best distro for old laptop
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From: Anonymous on 2 Jul 2007 04:07 Hello all, trying to reduce my leccy consumption . Current box + monitor ~=220w , 15 hrs/day -> ~3kwh / day . So as part of the economy drive , I thought I might be able to use my wifes old toshiba satellite pro 430cdt ( *32MB* ram, 1.2GB hdd , 120MHz pentium) laptop (has floppy and a cdrom attached) , as an economical (in power terms ~= 20w) work station where I can code , maybe compile and debug the simpler bits of my project . In the heavier coding bits on my normal box , I have 4/5 virtual screens with 6 xterms each and one screen for googling ... so clearly this laptop wont get anywhere near that , any idea what it would support ? (currently has win98se installed) . I have booted with tomsrtbt ok and mounted the cdrom (just to test it). Anyway I have distros going way back , and the first CD version I have is a slackware set from 96 which says requires 4-8MB ram, and 12MB hdd and is kernel 2.0 . Clearly in terms of vintage and box spec, this matches quite well, but would it be best to use this or a less vintage version of slack, (8.0,9.0,10.2 or my latest 11.0) or something else ? Cheers , Steve Houseman -- currently : steve at houseman demon co uk | http://www.houseman.demon.co.uk/
From: Ian on 2 Jul 2007 05:06 On 2 Jul, 09:07, s...(a)jackass.woolacombe.lnx () wrote: > Anyway I have distros going way back , and the first CD version I have > is a slackware set from 96 which says requires 4-8MB ram, and 12MB hdd > and is kernel 2.0 . Clearly in terms of vintage and box spec, this > matches quite well, but would it be best to use this or a less vintage > version of slack, (8.0,9.0,10.2 or my latest 11.0) or something else ? I've been trying to get Damn Small Linux to work on an old Compaq Armada 1530 (133MHz + 88MB + 2GB). It installs fine, but I can't get X working properly. Seems to be a known problem, something to do with the Cirrus Logic graphics. However ... I'd suggest giving DSL a go. Ian
From: ruffrecords on 2 Jul 2007 05:35 steve(a)jackass.woolacombe.lnx wrote: > Hello all, > > trying to reduce my leccy consumption . > Current box + monitor ~=220w , 15 hrs/day -> ~3kwh / day . > > So as part of the economy drive , I thought I might be able to use > my wifes old toshiba satellite pro 430cdt ( *32MB* ram, 1.2GB hdd , > 120MHz pentium) laptop (has floppy and a cdrom attached) , > as an economical (in power terms ~= 20w) work station where I can > code , maybe compile and debug the simpler bits of my project . > In the heavier coding bits on my normal box , I have 4/5 virtual > screens with 6 xterms each and one screen for googling ... so > clearly this laptop wont get anywhere near that , any idea what > it would support ? > (currently has win98se installed) . > > I have booted with tomsrtbt ok and mounted the cdrom (just to test it). > > Anyway I have distros going way back , and the first CD version I have > is a slackware set from 96 which says requires 4-8MB ram, and 12MB hdd > and is kernel 2.0 . Clearly in terms of vintage and box spec, this > matches quite well, but would it be best to use this or a less vintage > version of slack, (8.0,9.0,10.2 or my latest 11.0) or something else ? > > > Cheers , > > Steve Houseman > I would suggest you try Puppy Linux or Zenwalk. Ian
From: Paul Sherwin on 2 Jul 2007 05:57 On Mon, 02 Jul 2007 02:06:02 -0700, Ian wrote: > On 2 Jul, 09:07, s...(a)jackass.woolacombe.lnx () wrote: > >> Anyway I have distros going way back , and the first CD version I have >> is a slackware set from 96 which says requires 4-8MB ram, and 12MB hdd >> and is kernel 2.0 . Clearly in terms of vintage and box spec, this >> matches quite well, but would it be best to use this or a less vintage >> version of slack, (8.0,9.0,10.2 or my latest 11.0) or something else ? > > I've been trying to get Damn Small Linux to work on an old Compaq > Armada 1530 (133MHz + 88MB + 2GB). It installs fine, but I can't get X > working properly. Seems to be a known problem, something to do with > the Cirrus Logic graphics. > > However ... I'd suggest giving DSL a go. I agree, a hard disk install of DSL is probably your best bet on this hardware. You'll have problems running mainstream apps such as Firefox or OpenOffice though, whatever the distro. You should try to upgrade the memory if at all possible. Paul
From: Nick Craig-Wood on 2 Jul 2007 06:30
steve(a)jackass.woolacombe.lnx () <steve(a)jackass.woolacombe.lnx> wrote: > trying to reduce my leccy consumption . > Current box + monitor ~=220w , 15 hrs/day -> ~3kwh / day . I have exactly this problem at home also! Except it is 3 servers on nearly all the time... > So as part of the economy drive , I thought I might be able to use > my wifes old toshiba satellite pro 430cdt ( *32MB* ram, 1.2GB hdd , > 120MHz pentium) laptop (has floppy and a cdrom attached) , > as an economical (in power terms ~= 20w) work station where I can > code , maybe compile and debug the simpler bits of my project . > In the heavier coding bits on my normal box , I have 4/5 virtual > screens with 6 xterms each and one screen for googling ... so > clearly this laptop wont get anywhere near that , any idea what > it would support ? This box has almost exactly the spec of my first linux box (from 1997!). I used to run Redhat 4.2 on it. I ran fvwm IIRC on it now and again, but I did nearly all of my work on it at the console. It was permanently connected to the internet and got rooted. Oh happy days ;-) You can only bump the RAM of your laptop to 48 MB by the look of it... http://www.crucial.com/uk/store/listparts.aspx?model=Satellite+Pro+430CDT I'd suggest xubuntu but that has a requirement of 64 MB of RAM minimum. I think I'd start with a minimal Debian then see what runs. You might be able to run a light weight window manager (eg icewm). Word on the street is that 2.4 kernels use less memory than 2.6 kernels. 32MB just isn't going to be enough RAM for compiling stuff at any sensible speed, and definitely not if you want to use a modern C++ compiler. Alternatively you could join a local freecycle group. People are giving away PCs and laptops of 10 times better spec! http://www.freecycle.org/ If you've got some cash to spend, then you could get one of these http://linitx.com/viewcategory.php?catid=119&pp=116,118,119 Which start at about UKP 200 for a 533 Mhz box. Or get yourself the cheapest of the cheap laptop (about UKP 300) - these seem to use about 20W also if you enable all the powersaving features. -- Nick Craig-Wood <nick(a)craig-wood.com> -- http://www.craig-wood.com/nick |