14 DAY TRIAL // After a few months of silence, the Gentoo-based Sabayon Linux operating system has finally received a new release with up-to-date images that bring not only updated components from the Gentoo Linux repositories, but also new features and much-needed improvements.
Backed by a brand-new build infrastructure and powered by Linux kernel 4.20, Sabayon Linux 19.03 release is here with full disk encryption support via the Calamares graphical installer, which replaces Anaconda as default installer, support for 32-bit UEFI systems, Dracut as a replacement for genkernel-nex as initramfs generation utility, and Python 3 by default.
"We’ve invested time in making our internal tooling better, dramatically important for future enhancements to our rolling release model," said the devs in the announcement. "We are using Mottainai in our build infrastructure to automatize build and release of Sabayon, allowing us to scale horizontally the load required to build ISOs, packages and more. The impact is noticeable for us, e.g. to build all ISOs flavors it now takes less than 2 hours."
It also features enhancements to the AMDGPU graphics driver for extended AMD Radeon Vega support including AMD Radeon VII, along with initial AMD FreeSync support, which will be enabled when the Linux 5.0 kernel hits the software repositories, through the Mesa 19.0.x graaphics stack and xf86-video-amdgpu 19.0.x graphics driver.
Nvidia FreeSync support has been implemented as well in the Sabayon Linux 19.03 release and can be enabled for G-Sync supported monitors in the Nvidia 418.43 graphics drivers via the nvidia-settings utility. On the other hand, this release removes support for Nvidia Legacy drivers, forcing users of Nvidia GeForce 8000 non-GTX GPU series to use the nouveau graphics driver instead.
Upcoming release could feature new look and feel, Linux 5.0 and ARMv7 support
There’s no new Sabayon Linux release without updated core components, which bring many improvements and new features to existing apps and programs, as well as improvements to Entropy, the default package manager from Gentoo Linux. Sabayon Linux 19.03 adds better tracking of “automatic” dependencies in Entropy, along with a new command, “equo mark”.
The next Sabayon Linux release could feature a new look and feel as the developers aim to add more polishing to their Gentoo-based, rolling release GNU/Linux distribution, as well as support for newer CUDA devices, new layered ARMv7 repositories, better support for AMDGPU, OpenCL, and OpenMP backends, unattended installer, updated Server edition, and Linux kernel 5.0.
Until then, you can download Sabayon Linux 19.03 release right now via our free software portal or the official download mirrors as Sabayon Linux KDE, Sabayon Linux GNOME, Sabayon Linux Xfce, Sabayon Linux LXQt, Sabayon Linux MATE, Sabayon Linux Server, and Sabayon Linux Minimal editions. Sabayon Linux is only supported on 64-bit computers.
