bringing a netbook to a usable level

[AlexGoesHigh]

ok, so my mom's 5-6 year old netbook is trash due to bloatware and crap accumulation through the years, it hangs for 5 minutes just browsing the web, this tells you everything so i'm planning on formatting it, but here where i'm not sure what to do, it runs windows 7 starter 32 bit and my mom hasn't use only windows, and she the kind that you have to tell her how to do the most simple things on a computer, she think the problems is because i'm using my computer doing internet stuff, yeah that's how bad the situation is <_<  but i'm not sure if reinstalling windows would be good because it was already slow when it was new, so i was thinking about using a linux distro but something that almost a copy paste of windows or at most very easy to use because, she never going to learn how to do the most basic stuff again, obviously it hast to be a lightweight distro so features is not a priority since she works on it with online banking, emails and cloud office (btw does cloud office works on linux?) so what would be best in this situation

 

specs:

toshiba nb305

intel atom n450 dual core 1.66ghz

1gb of ram

250gb hdd

 

more info here: http://support.toshiba.com/support/staticContentDetail?contentId=2580264&isFromTOCLink=false

[TheInverseKey]

ok, so my mom's 5-6 year old netbook is trash due to bloatware and crap accumulation through the years, it hangs for 5 minutes just browsing the web, this tells you everything so i'm planning on formatting it, but here where i'm not sure what to do, it runs windows 7 starter 32 bit and my mom hasn't use only windows, and she the kind that you have to tell her how to do the most simple things on a computer, she think the problems is because i'm using my computer doing internet stuff, yeah that's how bad the situation is <_<  but i'm not sure if reinstalling windows would be good because it was already slow when it was new, so i was thinking about using a linux distro but something that almost a copy paste of windows or at most very easy to use because, she never going to learn how to do the most basic stuff again, obviously it hast to be a lightweight distro so features is not a priority since she works on it with online banking, emails and cloud office (btw does cloud office works on linux?) so what would be best in this situation

 

specs:

toshiba nb305

intel atom n450 dual core 1.66ghz

1gb of ram

250gb hdd

 

more info here: http://support.toshiba.com/support/staticContentDetail?contentId=2580264&isFromTOCLink=false

 

 

Anything with an Atom CPU is going to be slow they are slower than most phones.

[CornOnJacob]

Since you only have 1 GB of RAM, try a distro with Openbox or another basic window manager.

 

Most Like Windows: Zorin OS

Lightweight Yet Fully Featured: Crunchbang

 

It will be tough/impossible to run Windows on only 1GB of RAM and an atom dual core.

[lani100]

I would pop in 2gb of ram and re-install windows.

And yes cloud office does work on linux.

But teaching your mom linux is going to be hard especially when some things aren't working or need to be done different.

Lubuntu should work fine as well as mint.

[WinNut]

Ubuntu or Xubuntu.

 

I used Ubuntu to revive my netbook (main computer) with a Celeron M single core clocked at 1.2GHz.

[Builder]

ok, so my mom's 5-6 year old netbook is trash due to bloatware and crap accumulation through the years, it hangs for 5 minutes just browsing the web, this tells you everything so i'm planning on formatting it, but here where i'm not sure what to do, it runs windows 7 starter 32 bit and my mom hasn't use only windows, and she the kind that you have to tell her how to do the most simple things on a computer, she think the problems is because i'm using my computer doing internet stuff, yeah that's how bad the situation is <_<  but i'm not sure if reinstalling windows would be good because it was already slow when it was new, so i was thinking about using a linux distro but something that almost a copy paste of windows or at most very easy to use because, she never going to learn how to do the most basic stuff again, obviously it hast to be a lightweight distro so features is not a priority since she works on it with online banking, emails and cloud office (btw does cloud office works on linux?) so what would be best in this situation

 

specs:

toshiba nb305

intel atom n450 dual core 1.66ghz

1gb of ram

250gb hdd

 

more info here: http://support.toshiba.com/support/staticContentDetail?contentId=2580264&isFromTOCLink=false

Puppy Linux or Arch if you're experienced.

[lani100]

Install Windows XP, that's the first right step.

>< 

[AlexGoesHigh]

Anything with an Atom CPU is going to be slow they are slower than most phones.

that why i said usable not fast

 

Since you only have 1 GB of RAM, try a distro with Openbox or another basic window manager.

 

Most Like Windows: Zorin OS

Lightweight Yet Fully Featured: Crunchbang

 

It will be tough/impossible to run Windows on only 1GB of RAM and an atom dual core.

checking this

 

Ubuntu or Xubuntu.

 

I used Ubuntu to revive my netbook (main computer) with a Celeron M single core clocked at 1.2GHz.

this to

 

I would pop in 2gb of ram and re-install windows.

And yes cloud office does work on linux.

But teaching your mom linux is going to be hard especially when some things aren't working or need to be done different.

Lubuntu should work fine as well as mint.

and this also finding another 1gb stick of ddr2 for laptops would be very hard 

 

Puppy Linux or Arch if you're experienced.

thanks

 

Install Windows XP, that's the first right step.

yeah i would prefer something that still has support and isn't 12 years old 

[Levent]

i have a netbook with same specs and only thing actually made a difference is 2GB ram i even tried my SSD on the damn thing and cpu just sucked too much to benefit from an SSD

XP seems to be only thing that is actually not bad to use ,i tried couple of distros ubuntu netbook edition,fedora ,arch linux and they all had cpu related lags

(its single core with 2 threads.)

[lani100]

How can it be hard to find ddr2 ram?

Most stores here just sell it and fairly cheap and there's webshops mate.

But it should run fine with a light tweaked windows 7.

[AlexGoesHigh]

i have a netbook with same specs and only thing actually made a difference is 2GB ram i even tried my SSD on the damn thing and cpu just sucked too much to benefit from an SSD

XP seems to be only thing that is actually not bad to use ,i tried couple of distros ubuntu netbook edition,fedora ,arch linux and they all had cpu related lags

(its single core with 2 threads.)

single core well this explains a lot, besides xp being old i don't have keys of it and i dont want to fiddle with cracks

[AlexGoesHigh]

How can it be hard to find ddr2 ram?

Most stores here just sell it and fairly cheap and there's webshops mate.

But it should run fine with a light tweaked windows 7.

i dont live in usa and neither europe also i'm trying to do this without expending a cent

[79wjd]

Trash it and tell her to buy a new computer for like $250-300. Even the cheapest piece of crap dell/Lenovo/other you can find will beat a netbook. That thing was a piece of crap the day it came out and it's only gotten worse.

There's literally nothing you can do to make it faster.

[lani100]

Try doing a reinstall of windows or light linux distro.

[AlexGoesHigh]

Trash it and tell her to buy a new computer for like $250-300. Even the shorties piece of crap dell/Lenovo/other you can find will beat a netbook. That thing was a piece of crap the day it came out and it's only gotten worse.

don't tell me about and i much rather prefer buy another thing but she bought this without my presence and when i saw it i almost burst in flame of how shit it is, but she stubborn and doesn't want to buy a thing so i'm trying to fix it because i'm tired of her complaints >.<

[flibberdipper]

Get a Samsung 840 EVO and then install Xubuntu. Gave my netbook a whole new lease on life, same as my mom's (just without the EVO).

[AlexGoesHigh]

I also have a similar Acer Aspire One AO532h with Intel Atom N450 @ 1.66Ghz and 1GB DDR2 @ 667MHz. I decided to build my own OpenBox WM with Arch Linux that uses less than 100MB of RAM.

 

-snip-

damn that impressive but i'm very unexperience with linux so something that just you run and install would be good though how much time did it take you to do setup that?

[AnnoyedShelf]

ok, so my mom's 5-6 year old netbook is trash due to bloatware and crap accumulation through the years, it hangs for 5 minutes just browsing the web, this tells you everything so i'm planning on formatting it, but here where i'm not sure what to do, it runs windows 7 starter 32 bit and my mom hasn't use only windows, and she the kind that you have to tell her how to do the most simple things on a computer, she think the problems is because i'm using my computer doing internet stuff, yeah that's how bad the situation is <_<  but i'm not sure if reinstalling windows would be good because it was already slow when it was new, so i was thinking about using a linux distro but something that almost a copy paste of windows or at most very easy to use because, she never going to learn how to do the most basic stuff again, obviously it hast to be a lightweight distro so features is not a priority since she works on it with online banking, emails and cloud office (btw does cloud office works on linux?) so what would be best in this situation

 

specs:

toshiba nb305

intel atom n450 dual core 1.66ghz

1gb of ram

250gb hdd

 

more info here: http://support.toshiba.com/support/staticContentDetail?contentId=2580264&isFromTOCLink=false

I'd recommend Linux Mint XFCE edition.  Very lightweight, highly customizeable, runs like Windows, and everything works from the get-go.

[Chillstice]

What I do whenever I need to totally clean out a computer is run a verity of programs which over the course of about 12-24 hours will make the computer a lot easier to use.

I run TuneUp Utilities (updated version) along with Slim Drivers and System Mechanic using all the tools within those programs to Clean out the registry, defrag the registry, defrag the hard drive, downlad drivers, clean out trash, and even move programs around n the hard drive to make them start faster.

[AlexGoesHigh]

ok i decided to go with crunchbang, any other recommendations before installing it?