First Steps: Zorin OS 18 ⭐

It’s been too long since I spent a meaningful amount of time using Linux, but the recent release of Zorin OS 18 inspired me to do so this week. So far, the experience has been overwhelmingly positive, with Zorin OS correctly identifying and supporting the full range of hardware features in an HP EliteBook, including its discrete and integrated GPUs.

I had wanted to have this write-up ready for the Zorin OS 18 launch last week, as I had access to a near-final beta version of the system ahead of time. But a series of issues, including a problem with the laptop that I initially chose for this test (not Zorin’s fault), pushed it back a bit. And I still have much to do, most notably in trying to figure out how this laptop might be used for gaming. But in the meantime, here’s what I have done so far.

Installation

Zorin OS Core is free and the ISO (x64 only) is a 3.5 GB download. So I started with that. I usually use Rufus to create USB-based installation media, but I couldn’t get that first laptop noted above to boot with that (or any other USB disk, I later discovered). And so I tried again on the EliteBook I’m now using and that didn’t work either. So I switched to balenaEtcher, which, granted, Zorin recommends, and the installation media I created with that app worked fine.

If you’re familiar with Linux, you know that most Linux distribution installation media boots into a live environment so you can test the system before committing to installing it. So that’s what I did with Zorin OS 18 at first, with an eye on examining some of its new features (see below) and whether it would correctly identify and work with the hardware components in the PC.

Hardware support, at least for this 2- or 3-year-old Intel-based laptop, is perfect, from what I can tell. The system came up in the native 2880 x 1800 resolution of the display panel on the first go and everything seemed to work properly from display dimming and USB ports to sleep and instant-on. I later confirmed with an app called Hardware Probe that most of the hardware components are indeed working fine, the one exception being the fingerprint reader.

With that success, I decided to simply install Zorin OS on the laptop. It gave me the option to dual-boot with Windows, but I wiped out the existing installation and installed Zorin OS 18 as the only OS. Once that was done, I started configuring the system and then decided to upgrade from Zorin OS 18 Core to Zorin OS 18 Pro. This costs about $35 and adds 8 more desktop layouts, more apps (mostly creative and productivity focused), and more. But it was mostly about the desktop layouts. That upgrade, oddly, took longer than expected, maybe 30 to 40 minutes.

Initial configuration

I went through a series of initial configuration tasks that I didn’t fully document for myself, but this included at least the following:

• Display Settings. I changed the scale level from 100 percent to 200 percent and configured Night Light.
• Power. I left the laptop configured with the Balanced power mode, but I changed the timeouts for the screen and sleep, and eventually disabled the automatic screen brightness feature because it changed the brightness too frequently.
• Appearance. Zorin OS supports various background color and wallpaper choices, but the bigger deal here is Zorin Appearance, which provides an incredible array of layout, theme, effects, desktop, windows, interface, and fonts choices. I will probably keep playing with this, but for now I am using a Windows 11-style theme that centers the icons in the Taskbar (and is part of Pro, not Core). I hide the Taskbar by default, as I do in Windows 11. And I configured the Start key (Super Left Key to Zorin) to open the Zorin (Start) menu instead of the default, Activities Overview (a sort of Task view showing multiple virtual desktops).
• Apps. Aside from a Markdown editor (Ghostwriter), I haven’t installed too many apps yet, or even looked at most of the bundled apps. But Brave is installed as the default browser, so I was able to get that syncing with my other Brave installs, giving me access to Proton Pass and my other extensions, and all my settings.

During all this, it was obvious how responsive this system is. I can’t say that Windows 11 runs slowly on it per se, but Zorin OS 18 is notably peppy. Most keyboard shortcuts, like Windows Key + D (Show desktop), Alt + Tab , and so on seem to work normally (as in, like Windows). Even Windows key + E works in that it launches the Files app. And I really like how windows are centered on-screen by default.

NAS access

Zorin OS 18 of course supports SMB networking, so I was able to quickly access my NAS after signing in and all its contents. Including playing a movie from my collection just to make sure video and audio were working correctly (they are).

Google account integration

Curious about the online account integration, I signed into my Google accounts in Settings > Online Accounts and gave GNOME (as it turns out) access to my Google Drive, Gmail, Calendar, and Contacts. In both cases, the account showed up as a new location in the navigation bar in the Files app and I could navigate into the respective file systems, open documents and other files, and so on.

There’s also an Evolution app for mail, contacts, and calendar, though I don’t typically use a standalone app for any of that.

Microsoft account integration

As part of its efforts to woo former Windows 10 users, Zorin OS also offers Microsoft account and, new to this release, OneDrive integration. So I did the same as with Google, first signing into my Microsoft account using the Microsoft option in Settings > Online Accounts. But after doing that, I discovered this was only for email.

So I tried the Microsoft 365 + OneDrive option next. But this prompted me for a Microsoft 365 commercial sign-in info like a Client ID and Tenant ID. I do have a Microsoft 365 commercial account, but I was hoping to connect this with consumer OneDrive, so I will need to look into this further.

I assume there’s no Files on Demand capability with any of these online accounts. But there are third party apps that get you at least part of the way there, so I will look into those (again) eventually.

Web app integration

Zorin OS 18 works “natively” with Progressive Web Apps (PWA) and can use any webpage to create a pseudo-app you can run alongside other (real) apps on the desktop. Obviously, Brave can install web apps and also install a page as an app. But Zorin OS includes a new Web Apps app that lets you paste in a URL and then configure the “app” as needed.

From there, a shortcut for the new app appears in the Start (Zorin) menu, you can pin it to the Taskbar (Dash), and launch it normally.

That works fine, but as is the case in other browser-based installs of this non-PWA web app, when you open Word or whatever it opens in a normal (Brave) web browser tab, not within the “app.”

So I installed the Word web app as well. That seems to work nicely.

Windows apps

Zorin OS offers a tailored Windows app experience in which you can try to run a Windows executable. It will offer you a native Linux alternative if it’s aware of one, or you can install Windows app support in the form of a Zorin app based on WINE and Bottles, or in some cases, choose to the launch the web app if available.

Naturally, I started with Microsoft Office, which I get via the Microsoft 365 website. But when you visit this site using Zorin OS and Brave, the “Install apps” link is missing. So I downloaded the installer on Windows on a different PC and sneakernetted it over to Zorin. And as expected, it gave me some options.

While Windows App Support was downloading and configuring, I took a look at LibreOffice Writer as it’s bundled in Zorin OS and was recommended by the tailored app intercept. It looks pretty solid, honestly, though this is mostly for testing purposes. I will be using Ghostwriter or some other Markdown editor for writing.

When Windows App Support finally finished installing, I re-ran the Office installer and chose to “Run it anyway.” WINE started up and then disappeared and nothing seemed to be happening. But when I re-ran the installer again, it told me that Microsoft 365 and Office were already being installed.  So I let that sit for a bit. And then for more than a bit. This one might require some work.

More soon

So that’s just the start of this, of course. As noted, I’m super impressed by how well this works, and I’m curious now to take this further with some more advanced creative and developers apps and games. So I’ll check in again soon.