I've Googled this but have found surprisingly little information.

What recommendations would you have?

I have used Ubuntu, and it seems ok, but i'm looking to experiment with family members. It must be noob friendly, people who are used to mobile phones and the like - used to Apples. So nothing 'Windows' like.

Cheers

Got a link to a laptop review that describes the specs?

Ah yes, that would be sensible.

I believe it is this one:
http://www.everymac.com/systems/appl...007-specs.html

That has enough power to run anything, although the more bulky distros would be a bit cramped with 1GB of RAM.

This page gives advice on installation. Although intended for Ubuntu (which I don't think would be a good choice for your older machine), then instruction on setting up the HD are valid for any distro. If you don't want to keep OS-X, it makes life simpler to reformat the HD and replace GPT by MBR.
https://help.ubuntu.com/community/Ma...elInstallation

For a distro, you need one with the Xfce or Mate desktops – KDE or anything Gnomish would be too much for it. For Xfce, I'd recommend AntiX MX (not the ordinary AntiX), and for Mate, Linux Mint.

^^+1 for DavidMcCann recommendation for MX-14 for a new user. Not to bloated on 1 gig of ram and ran good on my Atom Acer Aspire One zg5 netbook when I had it.

I had the XFCE task bar on auto-hide since screen real estate was small on that netbook.

Thanks for the suggestions. Antix looks quite 'traditional' in terms of the UI/DE and i was hoping for something more 'mobile-like' or 'apple-like'. Whatever happened to PearOS and is there anything resembling it or OSx these days?

Modern UIs generally require modern video hardware - I'd be hesitant to describe the GMA 950 as that. Might struggle with a heavy DE, which is what you might be looking for. No recommendation from me as a DE is just a DE to me.

Edit: given the EFI firmware, I'd be inclined to leave the disk as gpt - most Linux Installers will handle it fine, maybe even require it with EFI.

I've been playing around on this apple for a little bit using Ubuntu 14.04. For modest use even Ubuntu, which people tell me is on the 'heavy' side (resource use) runs reasonably well. Granted, Lubuntu/Xubuntu/AntiX are going to be snappier, but for what its being used for its not too bad. That said, it does occasionally "lock up" for a few seconds if "too much" is asked of it. Less snappy is ok with me - lock ups not so much.

What do people think of Elementary? I know its not yet at v1. It does have a cool-factor that might engage members of my family.

I know i can just go out and install whatever i like But with so many distros, it is good to get your opinions to narrow it down.

Xubuntu with a few customization's would work well for people who are familiar with OSX.

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http://bd.summit.net/articles/2015/0...t-immediately/

As far as Traditional. This was my Fluxbox Desktop on my EEEPC netbook before I sold it. I had it looking "apple-like" in Fluxbox.

You are going to have to put out a little effort to get your druthers I would think.

Go to distrowatch I guess and do a search using wbar or cairo dock as a search varible.

http://distrowatch.com/search.php

Snow Leopard?

Thanks guys, some good ideas there. I like the Xubuntu themeing. I haven't any experience yet in theming.. maybe its time to start.

We can consider this thread closed. Do i mark it somewhere?

Mark it solved via the Thread Tools drop-down menu, above your first post.

Ah, cool. Thanks - done.