Cyber Akuma Posted November 8, 2008 Share Posted November 8, 2008 I have a very old laptop, its a Dell Latitude CPi D266XT. It has a 200MHZ Pentium 2 CPU and 128 megs of what I assume is SDRAM, which is it's maximum limit. Windows 2000 has been running PAINFULLY slow lately on it to the point of being unusable, so I decided to install a distro of Linux on it with hopes that it will run little better, since I heard that many linux distros can run well on older hardware. Originally the system had Windows 98, but I forgot why, I needed to upgrade to Windows 2000 on it for something, so I can't go back to Win98 since im sure I will eventually bump into what forced me to upgrade last time. However, I tried looking and most distros demanded 196 or 256 megs of ram as a minimum to work. Finally I ran into Xubuntu which claimed to only need 128 megs to run live desktop or install and 64 megs to run after install. However, I can't get the Xubuntu disk to work. If I try to live desktop, it takes about 15 minutes to load, then it just stays on a blank desktop with a firefox and help icon on the top left of the screen and the time on the top right, nothing else loads, no drop-down menus or anything. Nothing responds. Trying the installer, a window appears with close/maximize/minimize buttons but thats it, nothing appears IN the window and nothing else loads. Nothing responds. Anybody have any ideas what I can do to either get Xubuntu working or know of a better distro to use on such an old machine? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
brentaal Posted November 8, 2008 Share Posted November 8, 2008 The only way to install Xubuntu on that PC is with the alternate cd... but I don't think it's worth it... I suggest you try one of these two distros http://www.puppylinux.org/ http://www.damnsmalllinux.org/ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lechio Posted November 8, 2008 Share Posted November 8, 2008 Have you choose installing it from boot, instead of running it on a live session? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
markwolfe Veteran Posted November 8, 2008 Veteran Share Posted November 8, 2008 ^^^ Yes, alternate CD skips the fancy live desktop, and is a great option if your computer cant handle the LiveCD aspects. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cyber Akuma Posted November 8, 2008 Author Share Posted November 8, 2008 The only way to install Xubuntu on that PC is with the alternate cd... but I don't think it's worth it...I suggest you try one of these two distros http://www.puppylinux.org/ http://www.damnsmalllinux.org/ Thanks, I will look into these, but I have some questions: See, this laptop isn't mine, I am trying to fix it for someone, and they are computer illerate. They coulden't stand how slow it had become and asked if I could do anything, they said they don't care what OS I use as long as they can go online and write documents with it. So do any of these have a GUI? Would they be usable for somebody who knows almost nothing about computers beyond using MS Word (Linux's equivelent is Open Office right?) and Firefox for webbrowsing and e-mail? Do they work with WiFi hardware(the laptop has a Linksys WPC11 PCMIA card)? Of course I will be the one doing the installing and initial configuring. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
markwolfe Veteran Posted November 8, 2008 Veteran Share Posted November 8, 2008 Yes, they all have GUIs. XFCE (xubuntu) probably has the nicest interface of the group I forget what Puppy has, but it is very light, yet still intuitive to Windows users DSL uses fluxbox, which is my favorite. But works the least like Windows (no start button) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lechio Posted November 8, 2008 Share Posted November 8, 2008 Xubuntu provides applications for those tasks mentioned. It has firefox for web browsing, programs for office work, email, media playing, (...). It's the right choice for that kind of hardware and for users who only want the basics of a desktop. The desktop is very intuitive, easy to use. Have a look at the features here: http://www.xubuntu.org/ Compared to the previous suggestion this is, in my opinion, the best choice. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
markwolfe Veteran Posted November 8, 2008 Veteran Share Posted November 8, 2008 I agree that xubuntu will provide the nicest interface of the lighter distros, but if it is still too sluggish on that PC, I can say that puppy is much lighter, yet still intuitive enough for a Windows user. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lechio Posted November 8, 2008 Share Posted November 8, 2008 (edited) ^^ True, it's a matter of getting it installed and trying it out. EDIT: go here for minimum Xubuntu system requirements. Edited November 8, 2008 by LechioPT Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cyber Akuma Posted November 8, 2008 Author Share Posted November 8, 2008 I already read the Xubuntu system requirements, they claim: # 166 MHz processor # 64 MB of system memory (RAM) # At least 1.5 GB of disk space # VGA graphics card The laptop exceeds all of those Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fish Posted November 8, 2008 Share Posted November 8, 2008 I've got Puppy running on an old PII 450mhz machine, and i'm really impressed with it. It's a great Distro. There are, perhaps, too many obscure programs installed by default to fully recommend it to someone unfamiliar with computers, but with a little effort in this area it would be fine. I'm thinking of donating this PC to my grandparents when I've finished simplifying it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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