Best distro for laptop?

[The Toxic Mite]

Hey everyone!

My stepdad's new partner gave me this old laptop recently. The known specs are as follows:

• 750MHz Intel Pentium III
• 128MB of RAM

The graphics are pretty crap as well, and the Ethernet's buggered (meaning I can't install from the minimal CD). So ideally I would need a light and stable distro with NDISwrapper included. And yes, I have tried Damn Small Linux but it cannot connect to any wireless networks when I try to use their front-end.

[HoboElectus]

Can't you upgrade the RAM?

[Simon17]

Puppy is light with good wifi support.

[dragos240]

Hey everyone!

My stepdad's new partner gave me this old laptop recently. The known specs are as follows:

• 750MHz Intel Pentium III
• 128MB of RAM

The graphics are pretty crap as well, and the Ethernet's buggered (meaning I can't install from the minimal CD). So ideally I would need a light and stable distro with NDISwrapper included. And yes, I have tried Damn Small Linux but it cannot connect to any wireless networks when I try to use their front-end.

DSL uses 2.4 linux, which does not support wireless well. Use a modern distro with minimal things installed by default.

[The Real Dave]

I'll suggest two things, Slitaz and taking a look a KMandla's blog, he does a lot of stuff with older computers, yours would be considered powerful

Its worth a look

As for Slitaz, I've only dabbled with it myself but I've heard good things, good compatibility and almost as quick as DSL

[rogue_0111]

This is from linux.org

http://www.linux.org/dist/list.html

Puppy is also an excellent choice.

[earthpigg]

Hey everyone!

My stepdad's new partner gave me this old laptop recently. The known specs are as follows:

• 750MHz Intel Pentium III
• 128MB of RAM

The graphics are pretty crap as well, and the Ethernet's buggered (meaning I can't install from the minimal CD). So ideally I would need a light and stable distro with NDISwrapper included. And yes, I have tried Damn Small Linux but it cannot connect to any wireless networks when I try to use their front-end.

you could get past the 256mb requirement for any ubuntu-derivative by creating a swap partition, rebooting, and then running the installer.

masonux (im biased, of course )
spri
crunchbang
etc



if that doesn't work out you could try 'remastersys lxde lite'. it's debian, and uses debian-installer, so it will install with the ram as-is. i have no idea how it's wifi support is.

http://geekconnection.org/remastersy....php?board=2.0

from here:

I do a lot of PC recycling for folks that can't afford PC's and wanted a robust, free, feature rich operating system that would work well even on older Pentium 2 PC's with only 128MB ram.

and fragadelic is a good guy

[beetleman64]

I can't promise anything, but CrunchBang (#!) is a good, light Ubuntu based distro which should run on your specs. I've heard good things about puppy Linux too.

[coolbrook]

I'm experimenting with my first Ubuntu Mini CD install and I might put LXDE on top.

https://help.ubuntu.com/community/In...tion/MinimalCD

[earthpigg]

I'm experimenting with my first Ubuntu Mini CD install and I might put LXDE on top.

https://help.ubuntu.com/community/In...tion/MinimalCD

i made a list of the package names of a few bits and pieces of the full ubuntu/gnome desktop that i find helpful with LXDE.

example:

Double Click to Install .deb Files
After you install this package, you will be able to double click on .deb files to install them, just like vanilla Ubuntu.
package name: gdebi

hunting down those package names for my own use was an annoying task, so i made a list of them. making it public was the next logical step.

if anyone has any suggested additions, please share!