Linux for my father...opinions?

[Jackelope]

Hi. I want to build a very simple system for my father to browse the web. I need an OS that will provide the following:

-Low system requirements (for a P4 with 512 ram)
-Very very easy operation. If it can boot up and launch Firefox in one go, that would be awesome.
-A little eye candy if possible.
-The quicker it can run, the better.
-Debian-based is preferred.

If anyone has some advice for a distro and some auto-run software I would appreciate it. Any other advice is appreciated as well. He needs to get off his Windows box because its slow as molasses and I'm sick of fixing it! ;)

[mamamia88]

can you be a little more specific with the specs?

[cariboo]

I use AntiX on an old 350Mhz Compaq. It's only got 256Mb ram, so Firefox 3.0 is a little slow. I use Opera on it, it runs acceptably. AntiX is based on Mepis, which is based on Debian, so apt-get works.

[Vostrocity]

I think it would be best to not use an actual desktop OS. Try something like Ubuntu Netbook Remix. It's got a really nice, simple GUI and you can still install from the standard repos if you ever need anything.

[keplerspeed]

Have a friend running ubuntu on an old athlon XP1700+, and he had 256Mb ram. Firefox was slow but opera ran nicely.

However, with an upgrade to 768Mb of ram, it runs fantastic, no problem with Jaunty (gnome), simple compiz stuff and firefox.

[nitehawk777]

I have a P4 with 512 ram,....
and I've run Debian Lenny,...Mint7,...and Mepis8 on it very nicely.
(Mint and Mepis are Debian based, and newbie-friendly).

[buzzmandt]

should run fine with ubuntu, I've had ubuntu running on lots of older low end machines. My parents run it now and they love it. Mom bought a laptop with win vista preinstalled (go figure) and she didn't even want to see it, told me I'd install ubuntu on it or else ....lol

[Vostrocity]

Well OP's "low system requirements" really isn't that bad. Pretty much all Linux distros should run fine on that. The main criteria is a good, simple interface. (At least that's what I think)

[Jackelope]

Thanks for the quick replies! Ubuntu Netbook Remix sounds like just the thing I need. If that doesn't work, I'll try some of the other suggestions. Thanks again!