A good review of the EasyOS Distro

[ssfc72]

https://distrowatch.com/weekly.php?issue=20220718#easyos

[fox]

Yes, I read that. I have yet to try any Puppy-type distro and I don't have a great need for a distro running from a USB stick, but I would be interested in hearing other member's experiences with EasyOS.

[ssfc72]

I think I probably tried the Distro before but I will have to give it another look.
I like and use Puppy quite often, when I run into permission issues with other Distros, while trying to access files on a hard drive. So, I should see if EasyOS gives the some access to accessing files with permission issues.

[ssfc72]

Ok, I put EastOS on an old 2G usb flash drive (thunb drive).
Booted from the flash drive quickly. Throws a lot of help info at you upon bootup and configuration.
Everything on my 14" Dell inspiron works. I was able to setup my internet connection easily.
I am running a wireless keyboard and mouse with my Dell Inspiron. They both worked without any setup. The only issue I had was that when I tried to close the notebook and just use the hdmi attached monitor, then the monitor went blank and I had to keep the notebook computer screen partially open to keep the hdmi monitor display, on.  I probably need to find and figure out how to switch to keep the hdmi moniter, to stay on.

The Distro is very quick working off the usb flash drive.  The whole system is very snappy in operating.
The Distro comes with Firefox and it works well.
The Distro desktop looks nice to me. Nice and clean looking.  I only played with it for a little bit, but it looks worth spending more time with.

[buster]

Might also be worthwhile to test Peppermint as well as EasyOS. I have liked it in the past.
Jesse reviewed it this year and wrote:

  My experience though was, if not amazing, then not bad either. On the positive side of things Peppermint is amazingly fast in my test environments, running circles around almost every other desktop distribution I have used in recent years. Its boot times, Xfce responsiveness, and small memory footprint are all fantastic.

The full review can be found here: https://distrowatch.com/weekly.php?issue=20220425#peppermint

[ssfc72]

Thanks Buster. Yes, I have used the Peppermint Distro before and it is also a favourite of mine.

I was interested in the EasyOS because it is suited to run from a usb flash drive, which I find quite handy and useful.

[fox]

Both are light, but the two are really quite different. Peppermint is based on Debian, but adds a bunch of web apps and is meant to be installed on an internal drive. EasyOS is its own baby, is meant to be run from a USB stick, and loads into memory.

[Jason]

The only issue I had was that when I tried to close the notebook and just use the hdmi attached monitor, then the monitor went blank and I had to keep the notebook computer screen partially open to keep the hdmi monitor display, on.  I probably need to find and figure out how to switch to keep the hdmi moniter, to stay on.

I had to learn how to do this to use the Toshiba laptop like a desktop (i.e. bigger monitor, USB switch, external input devices). I believe it's in the energy settings, as in, what happens when the laptop is closed. You may also have to change the display settings so that only the external display is enabled. I'm not sure what desktop environment EasyOS uses but I did it in Xfce in Linux Lite and then later in MX Linux.

[Jason]

Interesting comments on both Peppermint and EasyOS, which I had never heard of until now. Thanks for the review notes.

Bill: Is the flash drive persistent at least for settings? You wouldn't have to make the changes I mentioned over and over. However, if you always use an external monitor, there may be an option in your BIOS/EUFI to have it set so that the external monitor is preferred and/or that it won't suspend the display or laptop when you close it.

[ssfc72]

Thanks for the tips Jason, on where to look on the computer settings, to keep an external hdmi monitor from shutting down, while using EasyOS.

Yes the EasyOS distro on a usb flash drive has persistence.