PCLinuxOS 2024.12 MATE

About PCLinuxOS

PCLinuxOS is an independently maintained rolling distribution with a combination of traits found almost nowhere else: it packages software as RPMs but manages them with APT and the Synaptic graphical front end, a pairing inherited from its early days, and it deliberately ships without systemd, retaining a classic init arrangement. Begun as a package set for Mandrake Linux before becoming a full distribution, it remains a desktop-first project with KDE Plasma as the flagship environment and MATE and Xfce editions alongside. Wherever possible, administration happens through graphical tools, reflecting the founder's aim of a system comfortable for ordinary home users. The community produces its own monthly magazine and maintains remastering tools for building custom live media. Updates roll continuously, so there are no version reinstalls. It is a living branch of Linux history, and an OpenFactory browser session shows its old-school charm quickly.

What happens when you press Try now

The button opens the OpenFactory console in a new tab and boots a fresh PCLinuxOS virtual machine from OpenFactory's verified source media. The session renders directly in the browser, so there is nothing to download and nothing to install on your computer.

Each visit gets its own machine with a fresh overlay over an immutable base image. Files, settings, and desktop changes behave normally inside the session and are discarded when it ends, so every visitor starts from the same clean PCLinuxOS 2024.12 MATE.

How MATE behaves in a browser VM

MATE continues the GNOME 2 design: a two-panel layout, a classic application menu, and the familiar Caja file manager. It suits people who want a conventional desktop that stays out of the way.

Questions about this target