14 DAY TRIAL // The LXLE team has announced earlier today, March 11, the immediate availability for download and testing of the Beta versions LXLE 14.04.2 and 12.04.5 SMS Editions, introducing UEFI (Unified Extensible Firmware Interface) support in the 64-bit ISO images. The distribution also switches to SeaMonkey as the default web browser.
LXLE stands for Lubuntu Extra Life Extension, and it is an Ubuntu OS based on Lubuntu and built around the LXDE desktop environment. LXLE aims to provide a complete drop-in replacement for Windows XP, Windows Vista, and Windows 7 users who want to switch to an open-source operating system.
“This is the first Beta of LXLE 14.04.2 and 12.04.5 with the SeaMonkey Suite. They are meant for testing not production machines. We rarely release alphas since LXLE is a respin of Lubuntu. However our betas can change significantly before actual release. These are for testing only and bug reports.” was stated in the official release announcement.
The LXLE 14.04.2 Beta offers up-to-date software packages
According to the release notes, these Beta editions of LXLE offer up-to-date software packages. UEFI support in LXLE is possible thanks to Jeff Hoogland from Bodhi Linux. More details about the decision to switch to SeaMonkey as the default web browser can be found in this blog post. Please note that SeaMonkey’s components replace standalone applications that were distributed in previous releases of the operating system.
As usual, you can download LXLE 14.04.2 Beta right now via Softpedia or directly from the distribution’s homepage. However, please note that it is an unstable operating system and it shouldn’t be used on production machines. The LXLE 12.04.5 Beta is also available on the project’s website. Both editions are available as 32 and 64-bit Live CDs.