Good operating system with gui to host a web server on an old pc

[overther]

I have two old  pcs, one pentium 3 with 512mb ram and a celeron with 1,5 gb ram. I want a good os with gui to host a web server using them, just to play around with ( these systems are useless for anything else other than playing with anyway). So does anyone know any any os that would be usable on them? No need the latest version, I'm fine with a version thats 10 years old as well, since I'm doing this mostly to get some experience.

[NelizMastr]

Any Linux distro can run a webserver like Apache or NGINX. That Celeron might be okay with a more modern version, like Lubuntu 14.04 or 16.04, but that P3 is probably better off with 10.04 or older, which will limit compatibility with modern versions of packages like PHP.

[Smeltie]

1 hour ago, NelizMastr said:

Any Linux distro can run a webserver like Apache or NGINX. That Celeron might be okay with a more modern version, like Lubuntu 14.04 or 16.04, but that P3 is probably better off with 10.04 or older, which will limit compatibility with modern versions of packages like PHP.

linux would be your best bet, and as far as what distro, i'd pick a ubuntu based one and if you wanna get max performance install it without a gui... but since you want a gui i'd pick lubuntu 

 

[NelizMastr]

32 minutes ago, Martijn Klerks said:

linux would be your best bet, and as far as what distro, i'd pick a ubuntu based one and if you wanna get max performance install it without a gui... but since you want a gui i'd pick lubuntu 

 

You quoted the wrong guy, but thanks for agreeing with me  

[Smeltie]

1 hour ago, NelizMastr said:

You quoted the wrong guy, but thanks for agreeing with me  

i meant to quote you i just wanted to fill you in a bit  

[NelizMastr]

18 minutes ago, Martijn Klerks said:

i meant to quote you i just wanted to fill you in a bit  

You did basically say the exact same thing I suggested, though XD

[jpenguin]

CentOS

[CitrusBoot]

I'd recommend antiX.

[overther]

On 10/17/2018 at 12:26 PM, NelizMastr said:

Any Linux distro can run a webserver like Apache or NGINX. That Celeron might be okay with a more modern version, like Lubuntu 14.04 or 16.04, but that P3 is probably better off with 10.04 or older, which will limit compatibility with modern versions of packages like PHP.

Trying to install unbutu Lts 10.04 on the pentium. First attempt: the installation stuck at 79% had a skip option that wouldn't do anything. Manually turned of the system 

Second attempt: the installation stuck again,  this time at 78% on "configure network" no lan cable, WiFi adapter or anything else, the system is offline.  No skip option either this time,  it's been like this for about half an hour now.

 

Edited October 19, 2018 by overther

[NelizMastr]

3 hours ago, overther said:

Trying to install unbutu Lts 10.04 on the pentium. First attempt: the installation stuck at 79% had a skip option that wouldn't do anything. Manually turned of the system 

Second attempt: the installation stuck again,  this time at 78% on "configure network" no lan cable, WiFi adapter or anything else, the system is offline.  No skip option either this time,  it's been like this for about half an hour now.

 

Let's face it, that P3 system is from the year 2000, when the majority of LTT's fan base wasn't even born

 

Try 8.04 for good measure.

[overther]

16 hours ago, NelizMastr said:

Let's face it, that P3 system is from the year 2000, when the majority of LTT's fan base wasn't even born

 

Try 8.04 for good measure.

Idk,  it worked fine with the live cd,  not the fastest thing,  that's for sure, but definitely acceptable. I'm trying again now,  it seems that after 78% the installation slows down for some reason.  It takes like 5 minutes to reach 78 and it's been 4 hours since,  but it actually managed to reach 81%,  so I'm leaving it to see what it will do.  I'd try an other version,  but I'm out of cds,  so until I get some I'm stuck with 10.04.  

The Celeron being a Celeron decided all of a sudden that it doesn't want to post anymore, so I'm stuck with the pentium. 

[Ralphred]

On 10/17/2018 at 3:32 PM, jpenguin said:

CentOS

After reading about your pseudo-failed attempts, I'm gonna have to endorse centos too.

You can still get versions that are over 10 years old, and RH's text based menu installers* were much more mature and user friendly than anyone else back then.

(*useful if you are having lack of memory issues)

[Shoe_Eater]

I would personally recommend using linux and not worrying about any sort of full on graphical interface, although if you really needed one you could install something like xfce and only start up the gui when needed, which is what i did when i had my old server up, although i never used the x server since i became too fluent with the terminal and i would just ssh into it anyway since i couldnt be bothered changing the input from my laptop's hdmi on the monitor to the dvi taken up by the server