What is the best alternative to KDE Plasma?

Despite Cinnamon being on its stable second version it still crashes a lot, ranging from plugins all the way to drivers.

It is almost the same management like in 20-years old GNOME 2 environment. Although some elements are new.

Compared to other options, KDE is still perceived slow. Especially, the desktop takes a few seconds to login. Mouse pointer can feel sluggish, or laggy, on older systems

The log in screen as well as some other components of the OS do not scale properly under HIDPI. Everything in the log in screen will be displayed too small, as well as some areas of the OS.

This is better in KDE Neon with minimalist apps, which indeed in itself points out the problem.

Budgie has a nice and simple style, but the memory usage is quite high after booting.

Budgie is still young and in active development, so it may not be as stable as many other desktop environments.

Installing in distros that are not ubuntu based can be hard

If looking for a lightweight OS, and thinking of FreeDOS as a possible option, consider that it will only useful when having to deal with legacy software, or other dos-based programs still commonly used at workplaces. Nonetheless it's a fantastic solution for Retro-Gamers who still own a a sup...

If you own a sound card produced after than 2000, you won't find a driver to make it work.

Instead of having an official forum, users are redirected to their distributions support forums.

Since it's basically a fork of Gnome 2, and it's created to satisfy Gnome 'purists' it's very unlikely for it to add new features more in line with modern DEs.

It is pretty bare-bones on a stock install, but further configuration options can be added through various official tweak tools.

Good for people who want a plug and play simple Desktop Environment. But for a multitasking / entertainment / cutting edge or Gaming Rig this is not the answer.

As it has no set release date, and no set support and/or EOL dates, that makes it a not so good choice for enterprises managing a number of machines where such dates are important to know before hand.

The built-in compositor for Xfce does not handle VSync, meaning that it does not address screen tearing for those with Intel integrated graphics. A third party solution will have to be used for those that do want VSync such as using Nvidia proprietary drivers to handle VSync or installing a third p...

Out of the box, Xfce is the one of the ugliest if not the ugliest DE out there. It definitely can become the most beautiful and gorgeous DE after a bit of tinkering and theming, but the default theme is not that good.

Xfce is missing essential functionality like a file-archiver or a polkit-client, so you have to find alternatives for those applications (eg: by stealing them from MATE or GNOME, however this adds additional dependencies that will bloat Xfce).

As you can see Solus is new project that build from scratch.

Maybe because it's a relatively new project still in its infancy and this may be fixed in the future, but Budgie is not very customizable. You can only change the theme and wallpaper.

While there are a few tools on offer that will upgrade an old Fedora release to the newest, there can often be problems with these methods. Some that may not even crop up at first but will show later down the road. Being that upgrading can be an issue, it can be exacerbated by the fact that Fedora...

Some packages may break, because there isn't an option to test them before rolling them out.

Fedora does not support proprietary drivers, meaning that users may have problems with a lot of hardware when using Fedora. The software to make that kind of hardware work can be installed, but it can be done only through third-parties and it's not easy for the average user.

Backward compatibility is not guaranteed and extensions seems like second class citizens in the GNOME environment.

If you're looking to run an alternative window manager, like XMonad, you're pretty much out of luck.

To modify anything beyond the wallpaper requires third-party software.

Arch only holds your hand a little bit of the way. While documentation is great, you are expected to know what you're doing. The result is that when you find the solution for a problem on a forum or elsewhere, the response may be completely over your head. If you're not well-versed in Linu...

The installation process for Arch Linux is not as streamlined as it is in other distributions. You have to install the OS, Desktop Environment, Network software and configure everything by yourself.

Updating an Arch system is always a gamble. The problem could be as simple as a package having a bug causing a program to crash on start or it may be something bigger like the WiFi or Bluetooth no longer working. There is also the slight chance the system may not even boot at all after a large upda...

Linux Mint by default does not have auto updates turned on for important packages such as xorg or the kernel, thus leaving users with potentially insecure software.

While a new installed system is stable, after an update, there is a slight chance of something not working.

The Linux Mint team offers a method to upgrade the OS between versions but they tend to recommend clean installs, which isn't always suitable for everyone. However, following the upgrade process currently is less than straightforward and is easily capable of leaving your system in a confused st...

SteamOS is, first and foremost, meant to act as a gaming console - it doesn't ship with even some of the most basic applications, such as a file manager or image viewer. As a result, using SteamOS as your primary operating system would require a fair bit of work.

If you've installed Arch you're probably fine, but for those used to simple installs like (Ubuntu to name just one) you should prepare some patience, determination, and painkillers. Good news is, it's getting better (it's very young).

The slow release schedule makes the applications outdated. It drags behind Ubuntu LTS (on which it's based) which itself drags behind Ubuntu which is often still quite far behind Arch for example.

elementary does not offer any release date for their stable releases going more with a "it's done when it's done" attitude. Making depending on newer apps a difficulty as well as a poor choice for those that need consistent release schedules for their OS.

Every installation of elementaryOS looks excactly like the same

GNOME doesn't have a taskbar by default, and might be confusing to people migrating from Windows for that reason. It is however possible to install it through http://extensions.gnome.org.

Some aspects are still unpolished and lack features - the gnome design team works well, but seems to not be taking input from the outside world.

Backward compatibility is not guaranteed and extensions seems like second class citizens in the GNOME environment.

The installer, cnchi breaks all the time. It's very buggy.

Small issue, but would be nice to see package popularity in Antergos repos, just like it is visible for AUR. packages. Antergos with AUR gives access practically to all possible packages, so popularity could help in this sea of packages.

Rolling release is quite pain sometimes. You might face some problem with a bugged application since you always get the latest version. This problem is a little bit solved by Manjaro distro where applications are tested but updates are slower than usual.

The Unity desktop environment is practically non customizable with the user only being able to change certain themes and icons and adding a dock.

Unity does not align itself with the normal desktop paradigm and thus has a bit of a confusing UI in comparison to the norm of a Windows user.

The Manjaro unstable repository syncs with the Arch stable repository and if any package has moved, it gets moved to stable. The issue here is that this is not done frequently, which means that Manjaro may be getting package updates much later than Arch.

Since packages are not updated as fast as in Arch, critical security updates may not come as fast as needed for packages that may have issues.

There is nothing new in manjaro compared to any other arch based distribution.

All free editions only offer Windows XP, 2000, and 7 and Gnome 2. You have to pay $9-10 in order to get Unity (Ubuntu) and Mac OS X themes.

OSX is tied Apple hardware and Apple hardware tends to be expensive.

A comparison of package managers available for OSX can be found here.

For people who like to use open source tools for their development work, this may be a problem. There's plenty of advantages to open source software, one of which is the ability to tinker with and customize the tools themselves that you are using. Although there's plenty of FOSS tools avail...