Which distro for this ancient, broken lappy?
 

Hi all:

I have retrieved from the attic an ancient laptop and plan to give it to a young member of the family as a play-and-learn computer. Internt, basic office are the task it should perform.

Samsung laptop: 32Kb RAM, 4Gb HDD with Windows 98 installed. No modem or NIC present. CD ROM and floppy broken. Not bootable through USB.

I installed (under windows) a portable Freecom Traveller II PCMCIA CD-RW, and a PCMCIA modem.

However, I am concerned that Windows 98 is not exactly a secure system for surfing the net, and would like to install a Linux flavour on it.

My problem is finding the right distro. I would like a minimal graphic environment (no command prompt only) and a decent hardware support to be able to make the modem and possibly the CD RW work.

I noticed that the PCMCIA modem I installed is listed as working in Puppy Linux,... any other idea??

Thanks

Q4U

Puppy or DSL would be ideal. You may want to try zipslack.

The small RAM is your main issue.

Another reason for installing linux could be that you want the kid to be learning/working more than playing games.

Yeah, 32kb RAM is a big constrain (I think that 64Kb is the minimum recommended for running the X window system).

I run Ubuntu 5.04 so I am more comfortable with a Debian derivative such as DSL.

I will look into it, thanks for the recommendation.

If anyone has other experiences, pls post... for example: does anyone know if Ubuntu Lite is stable/mature enough for an absolute beginner like my nephew?

Q4U