installing linux on an old pc

Floppybits

I have an old dell pc knocking around, it only has half a gig of ram on it. I am planning on installing Linux on this PC. Is it worth formatting the harddrive first and then installing Linux, Or can I install Linux over windows?

I use UNIX and Linux in work but have never installed so any help would be welcome.

dioltas

You will have to format the hard drive anyway, but depending on what linux you install, the installer may do it for you or guide you through it.

If you want to securely format it though then maybe you should do it seperately. But otherwise just do it while installing Linux I'd say.

loldog

Floppybits wrote: »

I have an old dell pc knocking around, it only has half a gig of ram on it. I am planning on installing Linux on this PC. Is it worth formatting the harddrive first and then installing Linux, Or can I install Linux over windows?

I use UNIX and Linux in work but have never installed so any help would be welcome.

Most Linux installers will give you the option of formatting your partitions, and I think the Ubuntu installer automatically formats it to ext4. I would recommend you formatting to ext4 as it's quite fast.

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cable842

if your starting off try linux mint it really nice and easy to use. thats what I started off with and learned about linux threw using it then I moved up too ubuntu 9.10 remix.

download mint 7 and maybe 4 5 or 6 try the iso of them see how they run on the pc.

make sure your computer boots from cd first then the hard drive just change the boot order.

linux will run from the disc so you can see how it runs even go on the net. you dont even have to install it ever you can just run it from the disc forever

Ruski

For an old PC, I would recommend a distribution with a low-spec desktop environment, such as XFCE or Fluxbox. Maybe check out the Community Editions of Linux Mint for different desktop environments (the basic is GNOME, and KDE is far too demanding). Linux Mint is a distribution that I could recommend to everyone.

Johnboy1951

Floppybits wrote: »

I have an old dell pc knocking around, it only has half a gig of ram on it. I am planning on installing Linux on this PC. Is it worth formatting the harddrive first and then installing Linux, Or can I install Linux over windows?

I use UNIX and Linux in work but have never installed so any help would be welcome.

Half a gig should be sufficient for a 'full' Linux install rather than a 'light', even though the lighter Desktop Environments will be much snappier.

Mint
Mepis
PCLinuxOS
would be the three I would suggest to look at first.
I see PCLinuxOS has new Betas available in different DEs such as KDE4, Gnome, Xfce, LXDE and maybe E17 ...... plus it seems a light-weight Gnome version.

Also Mandriva have released their 2010 Beta for checking out.

If you have the bandwidth get a sampling of the above and see which type suits you better.

Remember ..... what suits me may not suit you and vice versa, so you really need to do a sampling to 'get the feel' of the different DEs.

Good luck and have fun.

barura

KDE 3.5 is lighter than Gnome 2.0

Or has stuff changed since I last checked?

Also; www.linuxmint.com would be my recommendation. Should run on anything with at least half a gig of ram beautifully.

Mean-Machine

#! CrunchBang Linux is well worth a try.
The new release codenamed “Statler” is changing from Ubuntu to Debian Squeeze sources and will feature both Openbox and Xfce.

Capt'n Midnight

Best bet is to get a live CD to try it out first and then install from that.

If the old laptop has more than 512MB Ram and more than 4GB diskspace you can try the wubi install , without even having to repartition drives - it's on the ubuntu CD


puppylinux - will run on the same HW as windows 98, unless you only have 64MB ram , handy if you want linux on a PII from before the millennium



xubuntu - ubuntu using XFCE for GUI, really want 384MB - consider 7.04 in you only have 256MB ram, if you only have 192MB then 6.06 is probably too old and go with puppy instead

ubuntu - ubuntu using GMONE as the GUI, if you have 512MB or more , most commonly installed linux out.


The next long term release of ubuntu is on thursday , but if you have a really old laptop you might consider an older LTS release like 7.04 (2007 / april)

Mathiasb

Just because the PC is old / crappy doesn't mean you have to stick old software on it (and you shouldn't, unless you don't give a damn about security). Stick a new and lightweight distro on there.

dioltas

I've only 512mb RAM on my laptop and I run the latest arch linux with KDE with no problems.

mach1982

You could try mint LXDE, I've read about it work fin on laptops with 256MB of RAM.

http://linux.softpedia.com/get/System/Operating-Systems/Linux-Distributions/Linux-Mint-LXDE-30905.shtml

Mathiasb

dioltas wrote: »

I've only 512mb RAM on my laptop and I run the latest arch linux with KDE with no problems.

Perfect example