Re: linux on a old laptop

Yves Bellefeuille (yan@xxxxxxxx) writes:
On Wed, 16 Aug 2006, John Thompson wrote:

Beg to differ. Vectorlinux with XFCE as the GUI ought to work. When I
started using linux, it was on a 5x86/133 with 32MB RAM. It won't be a
speed demon, but if you're careful about what you install and run it
should still be quite useable.

I just tried Vector 5.1 and told my system to limit itself to 48 Mb of
RAM. It worked, although X Windows was slow.

I'm more concerned about the hard disk space: Vector's basic installation
requires about 1 Gb.

Vector is apparently derived from Slackware, I once put Slackware 7.0 on
a 486 with a 240meg hard drive (some of which went to swap). I had to
be very selective, but I could put the basics there.

So the question is whether or not Vector allows selctive install, or
just puts all of it's limited selection on the drive.

From a brief glance at Vector some years back, I got the impression
that they limit the selection of applications to keep the distribution
size down, but the favor GUI based applications. So they'd not
include Pine as the mailreader, but some GUI based app that was
small for a GUI, but large compared to a console based application.
Maybe that's the wrong impression (though someone boasted about
Vector at the time, and then turned around and wanted smaller applications
that I sure would have included in a distribution).

Just as with any distribution, the difference is partly hype. Vector
hypes itself as being "good for older hardware" but they don't
define that and it negates that other distributions would work fine.
The basics don't take much space, and would fit fine in a 750meg
hard drive, though if one is doing a lot with it (saving all those
photos from the camera for instance), the drive will fill up fast with
user files. But most distributions have a lot in them, more than
any one specific person will use. So a selective install should easily
give the needed basics, like a mail reader and a browser and whatever.

I ended up with a Mac Powerbook for forty dollars a few years ago, 133MHz
and 48megs of RAM, which I consider still quite valuable as a laptop (given
that I have a primary computer to do anything heavy with). But that
the battery is dead and I've not decided whether it's worth spending money
on a new battery, I likely would make lots of use of it.

But, it apparently is not a good choice for running Linux, not because
it's a Mac, but because of the specific model.

If I found an equivalent Pentium for about the same price, I'd grab it,
so I could install Linux (albeit a limited selection of applications), so
I could have a laptop but not have to switch to a different operating
system to use it.

Of course, since I tend to use the console, I likely would be quite
comfortable with a very limited distribution on an older laptop.

Michael

.

Relevant Pages

  • Re: [opensuse] ranting and raving about dependancies.
    ... or no distribution at all just put exactly what you want on your hardware. ... I still say it's absolutely retarded to complain that you can't install ... I should be running it on my HP Dual P3/500 server with 256MB RAM? ...
    (SuSE)
  • Re: Distribution Choice
    ... [Invalid ng removed] ... > I need a little help in deciding what distribution i should install on ... about running KDE3/Gnome with only 64 MB RAM, ...
    (comp.os.linux.misc)
  • Re: Distribution Choice
    ... > I need a little help in deciding what distribution i should install on ... > a PC with the following configuration, so that normal day to day work ... I would say that the amount of RAM is the bottleneck on your system. ...
    (comp.os.linux)
  • Re: Distribution Choice
    ... > I need a little help in deciding what distribution i should install on ... > a PC with the following configuration, so that normal day to day work ... I would say that the amount of RAM is the bottleneck on your system. ...
    (comp.os.linux.misc)
  • Re: Universal sound card?
    ... As soon as that machine is set up and fully functional, I intend to install ... GNU/Linux as an operating system was meant as a Windows replacement. ... GNU/Linux continues that tradition - and perhaps more so even for the Linux ... AFAIK Mandriva is not the only distribution that is this ...
    (comp.os.linux.hardware)