am not into theming.

I am using XFCE 4.4 in Fiesty on a P4 computer, and I must say that it is really nice and noticeably faster than Gnome in Edgy. I think it is a big improvement over 4.2.

[angryfirelord]

I've recently switched to XFCE because even though I have a gig of ram, it has a more snappier feel to it.

The lack of desktop icons I can live without, but the thing I dislike about it is the menu editor. The Alacarte menu editor for gnome is much better than the wimpy thing provided with xfce.

I love thunar because it's just what a file manager should be, a file manger. Much snappier than nautilus or konqueror.

Gnome still comes at a close second.

[graabein]

Thanks for the replies DirtDawg and manmower. I'll take a look at that link when I get home from work.

I also found a nice page on the Xubuntu wiki for Gtk programs: https://wiki.ubuntu.com/Xubuntu/ProposedPackages

[DirtDawg]

Thanks for the replies DirtDawg and manmower. I'll take a look at that link when I get home from work.

I also found a nice page on the Xubuntu wiki for Gtk programs: https://wiki.ubuntu.com/Xubuntu/ProposedPackages

Oh, great link! Thanks for that.

[FyreBrand]

This is probably my *only* criticism of Xfce, I love how in gnome you can just drag an app from the menu to a panel to get a shortcut to that, wheras in Xfce you have to create the shortcut manually, giving it the path, the path to the icon etc etc.

If anyone knows of an app or something that I've missed that gives you greater drag and drop in Xfce that would be awesomeI agree that is a little clunky. I do like the drag-n-drop gnome offers or the right-click -> add application in KDE. I have to open up the menu editor copy the information over to the panel bar launcher so I can get the start up switches right.

I don't change app launchers on the panel a lot though so once I go through the initial hassle it's not really a big deal.

I noticed there are a few startup differences that I'm having to get used to that are different than gnome such as how environment settings are saved and reloaded, but eventually I'll get the hang of it. Gnome just kind of takes care of all that for you which is convenient, but I'm still having fun with xfce. Learning it's little differences has been educational.

[raul_]

I switched to Xfce a couple of days ago. I tried many times, but i just didn't like it. But i spent a little time customizing it, and remembering that it wasn't supposed to be Gnome and now i'm getting rid of all my Gnome apps (Epiphany, Evolution, etc) and i'm going Xfce all the way.

I have a nice machine (amd sempron 2800+, 1gb ram) but i just like the responsiveness of xfce. Plus, my cpu spikes dropped a lot :)

EDIT: just to make a point, i don't use xfce because my computer can't handle gnome, i use xfce because i think it's better. But i also like Gnome very much (i've always used it)

[Graduate]

When i was using Ubuntu, my fluxbox kept messing up and I would end up in metacity with not gnome panel. So I tried out xubuntu and it works great with openbox.

[maxamillion]

I use Xfce because I like it better, but Gnome is a very close second .... there are just certain things about Gnome that I feel are a little too automated (which is by no means a bad thing, I just like control)

[zubrug]

Using kde feisty at the moment, love xfce though, will switch this box back soon. Gnome is nice too though but slow (this is not so obvious as it was in 5.10) , I will most likely use kde on a new system though as I use quite a few kde app's so why not.

[illu45]

I usually use Gnome (or Beryl), but I did give XFCE a try recently and I quite liked the lightweight feel of it. However, I didn't see much difference in speed between the two and by this point I'm quite used to my Gnome setup, and see little reason to switch over to XFCE. However, if I were to do an install on a new computer (especially an older one), I'd probably go with XFCE.

[LookTJ]

I tried both.

They both look the same.

XFCE is faster and nice

but I still use gnome.

[raublekick]

I tried both.

They both look the same.

XFCE is faster and nice

but I still use gnome.

Xubuntu and Ubuntu look the "same". XFCE's default does not look like GNOME's default.


An important thing to remember is that Xubuntu has a very modified XFCE. I rather suggest installing xfce over xubuntu-desktop, but that's just my preference.

[LookTJ]

Xubuntu and Ubuntu look the "same". XFCE's default does not look like GNOME's default.


An important thing to remember is that Xubuntu has a very modified XFCE. I rather suggest installing xfce over xubuntu-desktop, but that's just my preference.

they look the same, but xubuntu is smaller.

[XeroZohar]

I used blackbox and then fluxbox on my old slack box for the longest time. When I did a LFS project for an old notebook computer, I decided on using XFCE. I really liked it on there, so when I saw there was an XFCE-based Ubuntu, I jumped at the chance to use it. It hasn't disappointed me yet, and I've even managed to get it themed just like I want it. Very nice and customizable.

This probably will negate the point of my reply to this particular thread, but I've never actually used GNOME. Limited experience with KDE as well.

[Dragonbite]

I've used Xfce for a while but currently I'm using Gnome for a couple of reasons.
Customizing in Xfce can be a pain because of more screens to click through
Modifying the menu, say to take out Gnome apps (like gEdit) so you get the Xfce apps (Mousepad) showing without bloating the menu) can be a pain if you are not ready to redo the entire menu
I like Gnome's system resource monitor better (esp. the Network monitor)
I can never figure out how to make the panel backgrounds in Xfce transparent
Adding an application to a panel is a pain-in-the-@$$! I like in Gnome where you right-click on a menu item and have the options to "Add to Panel" or "Add to Desktop"

I will say, I do like some of the things about Xfce.
Since the right-mouse button pulls up the menu and the middle-button brings up the list of open windows in all desktops, the requirement on using panels is minimized and for a while I did have a desktop with NO panels (I also bind the Windows and Menu keys on the keyboard to the right- and middle-buttons of the mouse)
I like a clean desktop, so having only minimized applications show up on the desktop is kinda nice
I notice a very slight responsiveness difference (I think on older machines the difference is more noticeable than on newer/faster machines)
Looks cleaner


I may be setting up an Edubuntu thin client environment at home sometime this year and if I do I am going to keep an eye on using Xfce for the desktops instead of Gnome and see if that helps in handling multiple logons better.

[addux]

Xfce: 8
Gnome: 7.5
(KDE: 7)

I've had more problems with gnome, I like Beryl a lot and as of right now I can't get them to work together well. When I was using Ubuntu, Beryl worked with gnome from anywhere between 5-50 minutes. On a whim I installed Xfce and was able to use Beryl with better performance. I RARELY have problems with Xfce/Beryl, I dare say never. Editing panels did require more steps with Xfce, but it's not bad and really only needs to be once in a while. Xfce feels more responsive and as I said before, my experience has shown it to be much more stable. Gnome has burned me too many times for reasons I don't know. Just imagine the blue screen of death, but instead of blue, you have a picture of your current screen, nothing is responsive, with the exception a few peripherals (not the Keyboard), and no logging in any default logs to help me get any clue as to what happened. The negativity aside, Gnome is great (for me preferred over KDE) and I must stress I had major problems with Beryl only, nothing else to speak of.

[linfidel]

I installed xubuntu gutsy along with my ubuntu gutsy, sharing the same /home partition.

If it were not for compiz, I'd definitely use xfce over gnome. But I like compiz + gnome a lot. Not only does it look good and have some nice plugins, but keyboard shortcuts seem to work more consistently.

Can compiz be used with xubuntu? Would that be the same as ubuntu with compiz, more or less?

xubuntu definitely boots faster for me, about 3 times faster, I think. I like the fact that I can share the home directory, so I can just run either one, although there is the added overhead of keeping both updated.

[-grubby]

I installed xubuntu gutsy along with my ubuntu gutsy, sharing the same /home partition.

If it were not for compiz, I'd definitely use xfce over gnome. But I like compiz + gnome a lot. Not only does it look good and have some nice plugins, but keyboard shortcuts seem to work more consistently.

Can compiz be used with xubuntu? Would that be the same as ubuntu with compiz, more or less?

xubuntu definitely boots faster for me, about 3 times faster, I think. I like the fact that I can share the home directory, so I can just run either one, although there is the added overhead of keeping both updated.

yes compiz can be used with XFCE: type compiz --replace

[Cursim]

I don't have much on the comparisonto gnome, but I know that before I installed compiz, my computer FLEW with xfce, noticably faster than KDE, which I switched from. Even with compiz it's still pretty damn snappy. I still have the XFCE panel and menus and stuff. At first I didn't like it, but once i had it set up the way I wanted, I grew to really love it, and now I won't go back.

[crimesaucer]

I've used xfce4 for most my time on Linux. My first distro was xubuntu 6.0.6 and I used xubuntu all the way up to the tribe 5 Gutsy 7.10...


I used Beryl and then Compiz Fusion for most of that time, and had some very nice looking desktops using gtk themes that I wrote for the "engines-xfce" and the Emerald windows.


Then I went to Archlinux and since the new Gnome2.20 had just been released, I tried that out.


Well, the first things that I liked in my new Gnome were the panel and the menus... I also liked the sounds included, and nautilus and gedit were pretty nice.


What I hated about Gnome was that the minimize effect was lame, you couldn't drag and drop a window to the next workspace, gconf seemed very limited in possibilities, and for the first time in a year, I noticed that I used my swap file a bunch. (also missing compositing unless you use the svn...)


I also didn't like nautilus scripts compared to thunar custom actions... (I might not of given it a chance)... and I found that unless you set nautilus to a single file browser in gconf, you end up with so many windows open for no reason


Then if you add Compiz Fusion to Gnome, it really uses to many resources and get's slow when you have too many apps open at once.


So I went back to xfce4 (new xfce4.4.2) on Archlinux, and after a while, I stopped using Compiz Fusion all together and now my computer is so damn fast. And when I use the xfce4 apps like mousepad, they open instantly. So does AbiWord. Plus my Swap file never get's used now, and Swiftfox 3 is so fast!!!!!


This is xfwm4 with compositing on Archlinux:


Large View: http://i144.photobucket.com/albums/r161/crimesaucer/Screenshot-5-1.png
http://i144.photobucket.com/albums/r161/crimesaucer/Screenshot-5-5.png


Large View: http://i144.photobucket.com/albums/r161/crimesaucer/Screenshot-6.png
http://i144.photobucket.com/albums/r161/crimesaucer/Screenshot-6-1.png


Large View: http://i144.photobucket.com/albums/r161/crimesaucer/Screenshot-7-5.png
http://i144.photobucket.com/albums/r161/crimesaucer/Screenshot-7-6.png


Large View: http://i144.photobucket.com/albums/r161/crimesaucer/Screenshot-8.png
http://i144.photobucket.com/albums/r161/crimesaucer/Screenshot-8-3.png

[airtonix]

for me :

gnome is slow & heavy on resources, easy to manipulate in terms of desktop customisation, and convienent for the script user with nautilus-scripts.

xfce is great as a desktop that need no real network interactions....you cant browse network shares with thunar, so you will need to use NFS shares mounted locally..

kde is faters than gnome, and about the same as xfce for me. but it blows them both out the water with configuration possibilities.

I refuse to use samab anymore due to its infereror and immature state compared to NFS or SSH.

[new2*buntu]

I am currently using XFCE and I like it a lot. I used to use Gnome, but it was a bit too slow. So I tried out XFCE and so far it has been great. I like it better than Gnome and it is faster. Also, Compiz Fusion + XFCE has given me no problems, unlike the frequent crashes with it in Gnome when nothing moves but the mouse.

[frito]

i am also a huge fan of Xfce. The developers seem to try to avoid function creep which makes me happy.

I find the stuff Xubuntu avoids (ie. Nautilus) makes it much faster but using Xfce also helps a bit.

I compared two fresh installs of Xubuntu and Ubuntu and Xubuntu was noticably fater on my 2Ghz machine

[julian67]

On a really decent PC you won't notice too much difference in performance comparing Gnome and Xfce but as soon as you're not using AMD 64 or Intel Core 2 Duo you'll see differences. Gnome is horribly slow on older hardware. I have a centrino laptop 1.6GHz with 768 MB RAM and Xfce is obviously faster. Same on my desktop which is an old Athlon 2700 with 1GB DDR 400. My other laptop has Core Duo 2x 1.6 GHz and 1.5GB RAM and Xfce is still noticably faster. But on my friend's AMD Athlon 64 3400 Gnome is very fast (it had better be fast on that kind of processor).

Xfce's lack of integrated samba browsing is easily fixed by installing pyNeighborhood or there is a great howto somewhere on these forums for integrating fusesmb to give Thunar (apparently) native samba browsing capability like Nautilus.

[timzak]

I've tried XFCE a few different times on my PII 400 Mhz computer, and I really don't see a difference in response time between Gnome or XFCE (lol both slow, but usable) I also found I was frustrated trying to customize the taskbars, and I also never have found a theme I've liked for it.

I keep trying it out from time to time just to keep on getting used to it, but I find I keep going back to Gnome or IceWM. (and even Enlightenment from time to time)

I've had the same experience when comparing Xubuntu to Ubuntu default installs. However, I recently tried a minimal install (mini.iso) and manually installed gdm, xorg, xfce, and synaptic. Then I install just what I need with synaptic and in this light, the OS feels much more responsive. Uses about 50MB on bootup vs. about 100MB with a standard Xubuntu install. Now I'd like to try the same with Gnome and see if I can get Gnome to feel more responsive on a slow system.

[cardinals_fan]

well, not really. the difference is that unlike gnome i can still customize my xfce :)

I tried xfce for one day and instantly switched, it is pretty much exactly what I want from a DE. my only gripe is that it's not very well programmed. you can't notice it if you reboot often 8like every day or so), but both the menus and the desktop leak memory like there's no tomorrow. After 4 days or so they are both around 100 MB and desperately need to be killed.

This on both 4.4.0 and the one that originally shipped with xubuntu.

I haven't noticed this. I haven't rebooted my machine for over a week, and they are each using only about 3 MB. It is worth remembering that Xubuntu is not the best Xfce distro and could be much improved. Try Zenwalk for pure, unadulterated Xfce goodness :)

[Quillz]

I've just started using XFCE/Xubuntu as of late, and I must say, it's really very nice. I'm not sure if it's "better" than GNOME, but there's something about it I just really like. I personally think it looks better, too.

[iSplicer]

XFCE definately looks better with its blue theme, but GNOME beats it in functionality.

[cardinals_fan]

XFCE definately looks better with its blue theme, but GNOME beats it in functionality.
You do know that you can change themes, right?

[haiji]

I really like XFCE. I'm a former Windowmaker user XD (I know it's quite minimal but the thing that really pushed me changing into linux was Windowmaker, 5 or 6 years ago).
Why? because I was shocked to see that I'm capable to work with a clean desktop. I mean: no icons, no taskbar (!!), no launch bar etc... It's very cool to see an empty desktop with a cool wallpaper and only a single window in the middle of it. And that's only possible with a righ-click menu.
Imo Xfce is the natural evolution of windowmaker-like enviroments: very customizable (windowmaker can even use config files xD), in fact you can use all the gtk themes; minimal but beatiful, compiz-fusion works great in last versions, and perfect compatibility with gnome apps.
I know that gnome panels are customizable and it's possible to hide desktop icons, but for some reason I still feel claustrophobic (:lolflag:) in KDE and gnome, can't tell why. Maybe it's because with xfce I feel further away from microsoft's desktops.

btw, sorry for my english ;)

[cardinals_fan]

Why? because I was shocked to see that I'm capable to work with a clean desktop. I mean: no icons, no taskbar (!!), no launch bar etc... It's very cool to see an empty desktop with a cool wallpaper and only a single window in the middle of it. And that's only possible with a righ-click menu.

Sounds like you would enjoy a *box.

[RiceMonster]

I'll probably try Xfce soon. I'm pretty happy with my GNOME setup, so right now I'm not that interested in switching/trying anything else out just yet. I like Fluxbox too, it's nice.

[John T. Monkey]

This happens to be my first post from my shiny new Xubuntu 8.04 install. I was previously using Ubuntu 7.10, but thought I'd see if xfce would go any faster than gnome. I did use Xubuntu Edgy before, and was very happy with it, but then went back when I upgraded, for some reason I can't quite remember.

So far, theres not much difference between the two. I prefer the gnome menus, they are better laid out.
I'm noticing that xfce seems to draw windows faster, and firefox starts in about 5/6 seconds for me instead of 10 on my last install. My memory usage at the moment seems to be hovering around the same.

The best thing is the Xubuntu splash screen. :)

I will stick with it and see what happens...

[anv]

I like also Xfce, both in Debian and Ubuntu.

[charlemagne86]

Okay so what i've seen in this thread is the expereinces and personal preferences of users with respect to Gnome vs Xfce......

But could someone enlighten me, if possible, on the technical aspect(differences/advantages) among the two>.

thnx.

[bytor4232]

I'm no programmer, but I've been a hardcore Linux user and sysadmin since 1998. Basically, XFCE4 uses less resources. Period. Its gotten a lot more stable and leaks a lot less memory under the last few releases. Of course, if you load GNOME and KDE services with XFCE4, then it uses more resources than GNOME, cause its using GNOME resources as well as XFCE resources.

In my opinion, they both offer the same type of desktop environment. You have a file manager on the desktop, and a multi-panel system that is almost infinitely customizable, as well as a basic window manager.

GNOME seems to handle more things in the backend. For instance, when a program goes out to lunch, I can click the close button, and a window will pop up asking if you want to force-quit. Also extended functions work better on Ubuntu, my volume control keys, multimedia keys, and function keys work under Ubuntu, they don't work under Xubuntu. The best I've ever done under Xubuntu is the volume control. I've never been able to get the screen to blank under Xubuntu with the screen function key, and my laptop won't suspend under Xubuntu, only Ubuntu.

If you have an older PC with few resources, it makes sense to run XFCE. I'm currently running Xubuntu like a champ on a 500mgz Duron with 256 megs of Ram. If you want an environment that takes care of most things for you, then GNOME is for you, but XFCE has a more configuration options. Scroll wheeling on the desktop to change virtual desktops is the bomb. In Gnome, you keep the workspace switcher in a corner, you can scroll wheel by zipping to the corner the switcher is in.

If you have a gig of ram and a processor faster than, say, 2 Ghz, then your not going to see significant improvements between the two DEs. I've switched between Ubuntu and Xubuntu on my Celeron 1.7 ghz laptop with 1 gig of RAM and my 2.8 Ghz Pentium D with 2 gigs of ram, and GNOME is almost as fast as XFCE, not really enough to make me pine for XFCE4.

[bytor4232]

And I spoke too soon. This afternoon I upgraded my Laptop from Gutsy to Hardy, and booted into XFCE4 on a lark. All the buttons and functions that didn't work before are working now. It booted in about 15 seconds with GNOME and KDE sessions turned off in "Sessions and Startup". If GNOME sessions are are checked on, it takes as long to start up as GNOME. The GNOME and KDE applications seem to behave themselves too with the sessions turned off.

So I guess I just proved myself wrong. XFCE4 at least starts up in about half the time, depending on what its gotta start.

[L815]

Xfce is nice, and on a duo core 2gb ram laptop, I do notice xfce launches programs a bit faster regardless of libraries.

One thing I like Gnome better is the volume manager is more intuitive, and I can select multiple options on the desktop without holding ctrl.

Xfce also takes long to delete a file from the desktop and show up in the trash. It's as if it gets lost then finds its way after a while.

Even though there is a slight speed in launching applications, I find gnome works great (without compiz), especially paired with OpenBox WM. Talk about speed!

But on a side note, I find xfce's WM much better than metacity just for the fact that it has it's own compositions without the use of compiz. I find it superior to metacities damn black boxes -_-

[yanom]

if you kept right-clicking on your xp desktop, i bet it would shutdown eventually.

yeah... from memory overflow.

:)

[MikeTheC]

I've got a friend with a low-end system and going from Ubuntu to Xubuntu, according to him, made all the performance difference in the world.

I would say that, generally, if Gnome (or certainly if KDE) run on your system without any signs or hints of sluggishness, you're not going to see a performance improvement using XFCE, since your system at that point is already way ahead of the threshold.

That being said, I really don't personally care for XFCE's design metaphors (I don't mean about it's low resource consumption). It's much more of a fight for me to get stuff done in both XFCE and KDE than it is for me to use Gnome.

But XFCE definitely serves it's purposes, and so long as people are using it and loving it, who am I to say anything about it?

[RomanIvanov]

I love Xubuntu and even use it everywhere - quick or slow PC. And I can use all applications from Gnome and KDE :).

[cozmicharlie]

I am trying out xubuntu and ubuntu with gnome with enlightment now. I have tried kde and xfce but I always seem to gravitate back to gnome.

FYI - for those that want a right click menu in windows (if you are like me and have to use one for work) check out Emerge Desktop (it is free) - emergedesktop.org. Completely gets rid of the start menu.

[hero1900]

i try XFCE yesterday and i am thinking to switch over to it
it has everyhting that i need and it is easier to navigate and handle it need some work but it is better than gnome for me

[credobyte]

Looks clean and fast, but .. not suitable for a desktop PC ( from my point of view ) :-k

[dixiedancer]

What an amazing difference a DE makes! I've become a fan of LXDE (http://lxde.org) from the moment I started experimenting with it. It's even more lightweight than Xfce, the next fastest thing to having no DE at all. Yet it is beautiful and super-simple.

You can drag and drop applications and/or folders to the desktop from the file manager, or just use the menus. Wallpapers are easily changed (the default blue is pretty, but you can add them from any site and add them to usr/share/lxde/wallpapers).

LXDE flies along really fast and effortlessly on older hardware, too. And for looks, though they aren't related, I would say that LXDE could pass as KDE's pretty "little sister."

They're actually working on an official *buntu built on the LXDE environment. Look for "Lubuntu" in the next year or two.

-Robin

[ram4nd]

I have used gnome for about 2 years. And tomorrow I am going to install Xubuntu. I hoped that I can get some answers from this thread, but its seems that it's all about taste. I hope I remember to post here that how I feel about the difference.

[dixiedancer]

Well, my love affair with LXDE is over. It's full of little bugs which, over time and across multiple distros, have just sort of ruined the fun for me.

It's certainly lightweight, but the trade off is an unrelenting series of constant minor aggravations. LXDE remains "under heavy development" which, to me, means that it's immature and changing too quickly for me to keep up with.

I've learned that LXDE takes the majority of its code from Xfce anyway - so I tend to conclude that when LXDE "grows up," it'll be a Xfce clone (they already look very much alike - there's very little difference between PCManFM and Thunar, for example).

So I'm playing with Xubuntu Karmic - my first foray into Xfce. And I must say, it rawks! No bugs!! Yay! And it's not noticably any slower than LXDE was on my machine. But definitely faster than Gnome was.

-Robin

[cgroza]

on my 256mb ram sistem gnome was very slow....but i instaled xfce and now i can run even 9 apps at a time without lagging

[yurx cherio]

> I like nautilus better
You can run nautilus in Xfce same way as any other app. It runs just fine. In fact you can run and enjoy ANY of your favorite GNOME apps. Both GNOME and Xfce use GTK2+ libraries for UI.

Also you don't need to install xubuntu as a separate OS. Simply run Synaptic in your Ubuntu and select xubuntu-desktop. Any time you log in you can choose to run either GNOME or Xfce session. It is that simlpe.

[Dragonbite]

I give Xfce a +1 for not requiring Evolution.

This way I can pick my choice (e.g. Thunderbird) and not have to have Evolution taking up space.

[Simian Man]

Well, my love affair with LXDE is over. It's full of little bugs which, over time and across multiple distros, have just sort of ruined the fun for me.

It's certainly lightweight, but the trade off is an unrelenting series of constant minor aggravations. LXDE remains "under heavy development" which, to me, means that it's immature and changing too quickly for me to keep up with.
I also found LXDE to be quite buggy. Going from Gnome or KDE to Xfce, you will not lose too much in terms of features and customization (and gain a couple things). Going to LXDE, however, would be quite painful.

I give Xfce a +1 for not requiring Evolution.

This way I can pick my choice (e.g. Thunderbird) and not have to have Evolution taking up space.
Yeah Xfce sticks much better to the Unix concept of modularity.

It used to be that Gnome was focused on making a simple, easy to use desktop. With the developments of Gnome 3, along with a few other changes in the Gnome world, I really don't know what their focus is any more. Xfce seems to be the only big desktop that isn't trying to give us some kind of crazy new desktop metaphor that nobody asked for :).

[Dragonbite]

It used to be that Gnome was focused on making a simple, easy to use desktop. With the developments of Gnome 3, along with a few other changes in the Gnome world, I really don't know what their focus is any more. Xfce seems to be the only big desktop that isn't trying to give us some kind of crazy new desktop metaphor that nobody asked for :).
Yet. ;)

[Simian Man]

Yet. ;)

Ha ha yeah, maybe Xfce 5 will attempt to revolutionize the way in which we use our computers. I don't know what I'd use then!

[Dragonbite]

Ha ha yeah, maybe Xfce 5 will attempt to revolutionize the way in which we use our computers. I don't know what I'd use then!

Chances are CLI won't change much in the near future.

[gradinaruvasile]

I installed Xubuntu 9.10 on a Dell D630 (Core2Duo 2Ghz/2 GB RAM/Nvidia 135m) laptop a few days ago. I have a 9.04 Gnome install on it too. Xubuntu is far more responsive and snappier in general and its really obvious on this high end hardware too. The window rendering is faster in XFCE compared to Gnome (no compiz).
Advantages:
- The fact that you are not forced to use PulseAudio by default (and having the old style volume control applet) - anyway i installed PA and Blueman to use my Bluetooth headset, but the sound worked wery well with everything OOTB.
- No Evolution stuff hogging memory/running in the background - I never needed it anyways, better off with Seamonkey
- Full Gnome compatibility - You can install anything you can under Gnome...
- Snappy window rendering, very responsive system
-

Cons:

- Takes a time to configure the basics that you have in Gnome included - but still runs fast after configuring the gvfs support in gigolo that is supposed to work ootb but it requires some packages (gnome-mount and some i dont remember).
- Dont have that many configuration options than in Gnome;
- No easy way (that i know of) to customize menus;
- Some programs icons do not appear in the menus - Thats a big one, if u are a noob, u're toast...

All in all i like it very much. But some degree of knowledge of Ubuntu/linux is recommended when using it.

[Dragonbite]

Does Xubuntu 9.10 include UbuntuOne?

[yurx cherio]

If it doesn't you can install it. The important thing is - it works under Xfce.

[Praxicoide]

My vote goes for Xfce for modularity, customization and lightweight. Gnome does seem better for newcomers.

I will try Gnome 3, of course, but for now, I'm enjoying Xfce4.6 too much.