Will Linux improve a netbook video playback?

[ExoMale]

might sound like a daft question as everything varies to type of hardware, but I used to have a netbook that I had win 7 home and then win 10 before I sold it and YouTube videos wasn't very playable and it even struggled with kodi and my movie files, wasn't something I originally purchased it for, was perfect used condition and very cheap hence why I had it and so yesterday I put Zorin Education edition on my old battered dell inspiron 1501 to try out Linux again that isn't Pi related which got me thinking of buying a better condition laptop or even a netbook just for Linux use and to watch movies on when I'm alway.


So knowing that Linux is a light operating system genre and can run pretty much on anything I was wondering if it would improve the performance of a netbook for example as it won't be hogging resources as much as Windows does???.. tried to google search, but wasn't coming up with exactly the results I was after.

 

[ExoMale]

That's for the replies.

It's been awhile since I used Linux over windows, at one stage I had steamOS, but as an every day environment I would use zorin 09 which I've got on the dell be it the lite or educational version(think they were the only free ones on their page) or Linux mint which I have 2 versions of a 32bit plus a 64bit with one having kdxl or whatever it is as puppy seemed rubbish, Debian I had was old and useless for , unbuntu itself was okay, but killed a laptop I once had that was quite a performer and expensive lol, I've got like couples others on disc I think, one is arch assault which confuses the hell out of me and the other is just cmd based(again not pic related).. i downloaded some packages from the zorin icon and last night unpacked some game emulators I've not tried yet, but I know there tends to be better packages on other distros.

I'm going to look at the archlinux for my Pi if I don't use one designed for kodi, but for a laptop/Nettop I would like to do more than just movies and videos, so with that in mind are there many that you guys didn't mention that would use the performance of a netbook as you'd expect and not still limit from the hardware capabilities which I'm talking about the atom based models as there's more of them for a low price?


On another another note, I would agree with you that Windows 7 on those weak machines even starter is pointless, doesn't matter if they only 32bit, the max ram is the lowest you need for win 7 in general and a fast hdd doesn't aid too much, guess it was just an excuse to get people to buy them as cheap ways for Windows 7 etc.