I've just joined the Linux Mint community after using Kubuntu Linux since June of 2006.  I really loved Kubuntu for many years, but every single "Dist-Upgrade" I ever tried on that distro ended in the same disaster.  I basically knew what to prepare for before hand and looked at it as "system cleaning".  This time however, the latest version of Kubuntu just did not nearly make it as far as performance, installation, etc.  I've been hearing very good things about Mint for several years so I thought that I would give it a try.  So far I'm very happy.  It runs so much better than my last Kubuntu release.  It is just more solid, faster, and I'm not in fear of reboots all the time. I'm hoping things will continue this way.