New features in feren OS 2017.0 'Murdock'

Linux Mint Base

The Linux Mint base is now at 18.1

Application Updates

• All Applications are updated to their latest versions
  
• All themes and icon sets have been updated
  
• Automatic Updates are now really enabled by default
  

New Applications

• feren Welcome
  

Removed Applications

• Mint Welcome
  

Bug Fixes

• Mouse Bug has been fixed (Thanks Bad Wolf Plays for the idea which ended up fixing it)
  
• All themes work properly under Cinnamon 3.2
  
• Many bugs have been fixed that were reported
  

New Features

feren Welcome

The Welcome Center has had a major change this release now becoming a Budgie Welcome Fork called feren Welcome.

Desktop Icons

A change as small as Desktop icons is still important for newcomers, and this release, the Desktop Icons have been changed to these:

Themer

Themer has also seen a revamping this release, and is now easier than ever to use, and contains up-to-date themes, with useful theme previews for each theme:

'No Mode Set' for Nvidia Drivers incompatible with the other options now in the boot menu

Just look for the 'No Mode Set' option in the boot menu of the Live CD if you can't boot from the other options and/or have Nvidia drivers... If you have to once you've installed the OS, hold SHIFT to force the boot menu to appear.
NOTE: If you still cannot boot try one of the following solutions:

• Try with "nouveau.noaccel=1" instead of "nomodeset".
• Use the "Compatibility mode" to boot and install feren OS.
• After the installation, use "Advanced Options" -> "Recovery mode" from the boot menu and choose "resume".

Once you reboot from the Live CD, you need to (if you have to use the option in the Live CD boot menu to install feren OS in the first place) add the "nomodeset" option as illustrated below:
WARNING: If your graphics card is from NVIDIA, once in feren OS, perform the following steps to install the NVIDIA drivers:

• Run the Driver Manager
• Choose the NVIDIA drivers and wait for them to be installed
• Reboot the computer

With these drivers the system should now be stable and you no longer need to use "nomodeset".
Note: If you're using an Optimus card, you've nothing more to do. Upon reboot, a system tray icon should show up indicating which GPU is currently active. Click on it to switch GPUs.

Release Notes

​Sound and microphone issues
If you're facing issues with your microphone or your sound output, please install "pavucontrol".
This will add "PulseAudio Volume Control" to your menu. This application has more configuration options than the default volume control.

Mouse cursor disappears with Intel GPU
The mouse cursor disappears after switching users or suspending the computer. This is a known issue. Click here to see the upstream bug report.

Freezes/Crashes with ASRock Skylake motherboards
A known issue is affecting ASRock Skylake motherboards. The kernel floods /var/log/syslog with messages until the disk runs out of space.
If you are suffering from this issue add "echo 'disable' > /sys/firmware/acpi/interrupts/gpe6F" into your /etc/rc.local (to edit this file with admin privileges, you can type "gksu xed /etc/rc.local").
For more information on this issue, please visit https://forums.linuxmint.com/viewtopic.php?f=49&t=223180.

DVD Playback with VLC
If VLC does not find your DVD player, click on Media->Open Disc, and specify '/dev/sr0' as the disc device.

Issues with KDE apps
If you're experiencing issues with KDE apps (Okular, Gwenview, KStars..etc) run the following command:

• apt install kdelibs-bin kdelibs5-data kdelibs5-plugins

Other issues
feren OS 2016.2 is based on is based on Linux Mint 18 which is based on Ubuntu 16.04. Make sure to read the Ubuntu release notes.