I agreed with everything you said up until the last line quoted above. Firstly perception of speed is subjective and based on what one is used to. A 386 felt fast when upgrading from most 286s. For reference up until 5 years ago I had an ancient Sony Vaio PII 400MHz CPU maxed out with 256 MB RAM with Slackware 12.2 on it. Granted it took FOREVER to get to desktop which was KDE 3x but once at desktop, while hardly "snappy" it wasn't too painful. It worked and if that's all one ever had, until broswers became the RAM hogs they are these days, one could get by. Comparing that to even 2GB RAM makes a HUGE speed difference. That said, assuming RAM for that box isn't hugely overpriced, going to 4GB is a good idea.

Most importantly, whether one chooses kdm, gdm, or xdm makes little difference. As long as OP chooses a lightweight WM/DE kdm is no big deal. It's just a Display Manager/Login/Chooser after all and it is probably not at all wise for one so new to Slackware to not go with Full Recommended Install. The ONLY cost for that is hard drive space, which with just a 120GB drive is an important issue but far less important than the complexity created by a newbie not installing KDE.

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I also had a PC (eMachine) with a 400 MHz CPU and 256 MB RAM as my first Linux box. But I did notice a big difference between KDE (2 and 3) and lighter WMs like FVWM and WindowMaker. I tended to use the latter two most of the time because of this. It went through RH 5.1, SuSE 6.2, and Slackware 7.1, with the same results. I'd be shocked if a box that old could run even a basic GUI on Slackware 14.2 today, let alone any browser other than Lynx.

Actually, Slackware may not be what he needs. Something lighter like Peppermint Linux might work better for him.

@vw98008
Your treatment by this forum has been a clusterfuck compounded by your lack of willingness to read and understand what has been offered.
In your first thread, at post #3, you were given the correct advice, but were sidetracked by the mention of UEFI then Secure Boot, which were not applicable.
Following in that thread, in post #14, it was suggested that Windows XP could understand the ext4 filesystem. What nonsense!
Then, in post #16, well Windows XP is already installed, so WTF!
Then in post #18,'fdisk' is suggested, which has already been covered in more detail in the link post #3.

Now I move to the current thread.
In the first post, the you still had an NTFS patition containing your Windows XP installation.
You were badly advised in post #2, with an irrelevant link, where was more appropriate.
The lilo stanza should have been
I tried to get your partitioning information in post #8, without success.
The situation may have been salvageable at this time.

This thread then descends into nonsense about swap partitions versus swap partition files and lack of information on partition types and RAM size.

Poor advice leading to a borked system is inexcusable.
As someone who has been dual booting Windows XP and Slackware on 32-bit and 64-bit systems with 1GB of memory for years, and able to run a Windows XP virtual machine under QEMU in Slackware in a system with 1GB of memory, I am appalled.

I know I am insulting many people. That bang you heard was me slamming the door. Do not expect me back any time soon.

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I guess you won't see this then allend, but it should be noted for anyone else that (apparently inadvertently) OP, as you noted, posted at least 3 different but related threads, and in none of them did he start off with hardly any information about what machine or OpSys he had. Just one example that you mentioned, UEFI and SecureBoot, were brought up because those are considerations for any system made in the last 10-20 years. Garbage In > Garbage Out.

BTW it should be recognized that while OP certainly added to his problems by not researching first and lacking in thoroughness, it is also entirely possible that English is not his first language, always a concern on a global Forum.

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Thanks for your walking through this thread and provide a retrospect of the event. I was impatient with the task. My daily drive PC is dual boot, Windows 10 & Mint. I didn't expect those trouble I encountered of trying a dual boot on a 32-bit PC. My biggest mistake is that I should think of reinstalling the Windows after being told unvisiable Windows partition and partition needed to be done in on the Slackware. That was totally different from my experience of getting Mint on Windows 10.

Are you saying you have Mint on a shared MS partition?

It is a dual boot in different parts of HD or different partitions.

So what did you find so different installing the two?

The major differences are the installation process differences between Slackware and Mint (also Deepin). It is too easy to mess up on Slackware installation. And I get another one. I will post another question when I have time to deal with it.

Thanks for being honest vw98008. I hope you can take this constructively since it is by no means meant as any manner of condemnation.

You're absolutely correct. Slackware IS easier to mess up on, with the caveat that it isn't TOO easy to mess up for everyone, even though it seems to be for you and many others who are used to reduced power that requires less of you.

Have you ever seen this video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cNVrMZX2kms of comedian Eddie Griffin test driving a Ferrari? He wrecks pretty badly on the first curve exactly because he was inexperienced with that level of power. It wasn't that he was a bad driver. It's just that he was used to cars that are nowhere near as powerful or responsive. Slackware is like that. It requires that you know what you are doing and take precautions when you're learning and unsure. Put it this way... if you've driven a Toyota Corolla or the like for years you don't need training or even much concern or caution to drive a Kia, but you certainly will need considerable to attempt driving even a Porsche, let alone Lambo or Ferrari or a AA Fuel Dragster... maybe even a Land Rover.

An overly simple example is that before you delete or modify an important file, let's use xorg.conf as an example, you should make sure you can easily put it back to at least the previously working state. You could copy it to another location like your home directory, you could rename it "xorg.conf.org" while you create a new (untested) one, or perhaps simply know where or how you can restore the original from a website, install image, or whatever you find reasonable and memorable. Many editors make an automatic backup file of important files but you need to know that and verify it.

A more important example is your XP Partition. You should label your partitions with names that make sense to you so you will always recognize them for what they are, but at the very least you should know what file systems they are.

There is no shame in using an operating system that "holds your hand" and keeps you from making bad mistakes from ignorance, but it is a loss of power and understanding. If that is OK with you, if you prefer not being responsible for deep controls, that's perfectly valid. I just wonder what attracted you to an Admin oriented distro like Slackware in the first place. You seem unfamiliar with and uninterested in reading any manuals to become powerful. I know this is a roundabout way of saying the despised "RTFM!" but it really does seem to apply here and, as you now know. it matters. I'm sincerely sorry you lost your XP install and hope it had nothing critical on it. Hopefully you learned an important if costly lesson. Good luck.

The thing about a rope is one man will get tied up in knots, where another will use it great effect. Slackware's installed is to put it bluntly a lot of rope. Its basically a Linux Live environment, with Slackware's package manager and some handy scripts to ensure some critial initial configuration items get handled.

The *neat* thing has always been that it let you do stuff like partition and mount your block devices on your own. That means you could do things right away like intstall in a BTRFS subvolume or create some exhotic software raid setup, or any other thing you might imagine and still use the installer! Where the shall we say more soup to nuts approach to installers the other distros developed still fall flat on the faces if you go outside the dotted lines even today.

On the other hand yes, for people totally unfamiliar with the tools, not clear on PC architecture and boot process, or starting without a real plan for where they want to go, yes its easy to mess up and produce a 'system' that does not boot, inst installed completely, etc. Is also easy to foul up other platforms if you are installing along side.

When doing doing potentially destructive operations on Slackware, rule 0) is READ UP ON THE SUBJECT FIRST

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Thanks for sharing your thought.

Thanks for sharing your thought.

Back to your last sentence "READ UP ON THE SUBJECT FIRST". For people who have some basic computer knowledge, a Linux installation process shall be intuitive. I didn't read any document other than the dual boot portion prior to install Linux Mint. I don't know the Linux Mint website provides such a document as I can't find it on the site. I did the same for Deepin installation, did not need to read the installation document. The Deepin office website does provide such a document, but it is very simple.

I guess that Slackware is for different people. For some, I can think of a statement something like "Linux is free as long as you don't value your time". Some people make videos on the topic published on youtube.

If you choose to run Slackware there is an unstated assumption that you will read the available documentation.
I suggest that you try tinkering with Slackware in a virtual machine, perhaps virtualbox. The reward of successfully installing, configuring Slackware is worth the effort of reading the documentation. Don't get too discouraged.

It sounds quite insulting. Everybody isn't as slow as you are, reading and understanding.