Bert, <div> </div><div>You also might want to try crunchbang. It really is just a stripped down version Ubuntu. I use it on my netbook and have not seen any really big issues. <div class="gmail_quote">On Wed, Jan 20, 2010 at 10:52 PM, Bert W. Carrier Jr. <<a href="mailto:bertcarrier@gmail.com">bertcarrier@gmail.com</a>> wrote: <blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex;">Richard, Those are some excellent points. I am concerned about power draw as well. This machine is one of about 7 or 8 that I have laying around, and it is by noeans my main computer. It is nice and light, so it would be good for dragging back and forth to school. What is a good alternative to Xorg X11? <div><div></div><div class="h5"> On Wed, 2010-01-20 at 23:43 -0500, Richard Houser wrote: > IceWM is a light-weight window manager as-is (my personal preference > for P3 class machine on a ram diet). Once you get your gui trimmed > down to that point, you should turn off all extraneous services to > save ram. Linux can do usability wonders with 32MB of server daemons, > but you want to avoid much of that if you are capped at 192MB. > > You may also want to swap from Xorg X11 to a lighter-weight > alternative. Also, don't even consider trying OpenOffice without a > RAM bump. Chick may have some recommendations for lighter-weight > replacement for some of this, as he tends to run some P2/P3 era > laptops. You may just be better off upgrading the ram. There's a > good chance you have a friend somewhere with 256MB of unused P3 era > RAM. > > If you are going to use this much, my personal recommendation is to > invest in a newer machine. Over the course of a few years, you could > easily pay for the cost of a new machine in electricity alone, > assuming you spec it out appropriately. My current (big) server > started out as a $200 black Friday build a year ago (4GB ram, AMD X2 > 4000 65 watt, Antec 85%+ efficiency PS), and you can certainly shop > used components in trusted circles, too. After adding a couple cards > and a hard disk, that machine pulls about 605-70 watts from the wall, > as opposed to near 250watts from my previous one. That's well over > 100Kwh difference a month if you leave it on, and the new hardware is > capable of running multiple operating systems concurrently under KVM > (replacing more machines). > > On Wed, Jan 20, 2010 at 7:00 PM, Karl Schuttler <<a href="mailto:rexykik@gmail.com">rexykik@gmail.com</a>> wrote: > > Any of the box's would be a good choice for a gui on an older machine > > (Fluxbox, Blackbox, Whitebox in particular), but you're talking about window > > managers (WM) and not about distros here. You could just install fluxbox on > > top of your base ubuntu/IceWM install (apt-get install fluxbox) and try that > > out, see if it's any faster. > > > > On Wed, Jan 20, 2010 at 6:54 PM, Bert W. Carrier Jr. <<a href="mailto:bertcarrier@gmail.com">bertcarrier@gmail.com</a>> > > wrote: > >> > >> Hello folks, > >> > >> > >> I am new to the group, and I have been using Ubuntu 9.10 for a few > >> months now on my main box. I like it quite well, and I rarely boot to XP > >> at all anymore. I tried Kubuntu, and did'nt care for it as it was slow > >> and crashed often. I also am running Xubuntu on one of my P4 laptops, > >> and it seems ok. > >> > >> My question is: I have a P3, 500mhz dinosaur laptop with 192mb RAM, > >> and I want to run linux on it for word processing, email, and web > >> surfing. I tried Xubuntu with no success, it's far too slow. I > >> installed the base Ubuntu system from the alternate install CD, and > >> installed IceWM, but I didn't care for that. I don't think I am ready > >> to build my own version of a GUI. What is a good, prepackaged distro > >> for a slow old beater? > >> > >> How about Fluxbox, has anyone tried it? Sorry if I come off like a > >> total noob, but I guess if the shoe fits, right? > >> > >> Bert > >> > >> _______________________________________________ > >> linux-user mailing list > >> <a href="mailto:linux-user@egr.msu.edu">linux-user@egr.msu.edu</a> > >> <a href="http://mailman.egr.msu.edu/mailman/listinfo/linux-user" target="_blank">http://mailman.egr.msu.edu/mailman/listinfo/linux-user</a> > > > > > > _______________________________________________ > > linux-user mailing list > > <a href="mailto:linux-user@egr.msu.edu">linux-user@egr.msu.edu</a> > > <a href="http://mailman.egr.msu.edu/mailman/listinfo/linux-user" target="_blank">http://mailman.egr.msu.edu/mailman/listinfo/linux-user</a> > > > > > _______________________________________________ > linux-user mailing list > <a href="mailto:linux-user@egr.msu.edu">linux-user@egr.msu.edu</a> > <a href="http://mailman.egr.msu.edu/mailman/listinfo/linux-user" target="_blank">http://mailman.egr.msu.edu/mailman/listinfo/linux-user</a> _______________________________________________ linux-user mailing list <a href="mailto:linux-user@egr.msu.edu">linux-user@egr.msu.edu</a> <a href="http://mailman.egr.msu.edu/mailman/listinfo/linux-user" target="_blank">http://mailman.egr.msu.edu/mailman/listinfo/linux-user</a> </div></div></blockquote></div> -- Jordan Robison </div>