Linux Distros for old Dell laptop

[greyowl]

I have an old Dell laptop which currently has XP and functions fine. I am considering switching it to linux but concerned if it will run slow or if the hardware, printer, and scanner will work. Below are the specs:

Dell Latitude D600 laptop
1.6 Ghz Pentium M processor
1 GB RAM
20 GB hard drive
Sigma Tel C-Major Audio
Mobility Radeon 9000 video
CD RW/DVD drive
Epson Perfection 1260 scanner (USB port)
Okidata OL 610e printer (parallel port)

I would want to remove XP completely and then install Linux on the hard drive. I have never used Linux before. I have reinstalled XP many times.
Would it install similar to XP?
Would drivers be available for the hardware, printer, and scanner? Would they be plug and play?
Would it run as fast or faster than XP?
What distros or versions would work best?

Thanks for the help.

[Pjotr]

I advise to select Linux Mint 17.1 with the lightweight Xfce desktop. During the countdown of the Mint DVD, hit the space bar and select the "forcepae" boot option (which is necessary for Pentium M processors).

I expect that everything will work just fine, but you can test that beforehand with the Mint DVD, in the tryout session (live session).

One final remark: although the hard drive has sufficient space, it's unusually small for a laptop of that age. How come?

[greyowl]

I advise to select Linux Mint 17.1 with the lightweight Xfce desktop. During the countdown of the Mint DVD, hit the space bar and select the "forcepae" boot option (which is necessary for Pentium M processors).

I expect that everything will work just fine, but you can test that beforehand with the Mint DVD, in the tryout session (live session).

One final remark: although the hard drive has sufficient space, it's unusually small for a laptop of that age. How come?

I agree it is small--not sure why?

Would this be lighter than Ubuntu?

[Pjotr]

Would this be lighter than Ubuntu?

Noticeably lighter than Ubuntu, comparable with Xubuntu.

[greyowl]

Would this be lighter than Ubuntu?

Noticeably lighter than Ubuntu, comparable with Xubuntu.

Is the Linux Mint Light xfce a better choice than Xubuntu?

[Pjotr]

Is the Linux Mint Light xfce a better choice than Xubuntu?

Both are equally good..... It's a matter of taste.

Linux Mint Xfce 17.1 is more complete and more polished "out of the box", but without too much effort and time you can easily achieve the same end result with Xubuntu 14.04.

Note that I leave Xubuntu 15.04 out of the comparison: that's merely a short-lived intermediate release and simply not in the same league as the long-lived LTS (*buntu 14.04 and Mint 17.x).

[greyowl]

Thanks for the help.

[Reorx]

LXLE is specifically designed to work with old (and anemic) hardware. I have a similar machine (Dell Inspiron - pentium class CPU, 1GB RAM, 20GB HD / purchased 2004 with XP on it) that is running 32 bit LXLE 12.04.5 (http://www.lxle.net/download/) and it works pretty well with descent (not fast) performance. LXLE is a Lubuntu (LTS) spin-off so it uses LXDE as a DE and it is pretty light on system resources. A freshly booted and logged in system uses about 85 MB of RAM (@ idle). Below are my system specs...

LXLE_12.04.5.png

[greyowl]

LXLE is specifically designed to work with old (and anemic) hardware. I have a similar machine (pentium class CPU, 1GB RAM, 20GB HD / purchased 2004 with XP on it) that is running 32 bit LXLE 12.04.5 (http://www.lxle.net/download/) and it works pretty well with descent (not fast) performance. LXLE is a Lubuntu spin-off so it uses LXDE as a DE and it is pretty light on system resources. A fresh booted and logged in system uses about 85 MB of RAM. Below is my system specs...

LXLE_12.04.5.png

Your computer is very similar to mine so it should work good.
How much Hard Drive space does it take?

I will look into it.
Thank you.

[Reorx]

Your computer is very similar to mine so it should work good.
How much Hard Drive space does it take?

I will look into it.
Thank you.

You're welcome.
The installation is in 2 partitions >>>
SDA1 is / and it has 4.9 GB taken up by the OS. /home is very small as I don't do a lot on that machine.
SDA2 is swap
<see "Drives" and "Partition" headings in the inxi output above>

To be clear >> LXDE DE is not as "pretty" as you might be accustomed to with Mint DEs. The basics of functionality are similar to what you are probably accustomed but there is a bit of a learning curve on the interface - or, at least there was for me... The machine works reasonably nicely for mundane computing, word processing, e-mail, web surfing but anything that requires CPU "horsepower" will bring performance to its knees. YouTube videos push the CPU utilization to 90% and beyond - sometimes to 100%... the CPU is only "single threaded" and reaches its limits easily with video. If you browse a lot, install NoScript FF add-on - it will take some load off the CPU but negating the CPU overhead for java and flash which can quickly push the CPU to the edge on a "busy" page... Video > 1/4 of the screen and/or hi esolution will peg the CPU and result in "framey" video play back and/or overheating issues... But otherwise, I think LXLE is a good fit for that machine... YMMV!

Good luck and Enjoy the LXLE!

[greyowl]

Thanks for the information.

Does your computer run as well and as fast as it did with XP?

[Reorx]

Thanks for the information.

Does your computer run as well and as fast as it did with XP?

I bought that computer with XP on it in 2004... after putting an internet security and antivirus package on it and then updating it with MS bloated code for 7 years, it was running pretty sloooooowwwww. That old hardware runs much better with LXLE!

See also this Distro Watch page for "good distros" for "older" hardware >>> http://distrowatch.com/search.php?ostyp ... tus=Active

[greyowl]

Thanks for the information.

Does your computer run as well and as fast as it did with XP?

I bought that computer with XP on it in 2004... after putting an internet security and antivirus package on it and then updating it with MS bloated code for 7 years, it was running pretty sloooooowwwww. That old hardware runs much better with LXLE!

See also this Distro Watch page for "good distros" for "older" hardware >>> http://distrowatch.com/search.php?ostyp ... tus=Active

Great! I am hoping to get better performance from Linux.
I have only started using Puppy Linux from a CD.
I suppose a more elaborate version of Linux would be better than Puppy Linux.

[Reorx]

I've never used Puppy - can't give you a comparison.

[jimallyn]

I recently installed MX-14 on a couple of computers with similar specs, although slightly less RAM. Works well on both of them.

[English Invader]

The trade-off with the low spec distros is that you're shutting yourself off from mainstream software support. If you keep XP offline and use Puppy Linux for online tasks, there will be a lot more software available to you.

Puppy Linux runs live from a CD or USB stick and will do everything you need online from e-mail and YouTube to downloading software onto your hard drive for you to run on XP.

I did this with my old laptops last year and when I removed the AVG anti-virus from the XP installations it improved their performance by 60% (no exaggeration).

[Reorx]

The trade-off with the low spec distros is that you're shutting yourself off from mainstream software support. If you keep XP offline and use Puppy Linux for online tasks, there will be a lot more software available to you.

Puppy Linux runs live from a CD or USB stick and will do everything you need online from e-mail and YouTube to downloading software onto your hard drive for you to run on XP.

I did this with my old laptops last year and when I removed the AVG anti-virus from the XP installations it improved their performance by 60% (no exaggeration).

I have said (more than a few times) that Windows is a perfectly good OS for desktop use as long as you don't connect it to a network. I have a netbook that came with WinXP (SP2?) that I used as a testbed back when I was "experimenting" with Linux. Even with a lowly Atom processor and 1GB or RAM, it ran XP just fine. I have never connected the XP side to the internet. I stripped off all the performance crippling bloatware (internet security & antivirus software) and it runs great under XP. I have never updated the WinXP side as it doesn't need updating if it never connects to the internet. At this time, it has WinXP, LM17M32, LM17C32, & LM17X32 on it for "testing" purposes. I am not thrilled with the performance of that machine under LM - all versions show sluggish performance (some worse than others). I have considered wiping the LM partitions and replacing them with LXLE or just restoring the netbook to Day0 (and continue not connecting it to the a network) - haven't decided yet...

[greyowl]

The trade-off with the low spec distros is that you're shutting yourself off from mainstream software support. If you keep XP offline and use Puppy Linux for online tasks, there will be a lot more software available to you.

Puppy Linux runs live from a CD or USB stick and will do everything you need online from e-mail and YouTube to downloading software onto your hard drive for you to run on XP.

I did this with my old laptops last year and when I removed the AVG anti-virus from the XP installations it improved their performance by 60% (no exaggeration).

Thanks for the suggestion--this could be a good compromise.

One Question: When using Puppy Linux online, how do you download software onto your hard drive?

[Reorx]

One Question: When using Puppy Linux online, how do you download software onto your hard drive?

You said that you were running Puppy from a CD. If this is a Live session, you can not permanently install software on a Live system. You can D/L anything you like. If Puppy is like Live Mint sessions, the D/L will be in the Downloads (eta) folder until you end the session (shutdown) and then it will vaporize. But during a session, you can copy the file from your Downloads folder to any other location you like - including the HD on the computer or a USB flash drive.

[greyowl]

One Question: When using Puppy Linux online, how do you download software onto your hard drive?

You said that you were running Puppy from a CD. If this is a Live session, you can not permanently install software on a Live system. You can D/L anything you like. If Puppy is like Live Mint sessions, the D/L will be in the Downloads until you end the session (shutdown) and then it will vaporize. But during a session, you can copy the file from your Downloads folder to any other location you like - including the HD on the computer or a USB flash drive.

Thanks for the instructions.
I will try to figure it out and report back.