14 DAY TRIAL // If you’re a Linux Mint user who can’t wait to try out the all-new version 20, then you’re in luck, as the team working on this distro has just published the latest beta builds on the official servers.
In other words, yes, Linux Mint 20 beta is now available for download and everybody can give it a try by simply downloading the ISO images.
Now, there are a few things that are worth mentioning here.
Discovered on reddit, these download pages are hosted at linuxmint.com, so they seem to be the official links that will be used when Linux Mint 20 beta is announced officially too. Most likely, a blog post to reveal all changes and everything else is supposed to go live sometime very soon too.
In addition, there are several other mirrors for those who want to download from other sources, but since this isn’t an official release just yet, you better sick with the main linuxmint.com mirror.
Best way to test it: virtual machine installation
Needless to say, the full details and the SHA256 sums, which many people are looking for before downloading the new ISOs, are available right now, so if you want to try out these betas, the easiest way to do it is in a virtual machine that eliminates any security risk in the first place.
As for what’s coming in Linux Mint 20 beta, little information is available at this point, but it’ll be based on the recently released Ubuntu 20.04 LTS and run on the Linux kernel 5.4 LTS. Of course, the typical Cinnamon, Xfce, and MATE versions will be part of the release (they are also included in the beta if anyone wants to try them out), and the Cinnamon 4.6 DE will be updated to version 4.6. It will only ship with 64-bit builds, as the 32-bit version has been officially dropped.
Since many people are wondering how long this beta is going to last, the information in this regard is still vague at this point, but more specific should be shared once these testing ISOs are officially announced.