Need Some DIstro Recommendations

[DM was on fire!]

I'm most likely getting my dad's laptop, and I've already told him that if he gives me an hour with it, it won't have Windows on it any more.
However, I got thinking about this last night...it's only an 800mhz processor. The hard drive and memory would not be a problem (40gb and 512mb, respectively). It's only the processor. :(
So now I'm searching through distros trying to find something. XD
So far, I've found Puppy, U-lite, and Fluxbuntu.

Just curious if you guys could give me some recommendations?
Thanks. <3

[semitone36]

If youre feeling adventurous I would try Arch (http://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Main_Page). Its not quite as easy to install as Ubuntu but once you get it going it works like a well greased machine.

Im not sure what the requirements are for processing speed but Arch is one of the lightest distros so try it out if you want.

[snowpine]

Your computer is not that bad; there are certainly people here on the forums with worse (myself included). Ubuntu or Xubuntu should run okay on that thing, maybe not blazing fast. I personally like Crunchbang, which is like Ubuntu but uses the Openbox windows manager for a little extra speedy. Out of the options you list in your original post, Puppy will probably be the fastest. Good luck!

[SpenceMakesSense]

800 mhz isnt that bad. With 512 mb and a 40 gb hardrive you can run xubuntu quite well. Maybe even ubuntu. Fluxbuntu is ok but your computer should be fine for something like xubuntu.

[Rotaj]

Zenwalk, sidux(KDE-lite), Arch.

After a distro is setup, everything should be pretty straight forward.

[notwen]

AntiX (http://antix.mepis.org/index.php/Main_Page) may be worth a shot. =]

[Kevbert]

I'd go for Xubuntu 8.04.2 as it should run quite happily. I'm running it on an Athlon 900MHz with only 256Mb and it runs fine. If you want to run the compiz cube/desktop effects response will be very slow (but compiz is more dependant on the type of graphics adapter).
Puppy will also run well.

[DM was on fire!]

I hear A LOT about Arch, but I'm not sure how I'd do with the fact I'd have to install everything, accidentally configure something wrong, et cetera. XD
And I have a friend who runs sidux and loves it and has been trying to get me to convert for a while. XD
Thanks for the suggestions everyone. :)

I have a really dumb question though...can't seem to find the answer. XD
What desktop environment does Puppy use (if any)? I thought it was KDE, but it apparently isn't.

[snowpine]

I believe Puppy uses JWM (joe's window manager) but there are lots of "puplet" remixes with all sorts of variations...

[snowpine]

I agree, if you are trying to install Linux in an hour, you should go with a "complete" distro as opposed to a roll-your-own minimal install.

Perhaps if you gave some more info about what you like (desktop environment/windows manager, applications, "vibe," etc.), we can narrow it down a bit...

[Sorivenul]

I second the recommendations of Zenwalk and MEPIS antiX.

[DM was on fire!]

LOL. As soon as you said JWM, I remembered:

Default user interface JWM

Right in front of me. x)
Through a little bit of Googling, I found this (http://www.puppylinux.org/wiki/applications/various/kde). I just have to see if it'll support KDE 4.1.

snowpine...lol, didn't think of that stuff. XD
[/fail]

Desktop environment, I'm not picky. I'm running GNOME right now, although my first Linux distro was Linspire 4.5 and I'm kinda wanting to go back to KDE.
Window manager, again, not picky. If it doesn't stress out the processor too much, I'd like to try Compiz and see what all the hype is about (I liek the transparent windows), but I can go with whatever's default. :)

Only applications I would really need are Konqueror and/or Epiphany for web browsing, Wine, AbiWord (which I think in the most of the lightweight distros comes default), Pidgin or Kopete (although i don't know if Kopete has the irc option that Pidgin does), XMMS, StepMania (lol that's totally not an application, but...) and if I could SuperKaramba or Screenlets. :)

EDIT - Oh, and maybe Conky too.

[yaaarrrgg]

I just installed XUbuntu on an old 600mhtz laptop with 128MB of ram. I turned off the startup services (like the notifier applet which was chewing up 30% of the RAM).

Aside from slight sluggishness with the startup of apps (like FireFox), it's completely functional as a web/office computer.

What's happening, IMO, is that computers have passed a point of usefulness in speed. Where unless you are doing hard-core 3d rendering, more speed is almost not needed.

[fistfullofroses]

An 800mhz CPU really isn't that bad. For almost any GNU/Linux distribution, that is fairly decent. You could use anything really. 512mb RAM, and 40gb HDD, with 800mhz should be enough for any Linux application too; just make sure that you disable things like compiz. I would highly recommend GoboLinux which runs extremely quickly on nearly anything, or something like Blag, which is totally open source.

[Mason Whitaker]

I've had good experience with Puppy Linux on less-than-new laptops, so try that out ^_^

[markp1989]

800mhz isnt that slow, you could try xubuntu an older version of ubuntu. just disable some services.

[COLiNx86]

I'd say arch. It's not as hard as it sounds just follow __this__ (http://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Beginners_Guide) step-by-step and you'll be set.

EDIT: also install something light like *box, E17, or maybe xfce if you want something closer to gnome. Definatly don't install kde4 on there. I have it on my computer right now, It looks nice and all but it's not very fast.(1.8 ghz processor, 1gb or ram)

[cardinals_fan]

SliTaz is fairly new but already awesome. Lightweight and powerful.

Otherwise, I'd say Arch.

[jay576]

Zenwalk is a great choice to try which is Slackware based and can be more difficult if you choose but it also is much easier to set up the Slackware. Arch Linux is a great choice but the takes a little more time to set up but it isa great learning experiences and pacman is extremely easy to use. Any distro should run fine but some applications will run slow and be limited by the CPU but for any normal desktop use it is fine. I recommend debian over ubuntu but even how easy debian is to use ubuntu is easier. Debian systems just seem better to me sorry guys ubuntu is great but I only recommend it if you want a very very easy to use linux system.
Also consider alternatives to KDE and GNOME but they will run on your system. I use Xfce most of the time but that is personal preference.

[C!oud]

The better question is what type of distro do you want? There are loads of OSs out there that will run on those specs (512 MB is definetely not horrible). Instead what you should be focusing on is, after selecting what type or which branch of linux you want, think more about the kind of window manager or desktop environment you are going to use. KDE might run on 512 RAM if you keep it slimmed down (don't install all that extra K bloat) but I'd still recommend looking into something like Xfce as a light desktop environment or one of the lighter standalone window managers (Openbox, Fluxbox etc etc).

[liamnixon]

Yeah, I don't know if KDE would work well with that PC. I have an 800 mhz processor with 128 MB of RAM and KDE destroys it. I installed it in Debian, which I'm using Gentoo with Xfce now and it runs fine.

Of course it doesn't help that it's kind of dirty, but anyway...

+1 for Xfce

[mikjp]

I have an 800 mhz processor with 128 MB of RAM and KDE destroys it.

I use WindowMaker and IceWM only with my 1 GHz + 256 Mb. Sometime pekwm and openbox.

Greetings,

mikko

[mikjp]

I just installed XUbuntu on an old 600mhtz laptop with 128MB of ram. I turned off the startup services (like the notifier applet which was chewing up 30% of the RAM).

Aside from slight sluggishness with the startup of apps (like FireFox), it's completely functional as a web/office computer.


Until it starts swapping for half an hour which makes it completely unusable as I have experienced with even 256 Mb.

AntiX, Debian, Vector and others work great.

Greetings,

mikko

[handy]

If you set up Arch, you will very likely fall in love with it, most users do, even if they still hop around.

If you install Arch you have the option of using KDEmod:

http://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/KDEmod

Which uses less resources & allows you to choose what you do & what you don't want in your KDE installation.

I just modified my Arch install yesterday, taking it back from Xfce to Openbox, but still using the xfce-panel, it looks like it did when it was Xfce, but boy is it faster, & Openbox would use less resources than Xfce.

Arch requires i686 architecture, so PII, Celeron & up.

LowArch is for i586.

http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1028174

[pmicheal]

I recommend you to use Ubuntu 8.10 on your laptop. Your laptop is not slower than my desktop :D I'm a desktop with 166MHz Pro + 128 MB RAM running Red Hat Linux 6 (an oldest release far 2000)

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