what os should i use for an old laptop

[Jasonbas]

i have an old toshiba satelite l500d (4gb ram ddr2 / amd athlon 2ghz

). for school , typing and web. what os should  i use to make it a litle faster(i mean  a lighter os)

[Electronics Wizardy]

Id probably try somet linux distro like lubuntu.

 

Get a ssd in it aswell, makes a massive performance difference

 

 

[Haro]

Linux 

[paddy-stone]

 

Just now, Electronics Wizardy said:

Id probably try somet linux distro like lubuntu.

 

Get a ssd in it aswell, makes a massive performance difference

 

 

Agree, ssd is cheap and makes a HUGE difference. Would recommend Ubuntu personally as it's well documented and easier to search if things go wrong or whatever.

Pretty much any linux distro is good though as they're much lighter footprint than windows, and for your usage case it's pretty basic.

https://distrowatch.com/

[Jasonbas]

3 minutes ago, Electronics Wizardy said:

Id probably try somet linux distro like lubuntu.

 

Get a ssd in it aswell, makes a massive performance difference

 

 

thanks i cannot put an ssd becouse i am sure it has one already

[Ubuntu is love]

You can try Arch Linux, if it will run else you can try pop!_OS. They seem to be popular right now. 

[aisle9]

It shipped with Vista, so if you're dead-set on Windows, 7 would be a better bet than 10.

 

If you want a Windows-y look and feel without the bloat, Mint XFCE. If you want something different, Elementary. If you hate your life and want to spend a week hunting down obscure drivers for an ancient OEM laptop in hopes of it running smoothly when you're done, Arch. If you just need it to browse the web, play YouTube and handle email, Cloudready's ChromeOS. My personal choice would be, as it almost always is these days, Mint XFCE.

 

Whatever you do, spend $20-30 on a 128-256GB SSD. You'll thank me (and @Electronics Wizardy and @paddy-stone) later. Move the files you want to keep onto a USB drive, then pull out the HDD, plug in the SSD, install your new OS of choice and enjoy.

[kelvinhall05]

11 minutes ago, Ubuntu is love said:

You can try Arch Linux, if it will run else you can try pop!_OS. They seem to be popular right now. 

Pop is certainly not the lightest distro, and I have a feeling that someone new to Linux doesn't want to install Arch, lol.

 

 

 

That being said, Linux certainly is the way to go, as is an SSD upgrade.

[Ubuntu is love]

3 minutes ago, kelvinhall05 said:

Pop is certainly not the lightest distro

Pop!_OS runs on 32bit and 2GB of memory, it's ofc not the lightest, but if he want to learn some Linux, its not a bad start. You could always install a server version of an popular Linux distro, that's the most lightweight. But then it's going to be a hard learning curve. pop!_OS is a simple start.

[Jasonbas]

 

1 minute ago, Ubuntu is love said:

Pop!_OS runs on 32bit and 2GB of memory, it's ofc not the lightest, but if he want to learn some Linux, its not a bad start. You could always install a server version of an popular Linux distro, that's the most lightweight. But then it's going to be a hard learning curve. pop!_OS is a simple start.

sorry if i didnt specify i am not like 60yo i am 15 and i learn easyly so the learning curve is not a problem 

[Ubuntu is love]

1 minute ago, Jasonbas said:

 

sorry if i didnt specify i am not like 60yo i am 15 and i learn easyly so the learning curve is not a problem 

I'm sorry, then it's good to start with CLI only. In enterprise they don't use GUI's anyway.

[Jasonbas]

Just now, Ubuntu is love said:

I'm sorry, then it's good to start with CLI only. In enterprise they don't use GUI's anyway.

what is an cli and an gui sorry if i am being stupid

[Ubuntu is love]

Just now, Jasonbas said:

what is an cli and an gui sorry if i am being stupid

If you have only a CLI, you don't have nice pictures and colors on your screen........ or a mouse for that matter.

[Jasonbas]

Just now, Ubuntu is love said:

If you have only a CLI, you don't have nice pictures and colors on your screen........ or a mouse for that matter.

ok

 

[SHADFAN]

1 hour ago, Jasonbas said:

i have an old toshiba satelite l500d (4gb ram ddr2 / amd athlon 2ghz

). for school , typing and web. what os should  i use to make it a litle faster(i mean  a lighter os)

Linux mint

[kelvinhall05]

1 hour ago, Ubuntu is love said:

Pop!_OS runs on 32bit and 2GB of memory, it's ofc not the lightest, but if he want to learn some Linux, its not a bad start. You could always install a server version of an popular Linux distro, that's the most lightweight. But then it's going to be a hard learning curve. pop!_OS is a simple start.

Mint is a better choice if he wants an easy to use and lightweight distro. I also have a feeling OP is going to use this as his main device, and I highly doubt CLI would suffice for him. He could always learn to use something like i3 instead of an actual DE, but that's all up to him.

[Jasonbas]

2 hours ago, kelvinhall05 said:

Mint is a better choice if he wants an easy to use and lightweight distro. I also have a feeling OP is going to use this as his main device, and I highly doubt CLI would suffice for him. He could always learn to use something like i3 instead of an actual DE, but that's all up to him.

no i am not using it as a main device

[kelvinhall05]

1 minute ago, Jasonbas said:

no i am not using it as a main device

What are you using it as? 

[Jasonbas]

4 minutes ago, kelvinhall05 said:

What are you using it as? 

i am using it as a secondary portable device so i can type on the go

 

[redbrickwhale]

Spoiler

 

Ubuntu

[Tristerin]

Manjaro runs very well on my i7 620m with 2gb of RAM

[kelvinhall05]

7 minutes ago, Jasonbas said:

i am using it as a secondary portable device so i can type on the go

 

Then you want a GUI.

 

 

I love Manjaro but it might be a bit too heavy depending on the DE you choose, hence why I suggested Mint or Lubuntu. Try those.

[Jasonbas]

ok i ve made up my mind i am going to install mint linux 

 

[Drama Lama]

24 minutes ago, Jasonbas said:

ok i ve made up my mind i am going to install mint linux 

 

A good choice I use mint too it’s very easy to use but lubuntu or manjaro are also good 

[Nayr438]

I would recommend Manjaro KDE or Manjaro XFCE.

 

KDE isn't as heavy as it used to be and will run on fairly old hardware, The environment is fairly similar to Windows 7 as well.

With 6 Firefox Tabs, spotify playing, and the window compositor enabled. I am sitting at 2GB of memory usage and 2% cpu usage, however this is on a Ryzen 3600.

 

Going with Manjaro, would also mean having access to one of the largest repositories and wiki's available in the Linux community as well as up to date software.