old, old box - what fits best?

japh · #1 10-13-2009, 02:03 PM

hi all,
I just discovered an old box ...
400 MHz, some memory - probably half a gig, an 8 GB hdd ...

What would be the recommended distribution to use.

I only need Internet connection and a very simple app that is an ftp client in essence.

I guess any distribution is good, however, I am interested if there is any distribution that does well with the bare minimum - in fact if it does better than the other.

If you feel like , please comment on what that bare minimum would be - I haven't touch a Linux system in quite a while ...

Thanks,
japh

**ph34r** · #2 10-13-2009, 02:08 PM

I've got a dozen kiosks running on P2-400s thru P3-500s w/ 384mb ram and 6-10gb disks all running Ubuntu 9.10 w/ no issues.

BTW - "old" computer means early pentium or 486 (well, at my house it goes down to 286 but...) and even one that old (486 or better) can run current release of Debian w/ enough ram (16mb was a ***** to install with requiring floppies and manually creating and using swap space, 32mb had no issues)

LewRockwell · #3 10-13-2009, 03:30 PM

Try Puppy Linux and/or Damn Small Linux for legacy equipment

Damn Small Linux is a 50MB *nix distro

http://www.damnsmalllinux.org/index.html

Pupply Linux is a 100MB *nix distro

http://www.puppylinux.org/main/index...%20Release.htm

or you could even go with Tiny Core at 10MB

http://tinycorelinux.com/welcome.html

hey, whateveryoudo...enjoy!

.

mrrangerman43 · #4 10-13-2009, 03:56 PM

I have Slackware running on a PI 233 with 384mb ram I use xfce for the window manager and the system is usable. Slackware was the only distro I could get to install, Debian Etch (the then stable version) wouldn't even install.

japh · #5 10-13-2009, 04:02 PM

thanks a bunch all,

the box will probably not have a window manager, nor will it be hooked at a monitor - what terminal should I use for accessing it; am I going to be able to remote to it and still have admin like privileges?
thanks,
japh

mrrangerman43 · #6 10-13-2009, 10:10 PM

look into ssh

If your going to access it from window you'll want putty

folkert · #7 10-15-2009, 11:23 AM

You want remote access and an ftp client? or doe you mean ftp-server?
by the way ssh (sshd) also has an file transfer option, called sftp. This can be accessed from windows with winscp, or reddrive, and from linux you can even mount it with sshfs.

If you are doing nothing with an windowmanager, and just transfer files, I think your old pc is quite sufficient

blackbelt_jones · #8 10-25-2009, 09:27 AM

Hmmm. No window manager means no X, right? It probably doesn't really matter at all. Most distros can run without X. Slackware is the only major distro that I know of that runs without X by default, though most people certainly go ahead and startx when it's booted. I know of three distros that are meant to run without X at all, INX Ubuntu Server (INX is not X) and Slax Frodo. But most distros, maybe all, can run without X when required, and I think that anything without X would run just fine on your computer, which isn't all that terrible compared to some I've used. Once, while my P4 motherboard was off visiting the factory for the summer, I had nothing to use but an early Pentium with 133 mhz and (ahem) 32 mb RAM. The thing slowed to a crawl if I tried to do so much as look at a *.JPG file with fluxbox, but when I ran emacs, lynx and irssi without X (the distro was Slackware 11.0), it just hummed right along.

If performance isn't an issue, I suspect that your decision might be guided by things like package management and access to software. For me, that would indicate a debian based distro. If you're not 100 percent comfortable without X, INX might be worth looking into. INX works hard at being the most user-friendly console. But from a performace pont of view, I don't think it matters at all.

Now, If you think you might want to use a window manager, even some of the time, my first recommendation would be the Vector Linux Light, which brought my old laptop to life when nothing elkse would. Vector Light's default is IceWm, which is as light as is gets, but not the grim vanilla version of Ice Wm that you get when you install it in most distros. Nothing is ever haphazard with Vector Linux, and their take on IceWm is beautiful and powerful. The major Desktop environments (KDE,. Gnome, XFCE) have a convention of making ALT F2 the default shortcut for the run command dialogue. That means that you can usually start opening apps fast and easy with a desktop environment you don't know, if you know the name of the apps. IceWm doesn't follow the convention, but when it's running on Vector Linux, it does. Likewise for LXDE. I digress.