After upgrading using the LiveCD image since you can’t perform a proper upgrade from 13.04 to 14.04 LTS, and using it for like an hour, and installing all the necessities, I decide to do a blog post on what new the LTS has to offer.

First off, It’s a little disappointing, taking into account all the reviews I read about it’s beta releases being way more stable than all the previous releases, and the stuff they said about it’s performance and then just like they did with the release of 12.10 that coincided with the release of Windows 8, there was stuff about it being a great alternative to XP, the support for which has just been cut. Come to think of it, I even got fooled by the screenshots I saw, that had a completely different UI, and i was like, “Damn! this might perhaps be the best thing to happen to ubuntu since ubuntu.”

So far, the only improvements i’ve noticed is the lock screen, which was previously nothing but a floating ‘dialog box’ but now it’s been made to look just like the login screen. _Okay! _And the language toolbar in the gnome-bar which is more or less similar to the one you get in Windows, and though small, it is an improvement i appreciate. Then of course, there’s some improvement in the lens though they might have been there since the last release, e.g. option to search for messages on social networks right from the dash. Also, now in every guest session, right when you login, it issues a warning stating that all data and files while be lost when you log out, and as far as i remember the previous releases did use to save the files. Oh and I almost forgot to mention the change in the set of default wallpapers. And as for applications, Cheese webcam booth comes preinstalled, and so does an “_ubuntu browser”, _a web browser app, rather similar to IE10’s metro version, with bits in design that suggest that the app was intended for mobile devices, and is perhaps naught but an experimental example of an app designed for touch, still, it works fairly well. As for Ubuntu One, no it’s not included by default as the service is about to be shut down.

Now to performance, until now, far from satisfactory, lags way more than 13.04 ever did, and seriously if one ever asks me which release i was most comfy with, I’d say 13.04. It’s lagging even as I type this post, though this could be due to the fact that this is just the second session since the upgrade.. but well, I dont see much improvement in performance. If there’s some change, it’s probably de-provement  (though i might be wrong.) And there’s also this slight change in the File manager. I dont remember the Background as being this much “white”  _in 13.04, also, the black gradient of the title bar now stretches down further, covering the navigation buttons and the breadcrumbs bar, i mean, _wow!

On the whole, it doesn’t have much new _“features” _to offer. It may have a boatload of improvements on the back end. I wrote disappointed because, after all the reviews i had read about it (not canonical’s fault though that the people exaggerate) i was expecting a bit too much. Some even posted screenshots with modified UIs that fooled me into believing that it had been given a new look too. There have, yes, been certain improvements obscure from a consumer’s point of view, but the initial lag pissed me off.