Keeping 10.04 LTS

[argoz17]

Well I am building a Ubuntu computer. And i will be installing 10.04 LTS on it, I was wandering what are the downs to not upgrading when the next LTS comes out. Say I dont want to us Unity and just stay with 10.04, what problems would I face if any? Thanks. :)

[CharlesA]

Outside of not having newer stuff, I don't see any downsides.

[snowpine]

10.04 will be fully supported through April 2013, it's a good choice. :)

[AlexDudko]

In 1,5 year you won't receive any security updates (any updates to be correct).
For a server it could be critical but for a notebook or a home computer there won't be much trouble.
Actually, I faced only one issue: I nearly missed the train because I hadn't updated timezone data and it had changed in that country unexpectedly.

[BillyBoa]

Some years ago I had a similar question. After installing, reinstalling hundreds of times all possible versions and flavors, I'm sorry to say but you are very modest expecting to install Ubuntu just one time. It's so easy to do it, like doing a defrag to Windows.

[LowSky]

Outside of not having newer stuff, I don't see any downsides.

Software can be installed without synaptic or ubuntu's software center.

The biggest issue down the road will be security issues. The next issue is the software being 100% compatible without hunting down dependencies. The last issue is using an operating system so out of date that help guides may not be compatible.

[peter d]

10.04 is a great version. No problems for as long as it's supported (April 2013).

[jjex22]

I have personally chose to revert back to 10.04 for my netbook and laptop, but I do run 11.10 on the desktop (mac) as I find that the large screen is good for unity (surprising I know, considering unity's resemblance to the 10.04 netbook remix) I just find unity too slow for my portables, and whilst the launcher is perfect for applications I know are there, I find it irritating for browsing on the smaller screens - gnome 2's menu's work better for me.

It's of course a personal choice - unity 2 as I see it is a massive improvement on unity 1 (11.04) which I found very disappointing, and I really expect 12.04 to be an even bigger improvement as the dev's build on their knowledge - gnome 2 we had for ages, gnome 3 is still in it's infancy.

For my personal choice, lucid lynx is one of my favourite OS of all time, and I will be sad when it's support is ended - even though by then I'l be sure to be using a new swanky os, it'll still be sad to retire the ol girl!

[anaconda]

why wont you install 10.04 and then upgrade to the next LTS when it comes?

I am sure you will be able to install gnome to it if you want, and then it will be about the same than 10.04, but newer

PS. I also dropped unity. tried it for a few months, but didnt like it

PSS. 10.04 will have support until 2015, so you can use it atleast until that time. Just have to change the repositories to the server version, which is supported longer...

[CharlesA]

Thought it was only supported until 2013 on desktops, 2015 is for servers.

[3rdalbum]

If you're about to build a computer, you might find that today's components only work well with today's Linux distros. Intel "Sandy Bridge" hardware comes to mind - it causes crashes with last year's distros. It might be easier to just install 11.10 and get used to Unity or Gnome Shell, and then upgrade to 12.04 when it comes out.

[keithpeter]

If you're about to build a computer, you might find that today's components only work well with today's Linux distros. Intel "Sandy Bridge" hardware comes to mind - it causes crashes with last year's distros. It might be easier to just install 11.10 and get used to Unity or Gnome Shell, and then upgrade to 12.04 when it comes out.

I'm using Unity for a month on the desktop PC to get used to it before deciding what to do next.

For those who really can't face the changes in UI forced by the decision of the Gnome project to re-write their libraries, I'd point out that Scientific Linux 6.1 has support until 2017 and uses Gnome 2.x as the standard interface.

SL is a clone of Red Hat Enterprise Linux, so you have to learn Yum and RPM. It works fine on hardware that supports a PAE kernel. There is a live CD available (with installer) with really minimal applications so you can install your choices.

[gnusci]

I will give a Unity a chance. I think people need to be a bit more open to the new UI. You can switch the classic genome3 UI in Ubuntu anyway, if you like genome2 you can install it as well.