A distribution for a slowwww computer

dyw · 03-03-2005, 10:07 PM

I have a Pentium1, 40MB RAM, 800MB HD, no CD. It runs Debian fine. I installed the Debian Stable 3.0 via floppies and the net, then got some packages from the testing branch. I run IceWM as the window manager, rox-filer and xfe for file managing, dillo for browsing (firefox works but starts slow), abiword for word processing, and at one point I considered making it a web server so I installed dhttpd, and I can't remember what else.

qualx2003 · 03-04-2005, 11:43 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by cavalier
I have no idea about it's ability to be loaded without a bootable CD, but Damn Small Linux (DSL) is what my friend is using on a whole host of P166 machines with either 64 or 96 megs of RAM and 3 GB hard drives.

It actually can boot from a CD, it just wasn't cooperating at first. I downloaded DSL, and it runs fine and everything, but it lacks some things. I've already ran into an issue with running make. It doesn't have it. Other than a few minor setback, it works fine.

youngtom · 03-04-2005, 12:20 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by RodimusProblem
Anything with Fluxbox or XFCE or another lightweight windowmanager should be an option (even Mandrake).

One of the computers I manage has only 64 MB of RAM and can run Feather pretty well.

I think that PodimusProblem has got it exactly right. As long as you run a lightweight windowmanager almost any Linux distribution should work. Here's a good link that if you are interested in finding out more about X window managers - http://www.xwinman.org/