The team will only release 64-bit ISO images from now on

May 4, 2018 10:54 GMT  ·  By

It looks like Ubuntu MATE isn't the only official Ubuntu flavor to drop support for new 32-bit installations with the upcoming 18.10 release, as Ubuntu Budgie 18.10 will also remove 32-bit ISO images.

After writing the article about the Ubuntu MATE team deciding to drop support for new 32-bit installations with the upcoming Ubuntu MATE 18.10 release, we discovered that Ubuntu Budgie team also requested that 32-bit ISOs to no longer be generated for the Ubuntu Budgie 18.10 release as they want to concentrate only on 64-bit support.

"We have had a successful release of Ubuntu Budgie 18.04 LTS and we now are in full planning mode for 18.10. Similar to the decision made by Ubuntu themselves at 17.10, we have decided to concentrate all our efforts on producing a really good image based on the hardware almost all of you actually use now," said project leader David Mohammed. "From 18.10 onwards we would like to concentrate on the 64-bit ISO only."

Existing users won't be impacted by this change

According to David Mohammed, existing Ubuntu Budgie users won't be impacted by the decision to drop support for new 32-bit installations with the upcoming Ubuntu Budgie 18.10 release as most of the users are running the operating system on 64-bit capable machines, and those using the 32-bit version also have 64-bit computers.

Of course, the Ubuntu Budgie team will continue to support existing 32-bit installations as Ubuntu will still offer 32-bit (i386) packages in the software repositories for some time now. However, with the release of Ubuntu Budgie 18.10, there will only be a 64-bit ISO image and you won't be able to install the operating system on older 32-bit hardware.

The Ubuntu Budgie team recommends those who really need to install the operating system on 32-bit computers from more than 10 years ago to download Ubuntu Budgie 18.04 LTS (Bionic Beaver), which will be supported for three years, until April 2021. 32-bit ISOs will continue to be released throughout the life cycle of Ubuntu Budgie 18.04 LTS.