Lightweight Linux w/ GUI for Old PC

[danomicar]

I'm looking for a lightweight OS to use for an old PC i'd like to repurpose into a NAS/Plex Server. The system is using a 2nd generation i5, 4 gigs of RAM and GTX 520. So definitely not a lot of power to work with lol.

 

I'm currently running Ubuntu 18.04 64-bit on it however its a little slow and prone to crashing. I can't for the life of me figure out to enable write access for Samba either. So I'm looking to restart from scatch. 

 

Any suggestions on what linux distro may be best? Additionally, any recommendations for software for local network file sharing? Just some way I can access gameplay footage and audio from it. 

[RONOTHAN##]

Ubuntu server might be a better option for what you're doing. You'd lose the GUI, but if you're gonna be making it into a server, the GUI will just be taking up unnecessary CPU/GPU cycles. What I might suggest though is trying to buy an extra stick of memory off Craigslist or something and just installing Truenas. It needs 8gb of RAM to function properly, but it has a very easy to use WebUI and is very easy to setup Plex and NAS duty.

[Eigenvektor]

Are you using regular Ubuntu with a desktop environment or its server edition? This machine should be plenty as is for a server installation. You could use CentOS or Debian but all of them should work plenty fine as a server, just drop the GUI.

 

~edit: If you don't feel comfortable with a console environment and e.g. configuration via SSH, you can always use a server oriented edition, manually install a lightweight desktop like Xfce, start the DE on demand when you need to configure something and leave if stopped otherwise. A server typically should sit in a corner doing its job and not need constant maintenance. Running a DE full time just wastes resources.

[Master Disaster]

27 minutes ago, spkry said:

Ubuntu uses gnome, which is one of the most resource heavy DEs.

OK

28 minutes ago, spkry said:

At least switch to KDE

What? KDE is much heavier than Gnome.

 

1 hour ago, danomicar said:

I'm looking for a lightweight OS to use for an old PC i'd like to repurpose into a NAS/Plex Server. The system is using a 2nd generation i5, 4 gigs of RAM and GTX 520. So definitely not a lot of power to work with lol.

 

I'm currently running Ubuntu 18.04 64-bit on it however its a little slow and prone to crashing. I can't for the life of me figure out to enable write access for Samba either. So I'm looking to restart from scatch. 

 

Any suggestions on what linux distro may be best? Additionally, any recommendations for software for local network file sharing? Just some way I can access gameplay footage and audio from it. 

Ideally you would want to run a server build with no UI, you can then run something like Webmin or Cockpit on top to give you a UI should you need it.

 

Webmin is my preferred option, it allows you to do almost everything directly from your browser.

[Master Disaster]

14 minutes ago, spkry said:

I see people complain about RAM usage on gnome all the time, especially on reddit. https://cloudyday.tech.blog/2019/12/23/kde-vs-xfce-vs-gnome/

Those people are idiots, software using your RAM is not a problem, it only becomes a problem when you start to run out because the software is hogging it all and not releasing it back to the pool when its needed elsewhere.

 

There's a phrase used by programmers, "Unused RAM is wasted RAM"

[danomicar]

7 hours ago, Master Disaster said:

Ideally you would want to run a server build with no UI, you can then run something like Webmin or Cockpit on top to give you a UI should you need it.

 

Webmin is my preferred option, it allows you to do almost everything directly from your browser.

Thanks for your response. 

 

I did some googling and Webmin and it seems like a good solution. So ideally I could install Ubuntu server and webmin on the machine and then be able to SSH to the server from a browser on my home network?

 

The main reason I want a GUI is for troubleshooting. I am just setting this up as a hobby so it's difficult for me to be able to troubleshoot without a GUI. But if I can get root access from my office then this would be a huge win for me. 

[Master Disaster]

31 minutes ago, danomicar said:

Thanks for your response. 

 

I did some googling and Webmin and it seems like a good solution. So ideally I could install Ubuntu server and webmin on the machine and then be able to SSH to the server from a browser on my home network?

 

The main reason I want a GUI is for troubleshooting. I am just setting this up as a hobby so it's difficult for me to be able to troubleshoot without a GUI. But if I can get root access from my office then this would be a huge win for me. 

SSH? Nah, it runs a private webserver, you just browse to ipaddress:10000 in your web browser.

 

7 hours ago, spkry said:

Why use more ram when you can use less ram? Using it for nothing is wasted ram too, and a bit of electricity as well. More available ram leaves more headroom for the stuff you actually need ram for, like a video editor or something. Sounds like an excuse for not optimizing your programs.

This entire paragraph is one giant oxymoron. How can you use RAM for nothing? If the RAM is being used then it is being used by something for something. Modern computers have enough RAM and modern OSes are good enough at resource management that there's no need to try and squeeze everything into the smallest footprint possible, if an application needs more RAM the OS will free some up by deleting old data, moving data from RAM to the pagefile or it will just pause a non critical system service temporarily.

 

Also your example of video editors couldn't have been any worse, most video editors recommend using scratch disks as cache over RAM since RAW video can exceed RAM capacity very easily plus when video editing you don't need really fast access times.

 

Why use more when you can use less? Why not? What's the point in having 16GB of RAM at your disposal and only using 1GB? Also I don't think you understand one very simple concept, modern programming languages leave memory management up to the operating system (unless the dev specifically codes the app not too) and that's a very good thing, the last thing you want is every different trying to reserve its own portion of memory. What happens when you run 2 apps that both want the same pool or an overlapping pool?

[Wild Penquin]

  

Hi, here's just my 2 cents inline:

On 7/25/2021 at 9:10 AM, danomicar said:

I'm looking for a lightweight OS to use for an old PC i'd like to repurpose into a NAS/Plex Server. The system is using a 2nd generation i5, 4 gigs of RAM and GTX 520. So definitely not a lot of power to work with lol.

That's plenty of H/W for any file sharing server. The distribution doesn't really matter, just disable the services you don't need. This also applies to a GUI, as it is also a service. Just don't enable if you are not using the GUI (or don't log in; any login manager will take very little resources).

 

The only exception is HDD space; if you are really low on it, then the choice of GUI might actually matter, but since you're setting up a NAS I would assume you have plenty of storage space.

 

Also remember: Linux DEs don't replace a server-oriented Windows, as the whole philosophy of the OS is different. As a result, the GUI tools to set up any kind of server just (generally) don't exist. There may be exceptions, and if there are GUI tools, they are probably 3rd party front-ends for configuration, so don't expect them to be as polished - i.e. you might still need to revert back to the dreaded command line, in case some 3rd party front-end does not do it's job properly.

 

It is likely that by having a GUI the only thing you achieve is the possibility to have many terminal windows open (as an alternative to screen / tmux / VTs) and a web browser on the same computer, but that's about it - and you can have the same functionality by SSHing into the box, but with your familiar Windows/whatever desktop you currently have (and as such, this approach might actually even be more convenient than doing maintenance locally, but YMMV...).

 

The suggested Webmin does look quite cool, though, and most probably works well for established and developed services. But if the service backend is in heavy development, well, you can expect things to break. If some Webmin module has some bugs in it or is not in sync with the backend, or if some module is limited in its options, you might still need to use the command line and hand-editing. Personally, I wouldn't use Webmin since it just looks like an additional layer in between stuff I can already do, but YMMV - and on the other hand (provided the modules are well written), using it and hand-editing are not mutually exclusive.

On 7/25/2021 at 9:10 AM, danomicar said:

I'm currently running Ubuntu 18.04 64-bit on it however its a little slow and prone to crashing. I can't for the life of me figure out to enable write access for Samba either. So I'm looking to restart from scatch.

When do you have slowdowns? When does it crash? These are important questions! What you're describing sounds like you might even have a H/W issue, and if that is the case, starting from scratch will not solve anything.

 

Generally, in Linux it makes much more sense to troubleshoot an existing installation than to re-install (compared to pre-Vista Windows... hopefully more modern Windowses are also more clever in this regard, and so I've been told). Linux does nothing "behind your back" as some other OS's *ahem*Windows*ahem* might do. If you are certain you have screwed up the configuration so that you can not revert chances you've made, then (and only then, really) it makes sense to re-install.

 

Learn your package manager and how to restore stock configuration files with it, as that will take care of screwed up configuration most of the time.

On 7/25/2021 at 9:10 AM, danomicar said:

Any suggestions on what linux distro may be best? Additionally, any recommendations for software for local network file sharing? Just some way I can access gameplay footage and audio from it.

If the server it's just for Samba, I would choose some flavor of Debian, but just because I'm already familiar with Debian. But the already suggested Ubuntu Server is probably an excellent choice, too (and might not differ that much from Debian; it's been a few years since I've used either one, though). But the choice of distribution doesn't really matter that much - all distributions work just fine for home server use. Just don't choose something which is on bleeding edge (Arch / any rolling-release) and prefer LTS releases, and you're good to go. Bleeding edge distros will also work, but might break because of bleeding-edge features or bugs kreeping into the distro... that's why they're called bleeding edge!

 

The choice of tools for file sharing depend more on the client, i.e. what OS/software you need to access the files with. Again, the distro doesn't matter since all GNU and other FOSS tools are available for all distributions; it will be hard time finding exceptions! If you need the plex server, your choices are already a bit limited, as that is a closed-source piece of software. But overall, at Plex they seem to support quite a good selection of mainstream distributions, i.e. most Debian and Fedora based.

 

If you need to access the files from within Windows, so that all software can see the files transparently - and you need write access - the samba is probably the way to go. If the other computers are running Linux, then choose nfs. If you only need read access (and don't need the traffic to be encrypted, say, because it is in your private LAN and the files are not private / sensitive) then even FTP might work for you.

 

How you configure something like Samba will not really differ that much between distributions - the configuration will be identical for practical purposes (there might be minor differences in configuration file locations etc.).

Edited July 26, 2021 by Wild Penquin
Whoops a paragraph was malformed. Major TYPO cleanup and clarifications! Emphasis.

[Giganthrax]

I have an 11 year old toshiba satellite with very similar specs to the one the OP has described.

 

I've tested quite a few lightweight distros on it and so far I find Linux Mint Mate to be the best and most stable of them all. ZorinOS Lite is also really good, but it tended to crash occasionally. 

[10leej]

19 hours ago, danomicar said:

I'm looking for a lightweight OS to use for an old PC i'd like to repurpose into a NAS/Plex Server. The system is using a 2nd generation i5, 4 gigs of RAM and GTX 520. So definitely not a lot of power to work with lol.

 

I'm currently running Ubuntu 18.04 64-bit on it however its a little slow and prone to crashing. I can't for the life of me figure out to enable write access for Samba either. So I'm looking to restart from scatch. 

 

Any suggestions on what linux distro may be best? Additionally, any recommendations for software for local network file sharing? Just some way I can access gameplay footage and audio from it. 

openmediavault/trunas both of which ship samba and simplify it fairly well. These are the standard answers here.

 

Really you just want to avoid running a GUI on a low-spec machine like that, but if you're desperate you can use just a basic window manager.

I personally use Debian as my primary server OS, though redhat (might be a bit "too coorperate" for some) and CentOS Stream (avoid CentOS 8 it's EoL 12/2021) do exist,

[LBrocato]

IceWM Window Manager is a option in opensuse that could be great.  it call basic desktop envierment . you can install pacman repository unofically and rpms which give it one of the larges repository libraries.

 

[Alexeygridnev1993]

On 7/25/2021 at 5:49 PM, Master Disaster said:

SSH? Nah, it runs a private webserver, you just browse to ipaddress:10000 in your web browser.

 

This entire paragraph is one giant oxymoron. How can you use RAM for nothing? If the RAM is being used then it is being used by something for something. Modern computers have enough RAM and modern OSes are good enough at resource management that there's no need to try and squeeze everything into the smallest footprint possible, if an application needs more RAM the OS will free some up by deleting old data, moving data from RAM to the pagefile or it will just pause a non critical system service temporarily.

 

Also your example of video editors couldn't have been any worse, most video editors recommend using scratch disks as cache over RAM since RAW video can exceed RAM capacity very easily plus when video editing you don't need really fast access times.

 

Why use more when you can use less? Why not? What's the point in having 16GB of RAM at your disposal and only using 1GB? Also I don't think you understand one very simple concept, modern programming languages leave memory management up to the operating system (unless the dev specifically codes the app not too) and that's a very good thing, the last thing you want is every different trying to reserve its own portion of memory. What happens when you run 2 apps that both want the same pool or an overlapping pool?

Don't you work at development team of Google Chrome, by any chance?

 

On a more serious note. The entire concept of "free RAM is useless RAM" seems completely bogus to me. Any modern OS, be it Windows or Linux, uses all free RAM as disk cache, keeping recently used files and thus increasing system responsiveness. So, the more your programs hog the RAM, the less RAM there is for disk cache and the slower your system will work. So, if software is written in a way that it hogs all the memory it can, it's a bad piece of software. Especially when it comes to something as unessential as desktop environment (Windows 98 could somehow draw you windows and stuff while requiring 32 Mb of RAM for that).

[OldTweaker]

Your system is not low specs for running a UI (Windowing environment). You even have a discrete GPU, not much for gaming but it will work fine. I am all for using a Window Manager that uses as little resources as possible such as the suggested IceWM (I often use openbox which is even smaller). But that does come with a price, which is a learning curve and you often don't get all the handy tools that are really what you seem to want. Linux mint Mate is a nice compromise, lower resource usage but very user friendly with the GUI tools for system management.

 

A good suggestion was made to use Truenas which has a Plexplugin. Everything is setup via a webbased GUI.  It's build for this stuff and the ZFS filesystem will give you some great options such as snapshots which all can be done from the GUI. You connect using a browser similar to Webmin. However you need at least 8Gb of memory and multiple drives to be setup redundancy properly in the drives (RAID-Z) and as it is based on BSD, not all hardware is as well supported as on Linux.