Mepis is a good distro. A few years back it was my main OS at home - on both my desktop and laptop. I don’t remember why I switched to Ubuntu and now Mint. Could’ve been something as simple as just wanting to try something new...
That was My reason: trying something new. However, I just can’t get Mint to easily accept minor configuration changes, such as easily recognizing resized partitions. Plus, I too can not get it to share folders with other machines no matter what I do. I finally resorted to keeping files I wished to share on an external HDD and plugging in the USB cable to the other machine to transfer them.