Arch, Zenwalk or Damn Small Linux?

gam3r

gam3r

gam3r

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I have a spare PC currently doing nothing and i want to try out another linux distro to breath life into the machine. It will be used for web browsing, word processing and music so nothing too intensive. The specs of the machine are:

Intel Celeron 800MHz (Coppermine core)
386MB SDRAM
8MB On-board trident graphics
DVD-Rom drive
80GB IDE Hard drive

Now i was looking at either Zenwalk, Arch or DSL. I don't want to go down the Ubuntu route(too slow on the machine) or Xubuntu, so i was looking the above distro's as i have read they have rather light gui's which is essential as the graphics accelerator is very poor on this machine.

I like a clean cut and modern GUI and i don't mind spending a while setting the system up to work how i want it. I have heard of fluxbox but i am not sure which distro to use with it.

Which one of these distributions should i give a shot, taking into consideration my system? Are there any other alternatives also?

Thank you :)
 
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i can only comment on DSL as i haven't tried the other two.
but it sounds like it will be right for your rig.

in fact, DSL is designed to run well on much lower specs than yours, bet you could use DSL-N on that. similar small distro but newer kernel.

DSL-N
 
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also, you didn't mention hard drive spec, but DSL doesn't need one, it can boot from cd and use a USB memory stick for permanent storage of user data.

in fact if your mb/bios support it, you can boot from a usb pen drive as well, no cd necesary.

and with either of these solutions you can take your own personal pc setup with you in your pocket. just borrow other peoples PCs but boot with your mem stick (and cd if required) and get your desktop running without touching their hard drive.

true pc in the pocket experience. i did this for a while and it works very well. suprising how we are all very attached to our PC's. but the really important thing about our PCs is the data and setup, not the physical stuff.
 
Will take a look at DSL-N :)

Forgot to mention i had a 80GB IDE HD so space is no problem.

Thanks
 
gam3r said:
Intel Celeron 800MHz (Coppermine core)
386MB SDRAM
8MB On-board trident graphics
DVD-Rom drive
80GB IDE Hard drive
Click to expand...

My specs for this computer:
Intel PIII 500MHz (Coppermine)
128MB SDRAM
2.5MB NeoMagic256AV (onboard video AND sound)
10GB IBM TravelStar IDE

So I know the pain of a slow computer. Now with such a old product you need to squeeze all the juice out if it to make it bearable.

Arch Linux will not work on say a 486, DSL will. Why? Arch is optimised for slightly newer computers (i686). As in you will get a performance boost with Arch that you don't get with DSL and most other distros.

Everything you get is the newest, ie bleeding edge. Everything is kept simple, although most configuration is done through the command line.
 
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