Linux based os - suggestions

[Resident 1,193]

So I know there are some Linux gurus on here and I have a request for suggestions on which to use. 

 

When my father died I inherited a stack of old HDDs. Paranoid his personal data would be stolen he never binned any. 

Now the majority are IDE. I have managed to cobble together a system that has a main board with IDE & SATA but it's quite old hardware and not pretty. 

 

I need an OS that is:

 

1. Lightweight enough to to run from USB

2. Able to run on old hardware

3. Has a GUI so I can view photos/videos

 

Any suggestions 

[swarfendor437 14]

Hi Resident,

For an extremely light distribution I would go with AntiX 17 as it only uses 256 Mb RAM. I would go for the full one unless you want the base and add packages after.

 

https://linuxtracker.org/index.php?page=torrent-details&id=3bf1c6ec73864cff5f1e8590c85abd0d340f2e7c

 

The panel sits at the top on first run but you can easily move it to the bottom. Here is a link to a pic I took of the desktop on an old piece of kit:

 

(back later with the image link, struggling to find my post!)

 

Well I must have imagined it - here is a desktop image similar to what I had - the image is the default wallpaper (almost Sheffield SuperTram)!

 

The other thing you will need to consider is that the Processors probably don't support PAE (Physical Address Extension) if Intel processor. AntiX-17 is void of PAE kernel. Another to consider is SolydX 9 or whatever version it is currently at (Community Edition Stable branch). You will want iso's that are either labelled x86 or i386 for 32-bit processor.

 

https://solydxk.com/downloads/community-editions/

 

here is a video I created showing off SolydX 8 32-bit Community Stable Edition.

 

 

 

Edited November 26, 2018 by swarfendor43

[Resident 1,193]

23 minutes ago, swarfendor43 said:

Hi Resident,

For an extremely light distribution I would go with AntiX 17 as it only uses 256 Mb RAM. I would go for the full one unless you want the base and add packages after.

 

https://linuxtracker.org/index.php?page=torrent-details&id=3bf1c6ec73864cff5f1e8590c85abd0d340f2e7c

 

The panel sits at the top on first run but you can easily move it to the bottom. Here is a link to a pic I took of the desktop on an old piece of kit:

 

(back later with the image link, struggling to find my post!)

 

Well I must have imagined it - here is a desktop image similar to what I had - the image is the default wallpaper (almost Sheffield SuperTram)!

 

The other thing you will need to consider is that the Processors probably don't support PAE (Physical Address Extension) if Intel processor. AntiX-17 is void of PAE kernel. Another to consider is SolydX 9 or whatever version it is currently at (Community Edition Stable branch). You will want iso's that are either labelled x86 or i386 for 32-bit processor.

 

https://solydxk.com/downloads/community-editions/

 

here is a video I created showing off SolydX 8 32-bit Community Stable Edition.

 

 

 

Thanks for the reply

 

The main board is an old Asus KBU-X which is an AMD board. The cpu I'm not sure on as it was already fitted with the H/S & fan. It's got a whole 2GB of RAM 😂

 

http://tinypic.com/r/dzyxjp/9

 

The SolydX looks exactly like what I need so when I get some time to myself I'll give it a go. (just moved house, daughter is 2 in a few days and then there's Christmas) 

 

 

[swarfendor437 14]

Take your time - and a Happy Birthday to your daughter on the day. SolydX and AntiX both use xfce so it has the superior Thunar File Manager which comes with it's own Batch File renamer. Hope you are settling in nicely in your new home.

[alchresearch 215]

I'm refurbing some mini PCs which only have 1Gb of RAM.  I tried a few different OSes and after Swarf's recommendation found Antix to be the most responsive.

[Resident 1,193]

16 hours ago, swarfendor43 said:

Take your time - and a Happy Birthday to your daughter on the day. SolydX and AntiX both use xfce so it has the superior Thunar File Manager which comes with it's own Batch File renamer. Hope you are settling in nicely in your new home.

Thanks again. 

 

Technically it's not a new home. Before I met my wife I lived in it for 27 years. 

[swarfendor437 14]

Just found a better set of desktop  screenshots with open apps for AntiX 17 here:

 

https://www.distroscreens.com/2018/10/antix-172-helen-keller-screenshots.html

[Jaunty Springs 0]

Puppy is another alternative.

 

http://puppylinux.com/

 

 

 

[swarfendor437 14]

The only puppylinux that I have ever liked is a fork, macpup. 😉

 

http://macpup.org