14 DAY TRIAL // Tails, the amnesic incognito live system, also known as the Anonymous Live CD, will soon get a new version that promises to introduce several new features and updated components, along with an improved installer.
Tails 3.2 is now in development with a first Release Candidate (RC) milestone out the door this week, and it introduces Tails Installer 4.4.19, a version that's capable of detecting if Tails is installed or not on the target computer. This makes it possible to initiate an upgrade process from a previous Tails version.
Additionally, the Tails Installer no longer includes the splash screen and comes with some more tweaks to improve the user experience. The built-in Bluetooth support is now completely disabled in Tails 3.2 RC1, which instead adds PPPoE support to allow users to connect to DSL or dial-up networks.
"Upgrade to Tails Installer 4.4.19, which gets rid of the splash screen, detects when Tails already is installed on the target device (and then proposes to upgrade), and generally improves the UX. We are very interested in reports about problems with this new version of Tails Installer," said the devs in the release announcement.
Revamped root terminal, better support for Nvidia Maxwell GPUs
Tails 3.2 is not a major update, as it's only the second point release to the Tails 3.x series, which is the first to be developed only for 64-bit platforms, based on the Debian GNU/Linux 9 "Stretch" operating system. However, it looks like it will upgrade the kernel packages to a newer Linux 4.12 release in an attempt to support for Nvidia Maxwell GPUs.
The first Release Candidate ships with Linux kernel 4.12.12, but we imagine that the final release will be using a newer version, such as Linux kernel 4.12.4, which, unfortunately, marks the end of life of the Linux 4.12 kernel series. That being said, Tails 3.2 will also update the Mozilla Thunderbird email client to version 53.2.0 and fix a bunch of annoying bugs reported by users from Tails 3.1.
Tails 3.2 is scheduled to hit the streets around the date of September 26, 2017, but you can get a head start by downloading and installing the Release Candidate build. You can download the ISO image right now from our website, but please try to keep in mind that this is a pre-release version, so don't use it for any production work.