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Hi! I have a Compaq Presario 1200-xl118 that I would like to make usable in some way, at least with a working web browser. The specs are as follows:
192mb RAM
6gb Hard Drive
AMD K6-2 Processor
What kind of linux would be best to be able to do web browsing and have a usable GUI? I have poked around online and been considering Vector Linux Light with barebones GUI, Damn Small Linux, BasicLinux, Arch Linux, and Puppy Linux. Thanks in advance.
Last edited by ironmanzelda15; 01-22-2014 at 01:13 PM.
Hi. I'd start with #6 and 7 here or maybe a netinst of Debian with JWM () and the search is tweakable but (IMHO) try many and find your favorite for it... best wishes and have fun.
Edit: Puppy works well too.
Last edited by jamison20000e; 01-22-2014 at 01:15 PM.
Thanks. What do you think about Vector Light? I would try tiny core but since it is a laptop I want to be able to do Wifi and Tinycore works better with a wired internet connection. I might try Antix but it says it recommends a minimum of 128mb of RAM so I would be cutting it close to the bare minimum with 192. I want it to be fairly fast so I want to be a good amount over the minimum.
Last edited by ironmanzelda15; 01-22-2014 at 01:20 PM.
All the distros are for the most part running the same software. You'll want one with lightweight options. Like JWM for the wm and Midori or other light weight web browsers. It really depends on if all you want to do is check emails, or browse flickr. Or watch youtube or hulu. I can do all that on my ancient laptop. But it has better specs than that one. And not without it's quirks to do that much, i.e. not doing anything but one task at a time.
I haven't used Vector or many in a long time (my distro hopping days slowed way down.) Luckily there free to try. Antix is Debian based so you may need firmware? I like netinst (plus always need non-firmware) but I can never get my WiFi\Eth (network in general) set without first setting up a (GUI) DE\WM on it which you would want to do anyway so I add at lest one (or all three) of Debian's DVDs to my source.list then the question could be OpenBox, Lxed, JWM, WindoMaker, etc...
Are you using external WiFi?
Last edited by jamison20000e; 01-22-2014 at 01:56 PM.
I would be using a pcmia card to connect to the internet. I want internet speed more than anything, but basic programs like word processing and spreadsheets would be nice I wonder if using something SUPER light like Damn Small Linux or BasicLinux would be better because I could push it to its limits without worrying about slowing down...
Last edited by ironmanzelda15; 01-22-2014 at 02:17 PM.
Hi! I have a Compaq Presario 1200-xl118 that I would like to make usable in some way, at least with a working web browser. The specs are as follows:
192mb RAM
6gb Hard Drive
AMD K6-2 Processor
What kind of linux would be best to be able to do web browsing and have a usable GUI? I have poked around online and been considering Vector Linux Light with barebones GUI, Damn Small Linux, BasicLinux, Arch Linux, and Puppy Linux. Thanks in advance.
May be you should consider using old linux for your computer. I used Slackware 8.0 on Pentium III once and it was running well.
antix comes with most of the firmware standard debian leaves out. you also get a choice of icewm, fluxbox, and jwm for window managers. I know at least one person in the antix forums has got it running on a k6-2.
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) and the search is tweakable but (IMHO) try many and find your favorite for it... best wishes and have fun. 
