Solus Eveline 1.2: good for newbies

I am new to Linux and about 3 months ago tried Zorin 5.2 Core. I was very impressed with a Linux based operating system and decided to make my laptop a dual boot with Win7. I wanted a very stable Debian distro. I found Solus OS which seemed to have what I was looking for in a distro.

Solus comes in 32 bit and 64 bit editions and also in PAE and non-PAE, for those who want to use more memory. There are also Legacy editions.

The chief developer is Ikey Doherty. He was one of the original developers of LMDE.

I first tried the 32 bit install to my HP G60-549DX Notebook with a DVD as it is 1 gig.

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SolusOS 1.2 32-bit

It went very well, and the installer partitioned the hard drive without a problem. The only thing for a newbie is that the root partition must be set. I was not sure how to do that, but a right click on the partition set it as root. Once installed there is a first run wizard that starts the firewall and installs drivers for detected hardware.

The default menu is Cardapio, but the classic GNOME menu is included and can be used.

The wireless network was detected and connected to easily.

My first minor problem was the Cardapio menu keep disappearing, and I liked it better than GNOME. After a post to the forum I decided to install the 64 bit system.

SolusOS 1.2 64-bit

I burnt SolusOS 64 bit to an USB drive using Win7 and LinuxLive USB creator. I like this program as it will install even non-supported Linux operating systems. It will also let you run the program in Windows with a Portable Virtual Box. It also has persistence so software can be downloaded and installed and data saved to the USB drive.


I liked the 64 bit install better, it had slightly better look and seems to me more stable. My only problem was that PlayOnLinux did not have the 32 bit openGL libraries needed to run 32 bit .exe programs for some NVIDIA and my particular Intel graphics chip set. As a newbie, I was not sure how to download and install the correct drivers, so I installed Wine Tricks. Now I was able to install and run Quicken and Poker Stars running on Wine. I could install 64 bit programs on PlayOnLinux.

Solus OS 1.2 Desktop and menu

Solus is lightweight, fast, very professional looking and easy to use. It will work good for a newbie or an old hand. It uses the Debian repositories and .deb files, so there is a lot of good software. Libre Office, Thunderbird and Firefox are default.


For a very young distro Solus has very few bugs. If you want a stable Debian based distro capable of running modern software and a very good forum, that the developer actually answers some forum questions and asks for your ideas, give Solus a try. I don't think you will be disappointed.

To read more: another review of Solus OS 1.2. Eveline.

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This is a guest post from Jymm, who is a long-time reader of Linux notes from DarkDuck

Update 28.12.2013: Solus OS is discontinued. The links to their web site removed.