Will Ubuntu work in my Pentium II computer having a speed of 350MgHZ and 256MB Ram?? I'm planning to buy Ubuntu.

Ubuntu uses Gnome as it's defualt desktop, and with this your system will really suffer.

If you do go for Ubuntu I would suggest you try installing a lightweight window manager such as
fluxbox or openbox.

You could try Xfce http://www.xfce.org which has a simlar feel to Gnome.

Also, with only 350MgHZ you will may want research some lightweight web browsers, office utilities, filemanagers. Firefox apparently will work http://www.mozilla.com/firefox/system-requirements.html but you are right on the minimum.

also see this thread
http://www.ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=24890

I'll say the same as deroB, the system you've got will run Ubuntu, but the experience won't be great.

As for XFCE, I can't recommend it enough. Check out Xubuntu, which comes with XFCE by default.

I agree, Xubuntu is a better option. I use Xubuntu with just 96 MB and I use Firefox with multiple tabs a the same time while listening mp3. It's not bad

I'm currently running it on a Celeron 366 with 256 MB of RAM using Gnome.

Everything works. It won't set any records but it works well enough to be useful.

I would instlal ubuntu server and build it up from scratch that way with a different window manager besides gnome or KDE. But it really depends on what your intentions are with ubuntu.

I have a pentium II 350 mhz running ubuntu server with no window manager and it runs decent for what i need it for basically ftp server.

If you ask Ubuntu nicely, they'll give it to you for free ;-)

https://shipit.ubuntu.com/

Agree Xubuntu is the way to go. It's just regular Ubuntu with a lightweight window manager (Xfce). IceWM is supposed to be even faster but I've never tried it with Ubuntu.

I have xUbuntu on Pentium4 (I don't remember exactly, how much GHz it has, I bought it maybe 6 years ago) 768MB of RAM and 80 GB HDD (8 GB for root, 3 GB for swap) and normally system uses more than 256 MB of RAM. when I use firefox with multiple tabs, only this takes up to 300 MB of RAM and it grows if I use Firefox longer. Sometimes CPU gets mad: some processes use it 100%. But usually it keeps running 30%. more of it takes command called X.

I started use xubuntu 6.10 and now upgraded to 7.04 with xfce by default. Is it normal, that RAM is used so high?

A normal 'fresh' 32-bit Kubuntu installation uses about 96MB of RAM after loading everything. It's less than a fresh Windows XP install (uses 120 MB after booting); a system with 256 MB may fare well running KDE, however, CPU-wise a lighter window manager is recommended. If your system can handle Windows XP, it'll handle Kubuntu better so it'll be a better experience, however I don't think a 350 MHz machine handles that well so going Xubuntu might be the best option.

P.S.: MinLau: This memory usage seems way too high. Kubuntu AMD64 takes about 130 MB of RAM on startup. That's because 64-bit binaries are larger so take more memory when loaded. I think your reading is taking into account buffers/cache. Type free on a terminal right after booting, you'll see something like this:
You're interested in the second line (-/+ buffers/cache). It may seem at a first glance that my system is now with 448 MB of RAM in use, but only 234 MB are really being used, the rest is for system buffers (25 MB) and cache (188 MB) and that's managed dynamically by the kernel.
Also, this CPU usage seems abnormal too. I have an Athlon 64 3000+, that may be a just a little faster than your P4 judging from the time you say you have it (I got it 2 years ago), I'm running KDE and my CPU usage hovers between zero and 4% with the system idle, that even taking into account that my system is running only at 1 GHz (power-saving, it sets the clock speed to half and lowers CPU voltage when the system is idle to save energy).

I will go on for Xubuntu

MinLau

Given that you say that the process that takes up all of the CPU from time to time is X, that is the X Windowing System that manages all of the graphics. Is the machine you're using one that has an on-board video adapter? If so, it may be using the CPU to manage graphics as well, and that might account for the occasional spikes. Also, look at whether or not your video driver is the most recent available. Some have been notoriously buggy.

It is so. Sometimes usage of RAM and CPU are not much, sometimes it comes so high, that slows system work. It goes - one day it is normal, other day it is not. My computer has not on board video card (GeForce2 MX 64 MB). And lately CPU gets high because of FireFox, especially viewing some pages (e.g. myspace accounts), ktorrent or skype sometimes make it jump very high. At the moment there are 433 of 755 MB of RAM used by most of by FireFox, less of it X and KTorrent. CPU don't falls less than 30% of usage by KTorrent.

just thought i would give my stats

I have p4 (2.6ghz) with generic feisty kernel and 512 MB of pc3200 running xubuntu

system load with multiple tabs in ff is 0-3%max and this is with multiple x screens as well (monitor and tv out)

ktorrent with 25 torents one being 41gb in size so slow starting and stopping but does about 3-4% damage to system load (cpu) the only thing that makes my ram go very high is vlc when playing actually dvd movie on the tv out I have had multiple apps going and twice in 5 months went over and had to write to swap.

Trying to install xubuntu on acer travelmate lappy with 64 megs ram and 650
mhz proc and has been at it 5 hours. With alternate install disc

So you mileage may vary greatly