So i have a bunch of pc’s/laptops/computers and such that my family members refuse to depart with even though there really bad. so far they mangae to keep 4 bulky computers in total, we do have some new-ish ones but theses ones im talking about need some loving.1 computer is 32 bit and has 2gb of ram, the other 3 have 64-bit and range from 1gb of ram- to 2 and one of which has only 75 space hardrive.
are there any linux distros that might work becasue im a noob who uses windows so im very lost. any tips or suggestions or something would be great.
also if im posting in the wrong plac eplease let me know in the comments.
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Puppy Linux runs on a potato of any architecture and is super user friendly (grandpa certified)! Only 300 MB or so. https://puppylinux-woof-ce.github.io/
I know a lot of people recommended Mint, which I personally use on my very modern budget gaming pc, but you should really try Puppy Linux, it’s meant for the exact use case you’re describing.
Try mint with Xfce - on 64 bit machines and then go lighter.
alright and are you sure that is the best starter option? also what can i do on linux compared to windows?
best option
Ubuntu is popular and new-user friendly. And xfce is generally lighter on resources. It’s a good choice.
What can I do
Almost everything.
Some proprietary apps you’ve used from windows may not be available, but equivalent ones would be available on linux.
Stuff like browsing the web(provided that you don’t open too many tabs, because you have low ram) and watching movies n all is quite good.
What all things fo you intend to do on it? I think it’ll be easier to check that the things you want are there.There’s very little windows can do, which linux can’t also. The difference will be in how, and how easily.
Often the answer is just “install the same program, and just use it like normal”. Other times, you have to go out of your way to get something running using wine.
For this, bottles is a GUI manager that can make life a lot easier.
Something that uses XFCE is a really good starting point for weak hardware. And mint is a good option for someone new to linux. It is based on ubuntu, and there is plenty of info online on how do things on ubuntu.
It also has good default repos, meaning you’ll be able to find and install most software you might need, without having to start fiddling with custom software repos.
Think of it as Windows 7 in terms of functionality but with a Windows Vista/XP GUI.
That said, your CPU’s performance will increase noticebly on Linux.
For a more “friendly flavored” distro, MX Linux is Debian-based and comes with a bunch of quality of life tools
MX Linux seconded. It’s available in 32-bit versions, too.
I haven’t used it on a machine with less than 4GB though, but it runs well on an old Dell laptop from 2009.
Browser choice is probably going to make just as much difference as distro choice. Modern browsers kinda need at least 1 GB to be usable, ideally more. Depends what you do with it of course.
Try Pale Moon, Falkon and Konqueror.
In my experience, palemoon struggles a lot with modern JavaScript-bloated sites and becomes much slower to use. My suggestion is to use 32bit firefox.
those are very low specs for every day distros (meaning usable for the general public), you might get away with linux mint xfce, if it ends up usable on those machine and not lag too much then don’t bother with anything else, otherwise you might have to install lighter stuff like antix or lxle. If none of the above are usable you can always install puppy linux, it can run on a toaster but is not very pleasant to use. note that regardless of distro, surfing the web is going to be a chore due to half of the modern internet being heavy as fuck and hard to run, you might want to look for alternative frontend to websites like piped for youtube, urlebird for tiktok etc.
Puppy Linux is made for old machines and generally just works. You can boot it up on a live USB and see what you think. Lots of flavours to choose from.
I’d suggest Linux mint Debian edition, at least for the 32bit machine. Many distros have stopped supporting 32bit lately.
It should be fairly user friendly.
Considering that you’re planning to use this with family members who aren’t tech savvy, and as you’re essentially new to Linux yourself, I would suggest something like Zorin OS. The familiarity and ease of use should help you get started fairly quickly, even for newbies. There are a lot of other great distros, of course, some of which were mentioned here, but the learning curve for those can be just a bit steeper. As someone who’s essentially the “tech guy” of the family, believe me when I say you don’t want them to keep bugging you about questions or tech help because they “don’t understand” Linux. You want something that you just install and leave be.
Speaking of something that you can just install and leave, this isn’t strictly Linux, but a great OS to use for non-tech savvy family members is Chrome OS. Get Chrome OS Flex, install it on an old laptop, give it to your family members and call it a day. I’ve had success with it for some of my family members who’ve wanted to revive old laptops. It’s a lot more limited than full featured desktop operating systems, of course, but it’s perfectly suitable for the basic stuff. Best of all, it’s so easy to use that you usually wouldn’t even have to play tech support for your family for it.
I’d suggest Debian with LXDE, which, from my personal experience, works pretty fine on low-end computers. You can replace LXDE with your choice of Windows Managers for an even lighter system, but that might be a little hard if you’ve never used Linux before.
Lubuntu!
I put Lubuntu on a Chromebook with only 16 GB storage. It’s a great OS for shit systems.
I would suggest Debian 12 XFCE or Debian 12 LXQT. Debian releases are supported for 5 years, but it gets a new release every 2 years. You might have to help your family members do the upgrade every 2 years which might be problematic.
Another option would be either of those DEs (LXQT or XFCE) but on OpenSuse Tumbleweed. Tumbleweed is rolling but its packages are tested before being released which makes it safer than arch for a noob. It also has automatic snapshots which can be easily restored if anything goes wrong. And since it’s rolling, you can configure automatic updates and never have to help your family members upgrade every 2 years (like on Debian or any LTS Distro).
Codecs can easily be installed using “opi codecs”, so you won’t have to fool around for that too.
I’ve been running Tumbleweed for a bit now, and I can say it’s just like Windows for the ease of use, especially if you install a packagekit frontend like Gnome Software so that your family members can easily install new programs from repos or flatpak.
Whatever you do, don’t use Ubuntu or its official variants. It’s too bloated due to snap and other things they do by default.
Anything with Xfce or MATE, such as Mint Xfce or MATE
since you’re a noob, idk if this will be very helpful to you, but
i used debian with awesomewm on an old pentium 4 from 2004-2005 and it was pretty fast! like a modern low-end computer. but you’d have to configure it to be noob-friendly/have patient users. i don’t mind it cuz i enjoy tinkering, but i imagine it could be very frustrating for other people.
i’d give you my awesomewm config (i configured it to be super minimal, but also familiar, as i was trying to create a desktop environment that could be used on older machines), but unfortunately my desktop no longer has a power supply, so i can’t access it :')
I installed ZorinOS lite on someone’s laptop which still ran Vista and it just worked like a dream. No idea regarding the specs though.
My favorite very light is peppermintOS, I think you may have to go back to version 10 for 32 bit though.
