Friend has an old laptop with windows 10 that he doesn’t use because too slow and freezing all the time. Wants to revive it to leave at his lab in grad school for browsing the internet and editing stuff on google docs so he doesn’t have to carry his newer laptop everyday.

I suggested Linux but I myself always used Debian and I am not sure it will run decently with such low specs. Was thinking maybe Debian 11 with xfce or something? Any better options?

  • gi1242@lemmy.world
    0·
    1 month ago

    honestly the distro doesn’t matter so much as long as the hardware i supported. run a minimal desktop, disable CPU hogs and file indexing etc.

    I used fvwm on Debian for many years on old computers. worked great. now I have kde/plasma on arch. my 10 year old laptop handles it fine…

  • BlueSquid0741@lemmy.sdf.org
    0·
    1 month ago

    I think Slitaz is still around, I always liked that for older machines, I was going to try it on an AMD C-50 laptop I pulled out of storage recently, except I don’t have time for messing around.

  • nossaquesapao@lemmy.eco.br
    0·
    1 month ago

    There are plenty of distros for very low end pcs, but they tend to require more tech skills to use. I have experience with a friend in a similar situation. I installed with mx linux for her and she is liking it. The performance is pretty reasonable and it comes with various tools that make it easier for people with less tech skills. The only extra thing I did was install the 32 bit version of firefox, because it makes a huge difference in low ram devices.

    • 0x0@programming.dev
      0·
      1 month ago

      32 bit version of firefox, because it makes a huge difference in low ram devices.

      How so? What CPU does she have?

      • LeFantome@programming.dev
        0·
        1 month ago

        How so?

        32 bit pointers take up half as much RAM as 64 bit pointers. A complicated application like a web browser consumes much more memory as a 64 bit app than it does as a 32 bit app. That is true of most programs but you are really going to notice it in both desktop environment and your web browser.

      • nossaquesapao@lemmy.eco.br
        0·
        1 month ago

        I assumed a x64. Debian (the distro mx linux is based on) offers multiarch support, so i just had to enable it by running:

        sudo dpkg --add-architecture i386 
sudo apt update

        Then, to install 32-bit firefox, I first uninstalled it and then installed the 32-bit version:

        sudo apt remove firefox-esr  
sudo apt install firefox-esr:i386

        With the standard 64 bit version, the browser would struggle with just 2 or 3 tabs, and with the 32 bit version, she can use like 10 tabs without problems

  • Gutless2615@ttrpg.networkEnglish
    0·
    1 month ago

    As another said on the thread — it’s not really Linux that is the issue here as much as the internet. Browsers are just memory hogs now and you’re not going to get an enjoyable experience on 2gb of ram imo, if the goal is to have a functional laptop. OTOH, it would be a great little project server to play around with things like pihole or your Arrs🏴‍☠️ or other self hosting goodness.

  • 0x0@programming.dev
    0·
    1 month ago

    Last time i searched for “lightweight” linux distros (for an old Thnkpad) the ones i saw recommended the most were: TinyCore, Puppy, Porteus, Absolute, antiX, Q4OS, Slax, Sparky, MX.
    I saw Bohdi and other Ubuntu-based distros suggested quite a lot as well but my definition of lightweight means under 1GiB usage.
    For a DE go with XFCE or some other lightweight DE.

  • wolf@lemmy.zipEnglish
    0·
    1 month ago

    The most important thing is not the distribution, but to enable ZRAM (or ZSWAP) and use a lightweight desktop. I am not sure how much difference a 32bit vs a 64bit distribution makes, but if possible you could take one for the team and run some trials and report your numbers (RAM usage) back here.

    Of course I recommend Debian with a lightweight desktop of your choice, or Alpine.

  • LeFantome@programming.dev
    0·
    1 month ago

    Run a 32 bit distro. It is the only thing that will run well on 2 GB of RAM. It will run better than you think.

    Q4OS, Antix, MX Linux, Damn Small Linux, and even pure 32 bit Debian are decent candidates. If you use Q4, give the Trinity desktop a shot.

    I like Andelie Linux as well but MUSL may cause problems for an unsophisticated user.

  • zod000@lemmy.ml
    0·
    1 month ago

    I was always a fan of crunchbang when I used a couple of eee pcs as servers. It ran very light.

  • notagoblin@lemmy.world
    0·
    1 month ago

    I put Antix on a 2Gb 64bit HP Atom. Worked well for notes and browsing. Oddly an SSD seemed to make little difference to performance compared to the previous HDD. Old architecture I guess.