Advice on Distro for Compaq Armada 1573DM?

Ichido · 02-02-2006, 04:53 PM

I have an OLD Laptop running Windoze 98SE.
Pentium MMX 233MHz, 64 MB RAM with 3GB IDE Hard Drive.
Have tried Ubuntu 5.10, Kubuntu 5.10, PCLinuxOS0.92, Knoppix 4.0.2 and Linspire 5.0 "Live" CDs but none will run.
Can anyone suggest a Linux OS that will run on a OLD & SLOOOW Laptop?

nephish · 02-04-2006, 08:18 AM

try vector. old and slow is vectors main selling point (selling point is figurative, like most distros, its free)
Vector also has a pretty small footprint.
If i were you though, i would ebay myself a bit o' RAM, if your board will hold it.

Ichido · 02-08-2006, 10:20 AM

Thanks!!
I will give it a try.

nephish · 02-08-2006, 11:36 AM

forgot to add something, get the 5.1 standard, not the soho. You are going to want to run a lightweight wm on that thing, and you dont need a bunch of services included with it (web server, etc...) if you do , you can always install them later.

WoofDeF · 02-11-2006, 06:10 PM

An alternative is DamnSmallLinux. See if the livecd will boot. If so you could think about a frugal install. 64mb ram is luxury for damnsmall, and there are plenty of people on the dsl forums running it on similar laptops (and older!).

daiver · 02-12-2006, 12:00 AM

Yeah, I'd go with DSL. That's what I have in the other laptop and works great.