I have been trying to install the "Alternate" version of Xubuntu on my old Dell Inspiron 2500. The install process proceeds to completion but when it trys to start, it ends in a blinking cursor, as did the standard version of Xubuntu. I went with Xubuntu because I understand it should run with my 320Mb of memory and 8Gb harddrive. When I run the recovery mode from Grub, and choose "resume" from the recovery menu, after trying all the other choices, it ends again in a blinking cursor and the last line of the diagnostic display says "Starting Gnome Display Manger" I am able to "Drop to the root shell prompt" but don't know where to take it from there.

I was able to successfully install and boot a copy of Ubuntu that came on a CD in the back of the book Ubuntu Linux Bible by von Hagen 2007. But cant figure out how to get it to connect to WIFI using my Airlink USB WIFI dongle. I also have a D-Link PCMIA but it doesn't seem to recognize the PCMIA card.

One last thing - Puppy Linux 4.12 runs great on this machine.

So it appears my machine doesnt like Gnome, is there a workaround?

Thanks for listening. John

Use the search function at www.distrowatch.com. You can enter lots of parameters. For example I entered a search for old computers using Gnome and found BeatriX. Unfortunately the last version was released in 2005 so it may be abandoned. Anyway you can mix and match characteristics until you find one that works well. You should probably look at the 50 MB distributions for starters but you may find a slightly larger distribution with Gnome if you want Gnome.