small linux os, fast, youtube compatible, with some kind of office

Musmula · 09-05-2013, 04:35 AM

Hello, I am new to the forums so I have no idea how to start a post (or is it post a post?) anyway I am trying to get some live out of my dads pc, and its not really getting anywhere, I need help.

My dads pc has 2.53 Ghz cpu, 1.25 GB RAM, a poor intergrated gpu, 120 GB HDD.

He only needs his pc to watch youtube videos and to make some screenshots of those and copy it into a lo writer (or ms word, or...) file that is everything! Sounds not much, but I have tryed ubuntu 12.04 LTS...no, I have tryed ubuntu studio 12.04 LTS (since it is on xfce and doesent need a lot)... not working, btw. the 13.04 versions wont get installed, but that is not really relewant for youtube, I tryed win xp with the lovest amound of visual fx with sp3 and stuff, but I always have a problem with a corrupt svchost.exe file wich I have replaced about a houndret times, and I really dont know what am I gonna do :( please help

surio · 09-05-2013, 07:22 AM

A few:

http://www.slax.org/
http://bosslinux.in/
http://www.therebellin.com/
http://www.zorin-os.com/
http://www.linuxliteos.com/

They are specifically aimed at Windows users transitioning to Linux. Supposed to work on older hardware as well. Try them for yourself.

HTH

itsgregman · 09-05-2013, 08:11 AM

Her's a pretty good listing of what may help you.

http://distrowatch.com/search.php?ca...=Old+Computers

Personally I can recommend VectorLinux out of that list. It has most everything you would probably want in the default installation.
I've also heard good things about Antix but haven't used it myself.
Slitaz is probably the lightest on resources and I use it on my laptop but with the current release there are a few annoyances you would have to correct and not knowing your level of knowledge I'd hesitate to recommend it.

snowday · 09-05-2013, 08:14 AM

Can you be more specific than "not working"?

I have had good results with AntiX and CrunchBang for old hardware.

TobiSGD · 09-05-2013, 11:11 AM

Before going any further, having repeatdly corrupted files on that machine sounds like there is a hardware issue. I would recommend to check at least the RAM and the harddisk for errors, have a look at this on how to do that: http://www.linuxquestions.org/questi...re-4175461588/

DavidMcCann · 09-05-2013, 12:55 PM

This is not old hardware needing some special Linux: it's bigger and faster than either of my computers.

Ubuntu will not install because the installation disk only works with a dedicated graphics card (and it's a bit fussy about which one, too).

Try Linux Mint (use the failsafe boot option) and Vector Linux, and see which he prefers.

TobiSGD · 09-05-2013, 12:58 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by DavidMcCann

Ubuntu will not install because the installation disk only works with a dedicated graphics card (and it's a bit fussy about which one, too).

That irritates me. Do you have a link to an elaborating article?

Musmula · 09-05-2013, 02:47 PM

thank you everybody so much for your replys I am going to check them out...now.....................................................................(...)

DavidMcCann · 09-06-2013, 11:45 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by TobiSGD

That irritates me. Do you have a link to an elaborating article?

The first problem is that the Ubuntu live disk has generic drivers for Nvidia and ATI, a driver for the latest Intel chip, and VESA. There was a mention of the Intel problem somewhere on the Ubuntu website: they recommended using the alternative installation disk: non-live, non-graphical, and with some missing options. The second is that VESA is never selected, so if you need it you get one of the other drivers. The third is that if you force the use of VESA, Unity is unusable. It might be OK with a dual core, but with a single core and no graphics acceleration it takes about 30 seconds to recognise each key-stroke or mouse click. It used to be OK, but evidently it then had some sort of fall-back provision that's been removed.

The real problem seems to be that Canonical are only testing on a small range of up-to-date computers — they don't have the large team of disparate developers you find in independent distros — and the testing releases are probably not downloaded by many, since Ubuntu hardly attracts hobbyists. There was a similar problem with the mysterious installer crashes a couple of years ago: the Ubuntu bugs are always in the bits they add rather in the Debian software, even though it is from the Unstable repository.

rokytnji · 09-06-2013, 03:54 PM

Specs:

Code:

$ inxi -Fxz
System:    Host: biker Kernel: 3.7.10-antix.3-486-smp i686 (32 bit, gcc: 4.7.3) 
           Desktop: IceWM 1.3.7 Distro: antiX-13_386-full Luddite 01 June 2013
Machine:   Mobo: IBM model: 26474MU Bios: IBM version: 1AET64WW (1.20 ) date: 10/18/2006
CPU:       Single core Mobile Intel Pentium III CPU - M (-UP-) cache: 512 KB flags: (pae sse) bmips: 1598.53 clocked at 800.00 MHz 
Graphics:  Card: S3 SuperSavage IX/C SDR bus-ID: 01:00.0 
           X.Org: 1.12.4 drivers: savage (unloaded: fbdev,vesa) Resolution: 1024x768@60.0hz 
           GLX Renderer: Gallium 0.4 on softpipe GLX Version: 2.1 Mesa 8.0.5 Direct Rendering: Yes
Audio:     Card: Intel 82801CA/CAM AC'97 Audio Controller driver: snd_intel8x0 ports: 1c00 18c0 bus-ID: 00:1f.5 
           Sound: Advanced Linux Sound Architecture ver: k3.7.10-antix.3-486-smp
Network:   Card-1: Ralink RT2561/RT61 802.11g PCI driver: rt61pci ver: 2.3.0 bus-ID: 07:00.0
           IF: wlan0 state: up mac: <filter>
           Card-2: Intel 82801CAM (ICH3) PRO/100 VE (LOM) Ethernet Controller 
           driver: e100 ver: 3.5.24-k2-NAPI port: 6400 bus-ID: 02:08.0
           IF: eth0 state: down mac: <filter>
Drives:    HDD Total Size: 80.0GB (12.0% used) 1: id: /dev/sda model: ST980815A size: 80.0GB 
Partition: ID: / size: 73G used: 9.0G (14%) fs: ext4 ID: swap-1 size: 1.12GB used: 0.00GB (0%) fs: swap 
Sensors:   System Temperatures: cpu: 55.0C mobo: 51.0C 
           Fan Speeds (in rpm): cpu: N/A fan-1: 0 
Info:      Processes: 97 Uptime: 49 min Memory: 324.5/1007.8MB Runlevel: 5 Gcc sys: 4.7.2 
           Client: Shell (bash 4.2.37) inxi: 1.9.7 

$ inxi -r
Repos:     Active apt sources in file: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/antix.list
           deb http://www.daveserver.info/antiX/debs testing main
           Active apt sources in file: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/debian.list
           deb http://ftp.us.debian.org/debian/ wheezy main contrib non-free
           deb http://security.debian.org/ wheezy/updates main contrib non-free
           Active apt sources in file: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/various.list
           deb http://www.duinsoft.nl/pkg debs all

Not powerful but lean and mean with libreoffice included in the live cd. One of the few distros left that fit on cd and come with every thing but a Desktop Environment, (Window Managers are lighter and faster) Screenshot is from my other IBM laptop that is even
less powerful than this one I am posting with. http://oi43.tinypic.com/2dbndyr.jpg

TobiSGD · 09-07-2013, 06:12 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by DavidMcCann

The first problem is that the Ubuntu live disk has generic drivers for Nvidia and ATI, a driver for the latest Intel chip, and VESA. There was a mention of the Intel problem somewhere on the Ubuntu website: they recommended using the alternative installation disk: non-live, non-graphical, and with some missing options. The second is that VESA is never selected, so if you need it you get one of the other drivers. The third is that if you force the use of VESA, Unity is unusable. It might be OK with a dual core, but with a single core and no graphics acceleration it takes about 30 seconds to recognise each key-stroke or mouse click. It used to be OK, but evidently it then had some sort of fall-back provision that's been removed.

The real problem seems to be that Canonical are only testing on a small range of up-to-date computers — they don't have the large team of disparate developers you find in independent distros — and the testing releases are probably not downloaded by many, since Ubuntu hardly attracts hobbyists. There was a similar problem with the mysterious installer crashes a couple of years ago: the Ubuntu bugs are always in the bits they add rather in the Debian software, even though it is from the Unstable repository.

So what you actually wanted to say is: There might be problems with Intel video hardware.

273 · 09-07-2013, 06:33 PM

I would go for Linux Mint XFCE on that hardware. Flash and CODECs should be fairly easy to install and XFCE is easily light enough for that hardware.
I'm typing this on an EEEPC 1.6GHz Atom with 1GB RAM and I regularly use it for YouTube videos and have used it to update my CV fairly recently. I use Debian unstable but Linux Mint XFCE won't be any more resource hungry and could be a little easier to install.
In case you wonder why I use Debian but recommend Mint I prefer Debian as mint has things like sudo that I don't use, and I prefer to do some things manually but I only moved my EEEPC over to Debian recently from Mint and performance wise they're exactly the same using XFCE.

Musmula · 11-22-2013, 08:54 AM

I didn't think it it was relevant, but now I do... The pc has more and more issues, cuz ... you know... it is connected to a 16:9 Plazma LCD TV (oops)

snowday · 11-22-2013, 08:58 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Musmula

The pc has more and more issues, cuz ... you know...

No, we don't know... we are not mind-readers. What are the specific "issues" and what can we do to help?

Musmula · 11-22-2013, 08:58 AM

And it is running puppy linux now, and the image is non-stop lagging on movies, no subbtitles and gnome player wont show the image (that might be software) and I guess, it doesen't really help when I replace the intern GPU with an (old) extern (you know I thought I burned the intern) cuz, it is overheating... obviously, cuz the movie starts normal and than... LAGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGG...
cuz I want to say "cuz", cuz I'm making an idiot of myself cuz... I don't know