1y ago

Best lesser-known distribution/DE for low-end machines?

I know Debian and others can breathe life into older machines. But i wonder if there are any distros with serious optimizations that I haven't heard of. I've already tried MX Linux on an old Thinkpad SL400, and didn't see any difference from plain Debian.

Update: thanks for the great suggestions. Forgot to say many distros feel zippy and fast until you open a web browser. Appreciate your thoughts on which web browser to use too. So far I've had a positive experience with Thorium and Chromium.

54 comments

The problem with older machines is the web browsing, not the system itself. You could use a browser with Java script disabled but a lot of websites will refuse to work.
You have to sacrifice with browser functionality to improve performance.
- Yep. All this optimization you see here about "minimal installs" and which DE to choose is completely moot, if opening Firefox takes up more RAM than the entire operating system.
  Even 4gb are really low these days, if you actually want to do something in the browser.
- I've had good experiences with Midori and Dillo as alternative browsers on low-memory machines. Obviously features will take a hit but they're surprisingly functional. Don't expect to be able to open many tabs but you can do the usual things including YouTube etc.

Puppy Linux is what I shove on old Atom netbooks
- Can I run regular browsers on Puppy? Or have to use their own apps only?
  
  I'm afraid I can't answer that, It's been quite a while. I think qutebrowser is the one that ships with it?
  
  Subject lines on their forum suggest Firefox and Chromium are both possible.

Try: https://github.com/marmolak/gray386linux <-- It was designed for really old hardwares.
I’ve already tried MX Linux on an old Thinkpad SL400, and didn’t see any difference from plain Debian.
Because it's the stock Debian + custom themes/skins + some crappy useless minitools. The 99% of packages come from the official Debian repository, the rest are only the rice.
If you have newer machine than a real 386:
https://kisslinux.org/
https://github.com/oasislinux/oasis
https://www.glaucuslinux.org/
https://www.alpinelinux.org/
https://voidlinux.org/

Alpine is very lightweight. I think it was built so that it would run well inside docker containers, which means it should be fairly easy for low-end computers to run it.
Afaik, it doesn't come with a DE out of the box, so it won't be very user-friendly
- It has a script called setup-xorg-base that will install the basic graphical support, and you can add a specific DE on top. For example.
  
  Oh ok, cool!

AntiX/MX Linux, I've had great success getting them to boot on systems that were refusing to boot anything else, AntiX is my go-to distro for bringing new life to old hardware, it works with literally anything you throw at it.

c2d era laptop. first step if you haven't yet, swap the hdd for a low-cost sata ssd if you can. if you have some homeless sodimms, up the ram, too, if it won't cost anything to do it.
if you're going with mx, you want the fluxbox spin; or opt for antix with icewm instead.
otherwise start with a debian base install (no de or extra sw at install), then add only what you need. peppermint is another option--a basic debian with xfce out-of-the-box and little else. it's what i've been using lately on similar hardware.
for something 'different', you could look at slax.
- Thanks. I've already added an ssd drive and upgraded tge ram from 3 to 4gb. Another comment mentioned Icewm so I'm definitely giving it a try.

I guess it depends on what comes with the distro. If you start off with a basic Linux install and add a DE that is low on system resources, like LXQt, you can breathe life into a machine.
Bodhi, antiX and Linux Lite come to mind.
You can also start with a minimal base, Arch, Debian, Alpine, anything, and then add packages.

Q4OS
- Wow they even offer the Trinity DE :) thanks
  
  In earlier Q4OS versions Trinity was the only desktop environment. I still run it even though there's plenty of power on hand to run the others. It just works.

If you want serious optimizations - then Gentoo is your choice. But seriously, there won't be any serious difference between distributions. What really matters here are DEs and browsers. I would recommend some kind of lightweight window manager like i3 or dwm. If you do not want to configure everything yourself, then your choice is lxde/lxqt. Also, you can use distros without systemd (void, artix, devuan, gentoo etc), but that does not matter that much.
- Another alternative to not configuring is using someone else's rice

antiX should be ok, it's very light
- Love Antix! It is like the grandfather to MX Linux, but also the little baby?

Peppermint OS!
- I was really excited about peppermint so I switched my old laptop from Kubuntu. but peppermint feels more sluggish than KDE and now I'm not sure what I did wrong :(
  
  As in responding slowly? I'm aware Peppermint is not meant for aesthetics, but it should be responsive.

Bunsen Labs Linux and, for the experience, Tiny Core Linux

So Slackware? If you can cross-compile then maybe gentoo. I'm not sure if Raspberry Pi Desktop is x86.
- I'm pretty sure you can have a minimal slack and choose xfce in the installer.
- Raspberry Pi Desktop does have an x86 version.

Just install Arch without a desktop environment.
- It's kinda surprising how much you can do in just a tty, the only thing I can't think of a method for rn is viewing/editing documents.
  
  I can’t think of a method for rn is viewing/editing documents
  What is the extension of document? I bet you money it's possible in terminal. PDF? docx?

I use SpiralLinux on my old Inspiron but it's basically just Debian with some user-friendly tweaks. I guess you could try Tiny Core or Porteus or something really small like that.

I've always had a soft spot for CrunchBang and its spinoffs, BunsenLabs and CrunchBang++.
- All three are just a reskinned Debian, as is MX Linux.
  
  Absolutely. Just makes it a bit faster to get a slightly customised Debian out of the box.

I used to use WindowMaker on seriously underpowered laptops 10-15 years ago. Seems like it’s still just as efficient. For something more standard interface-wise you could try IceWM.
Another thing to do is build your own kernel without any features you don’t use. Not sure how much of a difference that makes exactly.

alpine and void linux are pretty lightweight.

Puppy/bodhi

Bodhi! Another I've found to be lean is Zorin Lite
- *buntu can't be counted as lightweight.

I used to use slax, I don't even know if it's still around.
- It is, and i guess it's now based on Denian.

If you have any expectation of privacy, you shouldn't use chromium based browsers. Their purpose is not privacy, and google actively makes sure it will never be.

54 comments