Other Distros

[Moat]

Hard drive sounded like a it was being powered by a drunken hamster in a rusty wheel. ......... I still intend to install Vista as part of a dual boot...

You'd be much better off installing Windows 7 instead - but even Win7 will thrash the HD and CPU out of the box. That thrashing can be quite easily rectified (on Vista or 7) by disabling a number of default, unnecessary disc caching/indexing schemes/services running in the background, via the built-in 'services.msc' utility (or better yet, use the free Mz Services Manager utility - http://www.mztweak.com/mzservicesmanager.html - which allows saving and reverting to previous settings... much handier when playing around with enabling/disabling services).

In particular - Readyboot, Readyboost, Prefetch and Superfetch are the services to look for, disable and play around with, IIRC. Made a world of difference on the boxes I tried it on - nice and quiet (like good ol' XP ) afterwards.

Yeah, it's a bit of a PITA to have to sort those things (and others) out in a Win7 (or XP, for that matter) install - but once done, can make for a fine OS.

Bob

[Moat]

Double post...

[cthisbear]

This runs well....by eXPerience

Around 25% of a Windows 7 install....fast.

" STATISTICS:

- ISO File Size.............................. 699 Mb
- RAM Usage On First Installation............ 185 Mb (VMware, 256Mb RAM)
- Entire Installation Size................... 1.64 Gb
- WINDOWS Folder Size........................ 1.55 Gb
- Running Processes.......................... 25
- Install Time (In VirtualBox, 512Mb RAM).... 11 minutes


https://thepiratebay.mn/torrent/5074537 ... tivated_CD

Chris

[David Andrew]

Hard drive sounded like a it was being powered by a drunken hamster in a rusty wheel. ......... I still intend to install Vista as part of a dual boot...

You'd be much better off installing Windows 7 instead - but even Win7 will thrash the HD and CPU out of the box. That thrashing can be quite easily rectified (on Vista or 7) by disabling a number of default, unnecessary disc caching/indexing schemes/services running in the background, via the built-in 'services.msc' utility (or better yet, use the free Mz Services Manager utility - http://www.mztweak.com/mzservicesmanager.html - which allows saving and reverting to previous settings... much handier when playing around with enabling/disabling services).

In particular - Readyboot, Readyboost, Prefetch and Superfetch are the services to look for, disable and play around with, IIRC. Made a world of difference on the boxes I tried it on - nice and quiet (like good ol' XP ) afterwards.

Yeah, it's a bit of a PITA to have to sort those things (and others) out in a Win7 (or XP, for that matter) install - but once done, can make for a fine OS.

Bob

Thanks for the info. I have legal copies of all Windows from XP up to 8, except my Vista DVD "just happens" to be the only one that I've lost. Probably a blessing in disguise.

Windows 7 is probably the best Windows since XP imo. I personally think 8 is ok-ish. Clunky interface on desktops, but at least it performs.

[wboz]

Windows 10 looks quite good. I may consider upgrading the ol' Lenovo if I'm allowed. I don't really know how the upgrades work.

The thing will still churn like heck with a 5000rpm HDD. Does anyone know if Windows 7 32bit goes to a Windows 10 64 bit or is that totally not possible? That would make a meaningful difference (with 4gb ram, Win 7 will only use 3GB ...)

[bark_bark_bark]

Sadly, you can't upgrade from a 32bit OS to a 64bit OS.

[siklopz]

i use arch, void, and debian (for a stable backup system, and the enormous repos).

[gerry]

James C: thanks. As you have noticed, I'm an "As a last resort, read the instruction book" person.

...and, of course, I've been spoiled by Puppy Slacko, where the wireless drivers are included, and language selection is a menu item.

[cimarron]

This runs well....by eXPerience

Around 25% of a Windows 7 install....fast.

" STATISTICS:

- ISO File Size.............................. 699 Mb
- RAM Usage On First Installation............ 185 Mb (VMware, 256Mb RAM)
- Entire Installation Size................... 1.64 Gb
- WINDOWS Folder Size........................ 1.55 Gb
- Running Processes.......................... 25

Nice, chris, thanks! It took me a while to find a good download, but Tiny7 is an impressive achievement. It runs fine on my old Inspiron 5100 with just 512M RAM. I thought 1G was too little RAM for Win7. Don't know how he did it, but Tiny7 is pretty amazing on old equipment.

[cthisbear]

cimarron.

eXPerience made an XP Lite as well.

Some people just have the smarts.

""""""""

MicroXP Smallest Windows XP SP3Download by eXPerience

Thank you for trying this special MicroXP edition of Windows XP.

With a WINDOWS folder that is only 199Mb and a CD size of
just 99.9Mb,this has to be one of the smallest Windows XP installations out there.

Whats more - you can use 99% of the programs you always use and up
to now there is not one single report of any game not working in MicroXP.

This installation takes only 5 Minutes 30 seconds.

The ISO file size is the same as in the previous release - 99.9Mb

Installation time, in VMware, from
ISO file, from end of formatting .......... 5 Mins 30 Secs

RAM Usage On First Installation ........... 39 Mb
Handles ................................... 2229
Threads ................................... 157
Processes ................................. 15

Entire Install Size ....................... 205Mb

Documents and settings folder size ........ 3.19 Mb
Program Files folder size ................. 2.79 Mb
WINDOWS folder size ....................... 199 Mb

Files In System32 ......................... 815

ISO File Size ............................. 99.9 Mb


* * * * * * * * * * * *

Only clowns like Microsoft can't see how they could still have
more market share with these gifted gurus.

But when you release crap like Vista and Windows 8, a good
kicking is the only gratitude you can expect.

Chris.

[Colonel Panic]

Zenwalk now has a 64-bit edition and I've just installed the latest version of it (7.9.3).

For the most part it's fine but at the moment I can't really see a big advantage over the 32-bit variant. Also, the networking doesn't work very well (unless I set it up wrong?).

[Colonel Panic]

I'm using the latest version of LXLE (14.04.2) now, which is based on Ubuntu or Lubuntu, and it's another good one which runs well on old computers.

I'm wondering if there is any big advantage now in running a Debian-based distro instead of a Ubuntu-based one, and it seems I'm not alone - I've noticed that Watt has gone back to a Ubuntu base after being based on Debian.

[nitehawk]

I'm using the latest version of LXLE (14.04.2) now, which is based on Ubuntu or Lubuntu, and it's another good one which runs well on old computers.

I'm wondering if there is any big advantage now in running a Debian-based distro instead of a Ubuntu-based one, and it seems I'm not alone - I've noticed that Watt has gone back to a Ubuntu base after being based on Debian.

That's interesting. I know from the time I joined the Debian forum (many moons ago, but am no longer active),...that there was concerned discussions over the "blurring" of the lines between Ubuntu and Debian. Many of the devs are on both distros,...so seems like it would naturally happen.

I just recently put MX14 on my HP Pavilion dv2500 laptop,..
and have it working really well. ( It's a nice smaller Deb.)
I used to be solid "Debian only" and shun anything Ubuntu.
But not so anymore. Maybe I'll try a small Ubuntu (or Mint)
derivitive on this lappy.
LXLE sounds nice,....

[James C]

Just installed Linux Lite 2.4 on an old single core. Appears to be pretty snappy.
Since it's based on Ubuntu there's lots of additional packages to choose from.Still fits on a cd and features XFCE.

https://www.linuxliteos.com

Code: Select all

 Computer
Processor	AMD Athlon(tm) 64 Processor 3800+
Memory	2063MB (389MB used)
Operating System	Linux Lite 2.4
User Name	james (james)
Date/Time	Mon 15 Jun 2015 02:09:11 PM CDT
Display
Resolution	1024x768 pixels
OpenGL Renderer	Mesa DRI nv18 x86/MMX+/3DNow!+/SSE2
X11 Vendor	The X.Org Foundation
Multimedia
Audio Adapter	VIA8237 - VIA 8251

Code: Select all

Version
Kernel	Linux 3.13.0-24-generic (i686)
Compiled	#47-Ubuntu SMP Fri May 2 23:31:42 UTC 2014
C Library	Unknown
Default C Compiler	GNU C Compiler version 4.8.2 (Ubuntu 4.8.2-19ubuntu1)
Distribution	Linux Lite 2.4

Code: Select all

james@james-asus-vintage:~$ free
             total       used       free     shared    buffers     cached
Mem:       2063984    1133592     930392       8464      44060     727584
-/+ buffers/cache:     361948    1702036
Swap:      4095996          0    4095996

[James C]

Just a side note....... was talked into trying Windows 8.1 again. Installed it last night and already dbanning the hard drive.Never try it again.....

[Colonel Panic]

I tried Salix 14.1 Fluxbox, and unfortunately was very unimpressed with it. First of all I couldn't log in because the installation was missing a crucial file (.dmrc) which told the bootup manager which window / desktop manager to load; this was fixable (and I did fix it, using instructions from the Ubuntu forums) but IMO a beginner would have no chance of working this out for him or herself.

Next, when I did log in I found that the devs hadn't bothered to set up the Fluxbox menu for the apps the distro actually had, which I think is inexcusable for a distro with only one window manager. There also isn't any option on the menu for regenerating it, so you have to edit it by hand.

Finally, the distro wouldn't let me access my pendrive even though I had stipulated on installation that it be mounted in my home directory. Again, there's probably a workaround for this but it isn't something a newbie would be likely to know how to do and I'd already written the distro off by this time so I didn't bother to find out how to do it myself.

[rokytnji]

I tried Salix 14.1 Fluxbox, and unfortunately was very unimpressed with it. First of all I couldn't log in because the installation was missing a crucial file (.dmrc) which told the bootup manager which window / desktop manager to load; this was fixable (and I did fix it, using instructions from the Ubuntu forums) but IMO a beginner would have no chance of working this out for him or herself.

Next, when I did log in I found that the devs hadn't bothered to set up the Fluxbox menu for the apps the distro actually had, which I think is inexcusable for a distro with only one window manager. There also isn't any option on the menu for regenerating it, so you have to edit it by hand.

Finally, the distro wouldn't let me access my pendrive even though I had stipulated on installation that it be mounted in my home directory. Again, there's probably a workaround for this but it isn't something a newbie would be likely to know how to do and I'd already written the distro off by this time so I didn't bother to find out how to do it myself.

You must have been in a bad spot in the universe at that time. My SaliX Fluxbox and Slackel Fluxbox netbooks don't even come close to having the problems you encountered/decribe happening.
Like Zero. Nada. Zilch.

Too each their own poison I guess.

[Colonel Panic]

I tried Salix 14.1 Fluxbox, and unfortunately was very unimpressed with it. First of all I couldn't log in because the installation was missing a crucial file (.dmrc) which told the bootup manager which window / desktop manager to load; this was fixable (and I did fix it, using instructions from the Ubuntu forums) but IMO a beginner would have no chance of working this out for him or herself.

Next, when I did log in I found that the devs hadn't bothered to set up the Fluxbox menu for the apps the distro actually had, which I think is inexcusable for a distro with only one window manager. There also isn't any option on the menu for regenerating it, so you have to edit it by hand.

Finally, the distro wouldn't let me access my pendrive even though I had stipulated on installation that it be mounted in my home directory. Again, there's probably a workaround for this but it isn't something a newbie would be likely to know how to do and I'd already written the distro off by this time so I didn't bother to find out how to do it myself.

Seriously, don't bother with this one. Salix Mate is much better, and Zenwalk 7.4 too.

You must have been in a bad spot in the universe at that time. My SaliX Fluxbox and Slackel Fluxbox netbooks don't even come close to having the problems you encountered/decribe happening.
Like Zero. Nada. Zilch.

Too each their own poison I guess.

OK, I've edited my post and removed the last paragraph; in the light of your comments it doesn't seem appropriate now. Thanks for your feedback.

[rokytnji]

Edited my quote to match your post CP.

I aint ragging on you. I was just surprised because those 2 distros have be problem free for me compared to Debian based distros even.

That is why I said to each their own poison.

Edit: Figured I should back up my post also so here goes.

Code: Select all

System:    Host: slackel.example.net Kernel: 3.14.13-smp i686 (32 bit gcc: 4.8.3)
           Desktop: Fluxbox 1.3.7 dm: gdm Distro: Slackware 14.1
Machine:   System: manda (portable) product: Intel powered classmate PC v: Gen 1.5L
           Mobo: N/A model: N/A
           Bios: American Megatrends v: CM94515A.86A.0024.2008.0715.1716 date: 07/15/2008
CPU:       Single core Intel Core N270 (-HT-) cache: 512 KB
           flags: (nx pae sse sse2 sse3 ssse3) bmips: 3191
           clock speeds: min/max: 800/1600 MHz 1: 800 MHz 2: 1333 MHz
Memory:    Using dmidecode: you must be root to run dmidecode
Graphics:  Card: Intel Mobile 945GSE Express Integrated Graphics Controller
           bus-ID: 00:02.0 chip-ID: 8086:27ae
           Display Server: X.Org 1.16.4 drivers: intel (unloaded: vesa)
           Resolution: 1024x600@53.33hz
           GLX Renderer: Mesa DRI Intel 945GME x86/MMX/SSE2
           GLX Version: 2.1 Mesa 10.5.4 Direct Rendering: Yes
Audio:     Card Intel NM10/ICH7 Family High Definition Audio Controller
           driver: snd_hda_intel bus-ID: 00:1b.0 chip-ID: 8086:27d8
           Sound: Advanced Linux Sound Architecture v: k3.14.13-smp
Network:   Card: Realtek RTL8101E/RTL8102E PCI Express Fast Ethernet controller
           driver: r8169 v: 2.3LK-NAPI port: ec00
           bus-ID: 01:00.0 chip-ID: 10ec:8136
           IF: eth0 state: down mac: <filter>
           WAN IP: <filter> IF: eth0 ip: N/A ip-v6: N/A
           IF: wlan0 ip: N/A ip-v6: N/A
Drives:    HDD Total Size: 30.0GB (21.4% used)
           ID-1: /dev/sda model: SAMSUNG_HS030GB size: 30.0GB serial: S1MBJ16Q727672
           Optical: No optical drives detected.
Partition: ID-1: / size: 26G used: 4.1G (17%) fs: ext4 dev: /dev/sda2
           label: N/A uuid: 8bd07441-689d-4079-ba3f-124ca4c68892
           ID-2: swap-1 size: 2.11GB used: 0.00GB (0%) fs: swap dev: /dev/sda1
           label: N/A uuid: c7e5d23e-43de-4e75-a2aa-bb4fe3b2f451
RAID:      System: supported: linear raid0 raid1 raid10 raid6 raid5 raid4 multipath
           No RAID devices: /proc/mdstat, md_mod kernel module present
           Unused Devices: none
Unmounted: No unmounted partitions detected
Sensors:   System Temperatures: cpu: 41.0C mobo: N/A
           Fan Speeds (in rpm): cpu: N/A
Info:      Processes: 131 Uptime: 5 min Memory: 120.4/987.2MB
           Init: SysVinit v: 2.88 runlevel: 4 default: 4 Gcc sys: 4.9.2
           Client: Shell (bash 4.3.301 running in lxterminal) inxi: 2.2.25 

[Colonel Panic]

Thanks. I agree that I was wrong in that last paragraph though to assume that my experience of Salix Fluxbox should be taken as typical or as the norm, and apologise for doing so.

Edited my quote to match your post CP.

I aint ragging on you. I was just surprised because those 2 distros have be problem free for me compared to Debian based distros even.

That is why I said to each their own poison.

Edit: Figured I should back up my post also so here goes.

Code: Select all

System:    Host: slackel.example.net Kernel: 3.14.13-smp i686 (32 bit gcc: 4.8.3)
           Desktop: Fluxbox 1.3.7 dm: gdm Distro: Slackware 14.1
Machine:   System: manda (portable) product: Intel powered classmate PC v: Gen 1.5L
           Mobo: N/A model: N/A
           Bios: American Megatrends v: CM94515A.86A.0024.2008.0715.1716 date: 07/15/2008
CPU:       Single core Intel Core N270 (-HT-) cache: 512 KB
           flags: (nx pae sse sse2 sse3 ssse3) bmips: 3191
           clock speeds: min/max: 800/1600 MHz 1: 800 MHz 2: 1333 MHz
Memory:    Using dmidecode: you must be root to run dmidecode
Graphics:  Card: Intel Mobile 945GSE Express Integrated Graphics Controller
           bus-ID: 00:02.0 chip-ID: 8086:27ae
           Display Server: X.Org 1.16.4 drivers: intel (unloaded: vesa)
           Resolution: 1024x600@53.33hz
           GLX Renderer: Mesa DRI Intel 945GME x86/MMX/SSE2
           GLX Version: 2.1 Mesa 10.5.4 Direct Rendering: Yes
Audio:     Card Intel NM10/ICH7 Family High Definition Audio Controller
           driver: snd_hda_intel bus-ID: 00:1b.0 chip-ID: 8086:27d8
           Sound: Advanced Linux Sound Architecture v: k3.14.13-smp
Network:   Card: Realtek RTL8101E/RTL8102E PCI Express Fast Ethernet controller
           driver: r8169 v: 2.3LK-NAPI port: ec00
           bus-ID: 01:00.0 chip-ID: 10ec:8136
           IF: eth0 state: down mac: <filter>
           WAN IP: <filter> IF: eth0 ip: N/A ip-v6: N/A
           IF: wlan0 ip: N/A ip-v6: N/A
Drives:    HDD Total Size: 30.0GB (21.4% used)
           ID-1: /dev/sda model: SAMSUNG_HS030GB size: 30.0GB serial: S1MBJ16Q727672
           Optical: No optical drives detected.
Partition: ID-1: / size: 26G used: 4.1G (17%) fs: ext4 dev: /dev/sda2
           label: N/A uuid: 8bd07441-689d-4079-ba3f-124ca4c68892
           ID-2: swap-1 size: 2.11GB used: 0.00GB (0%) fs: swap dev: /dev/sda1
           label: N/A uuid: c7e5d23e-43de-4e75-a2aa-bb4fe3b2f451
RAID:      System: supported: linear raid0 raid1 raid10 raid6 raid5 raid4 multipath
           No RAID devices: /proc/mdstat, md_mod kernel module present
           Unused Devices: none
Unmounted: No unmounted partitions detected
Sensors:   System Temperatures: cpu: 41.0C mobo: N/A
           Fan Speeds (in rpm): cpu: N/A
Info:      Processes: 131 Uptime: 5 min Memory: 120.4/987.2MB
           Init: SysVinit v: 2.88 runlevel: 4 default: 4 Gcc sys: 4.9.2
           Client: Shell (bash 4.3.301 running in lxterminal) inxi: 2.2.25