sp331yi

I had to use a laptop on Intel Core Solo for a year in 2018, and Lubuntu made it semi-usable for some time (I upgraded it up to 4 Gb of RAM though, otherwise even 1 Firefox tab would be painful). Even then, LXDE consumes up to 300 MB of RAM on the start, so, if you really cannot get your PC up to at least 1 Gb of RAM, the best option would probably be to install the latest available 32-bit Ubuntu Server and then just run your apps from a command line, without DE at all.

I've only owned one and yes, I agree.  Quality and configuration (ease of swapping out CPU and RAM, etc) just not there in comparison with Gigabyte, IMO.

"don't worry guys the market will regulate itself, if something is bad a competitor will rise up to do it better"
 

@Sauron  I cannot disagree with you, but capitalistic society may ultimately be to blame.  For accepting consumer gouging not only in the computer industry, but almost every other sector of the nation's and (to some degree) the world's economy. 
We are reaping what I recall as being sown during the Reagan Era -- deregulation of corporations.  But I digress from the topic. 
I have to accept many things I do not like and have had to live with proprietarianism on the part of peripheral manufacturers for too long for it to raise my ire, anymore.  Moreover, with GNU/Linux, I do NOT have to accept such from M$ anymore.  For that, I am grateful.
 
@WereCatf I hear what you're saying.  Being a user of old hardware, I have not had to deal with what you say to any degree worth mentioning.  i guess it may me Intel's reaction to having to take second chair to AMD, which is acting somewhat like a poor winner, wanting more.  Just my opinion. 
 
 
@pythonmegapixel Intercorporate agreements may have something to do with this!
 
Ran acoss something of interest in speaking with others a little older who think about Humanity and the World more than I do -- origin of the name 'Kali.'  See this Wikipedia article, please.

antiX, myself.
Recently installed Miyo from Devuan.  Like it.
Use old machines.  No systemd.  No UEFI.
With newer machine and being a photographer, I think MX would be more suitable.  It's Debian, but much easier to install and get running.

Oh well!  Since OP familiar with Debian, was going to suggest MX or antiX.
Manjaro ain't bad, though.
Current 'buntus are too buggy for me, personally.

How to edit and understand /etc/fstab

Try this may or may not work in your scenario
 
1) create or open this conf file:
sudo nano /etc/modprobe.d/zz-nvidia-modeset.conf
 
2) add the following line:
options nvidia_drm modeset=1 3) update your initramfs
sudo update-initramfs -u 4) reboot
 
Side note: are you using proprietary driver from under the additional drivers under settings?
 
 

Not gonna happen unless it's a text only website.
The system is too old to support even basic functionality of modern web sites, without pegging the browser at 100%.
I have a similar laptop with a Pentium M CPU, and even though I put in 1GB of RAM (a huge amount back in that time frame) it just couldn't keep up.
 
 All the same, if you still wanna give it a try, use 
https://antixlinux.com/
 
Lightest distro I know of that is still fully GUI

Have you tried
apt build-dep {package-name} then
apt install {package-name} If this does not help, uncomment (delete the # in front of) a couple repo sources -- that. is, they being
deb-src https:// . . . in /etc/apt/sources.list  or subdirectories of /etc/apt/sources.list.d/
then
apt update and try the first two, again.
ALTERNATIVELY, esp if you are unsure of the package name,
apt-cache search {package-name} following an update

Absolute -- about as light as you may want, relatively easy, very stable; Slackware-based
Salix is another slackware distro 'for the lazy slacker'
VServer Installation on Slackware
 
Debian is good, but installation more cumbersome
 
Alpine Linux
 

SPEAKING OF SERVERS --  OS Linux Server OS Research Library HAS FREE EBOOKS on the subject!

Install ntfs-3g in Linux and use it to look at partitons. 

EDIT:  for even better performance than LinuxLite, try antiX 19.1
good luck!

LOL -- always has been!

Hello,
 
we just had a very similar topic 2 weeks ago.
https://linustechtips.com/main/topic/1180526-linux-for-an-old-laptop/
I think this forum does support a decent search function.

Never had an issue with libreoffice-fresh from arch repos. Though they do have a Long Term Branch that updates infrequently, libreoffice-still.
Manjaro uses arch repos but puts Arch Stable into Manjaro Testing for 2 weeks before its pushed out to Manjaro Stable for Users.
 
I have personally run into compatibility issues with LibreOffice on Ubuntu Based Distros, due to it being out of date. I require it for work and found that to be a no go. I don't know about Debian.
 
You can also pick and choose what and when you update. I have never heard of smxi.
 
you can also add it to /etc/pacman.conf
IgnorePkg = libreoffice-still You would then have to specifically request for it to be updated, as it would be ignored by normal updates.

Like GNU/Linux, itself, what you are asking for is scattered about the internet, AFAIK.  Hope these links help!
 
https://www.tldp.org/LDP/intro-linux/html/
https://www0.sun.ac.za/hpc/images/d/d5/Rute.pdf
https://linuxnewbieguide.org/
https://www.linuxtrainingacademy.com/what-is-linux/
https://www.slackbook.org/
And here are some more
https://www.oreilly.com/library/view/running-linux-third/156592469X/ch01s02.html
http://www.linfo.org/linus.html
https://livinginternet.com/i/iw_unix_gnulinux.htm
 
Perhaps OP could write a compendium/history and share it with us!

FerenOS is what I recommend for Win7 newbies who are command-line challenged.
It's LIKE ZORIN BUT FREE!

@RadiumAngel
 
Loved my old Shuttle XPC with Core2Duo E8400.  It's what I learned Linux on, basically.  Had 5 hard drives I picked up used for average $10 each and put different distros on each.  The swap was SO easy with the Shuttle.  I fact, I rarely had the case cover attached because I was trying out distros quite frequently!

GTA III in 2000 on a custom-buit tower with 512MB RAM!