Okay heres the scoop, my father is working off an old laptop and is currently dual booting XP and Xubuntu 12.04, unfortunately xubuntu is not really working out for him.
I would try the latest Linux Mint on his machine but even I am having issues with it in virtualbox (12.10 really does suck no bones about it)
So I am in distribution hunt for him, I need something simple and easy to use, something fairly stable but also lightweight.
But I am taking out Ubuntu based distros out of the equation due to some major issues with Ubuntu right now with both 12.04 and 12.10 so I need something not based on the buntu family.
I would install openSUSE but I am not sure if his machine can take KDE, I tried him on gnome shell and he cant stand it and I would need the DVD installer for XFCE and I have no DVD’s to spare anmd right now I cant buy a stack of them.
I can use a USB flash drive but I am not sure how viable XFCE is on openSUSE.
I installed oS 12.2 with LXDE in an old celeron (approx. 4 years old) and it works nicely. XFCE is reportedly good too (I didn’t try it), and you can have some more bling with Enlightenment. IME you should have at least 512 MB RAM, preferably 1 GB.
LXDE should feel comfortable for someone coming from XP.
Yeah I am thinking of something LXDE based too.
I dont think enlightenment would be good for my father though, I have used it and like it but for new users it might be a tad clunky.
Any non openSUSE suggestions?
I’ve done the rounds with light distros, testing on my eeepc. Which currently runs Mint Mate 13. And I have to say, it’s absolutely fantastic. So I don’t know if you were testing Mate Desktop in your Mint experiments?
I pretty much gave up on Virtual Machines now, they just don’t give me enough of a real feel for things.
Sure, I’d love to use openSUSE on my eeepc, but nothing comes close to Mint with Mate. I just tell it the way it is.
Right this minute I’m in the middle of a Fedora 18 Beta + Mate install on the eeepc. It’s partitioned up for multiple installations.
They could do a better job in packaging so that the meta packages of Mint and Cinnamon won’t conflict (for no valid reason). But it’s a recurrent problem of .deb based distros.
On 11/28/2012 12:06 AM, MadmanRB wrote:
>
> my father is working off an old laptop and … I am in distribution
> hunt for him, I need something simple and easy to use, something
> fairly stable but also lightweight.
sounds like you are describing Puppy Linux.
–
dd
Yeah I thought about Puppy, I am just unsure if JWM would be suitable for him.
Linux Mint with Mate is under consideration too
Looks like you’ve already written off openSUSE but you did come to an openSUSE forum! I’ve openSUSE 12.2 with KDE installed on a 5-year old laptop and it’s runs perfectly well. On doorstop-worthy laptops (>8 years old) openSUSE 12.1 with LXDE works beautifully (I haven’t tried 12.2 yet).
But if you really want to control what you install and optimise it for your laptop, you should consider Arch (good) or Gentoo (better). Or just get another laptop :). If you need to update the hard drive, you can do from you own rig via ssh (very useful with `senior relatives’! 
).
The OP said his dad use to be using xp so LXDE will be good and fast
than xfce.If you can afford to download the openSUSE dvd you can customize your installation.
like mixing some application from different DE. Depends on what application
he wants to install and it wouldn’t hurt the machine that bad.
On Wed 28 Nov 2012 08:36:01 PM CST, conram wrote:
The OP said his dad use to be using xp so LXDE will be good and fast
than xfce.If you can afford to download the openSUSE dvd you can
customize your installation.
like mixing some application from different DE. Depends on what
application
he wants to install and it wouldn’t hurt the machine that bad.
Hi
SUSE Studio’s the place to visit…roll your own
–
Cheers Malcolm °¿° (Linux Counter #276890)
openSUSE 12.2 (x86_64) Kernel 3.4.11-2.16-desktop
up 1 day 6:02, 3 users, load average: 0.11, 0.09, 0.06
CPU Intel i5 CPU M520@2.40GHz | Intel Arrandale GPU
I am thinking of trying suse studio if this doesnt work out actually 
On Thu 29 Nov 2012 12:36:02 AM CST, MadmanRB wrote:
I am thinking of trying suse studio if this doesnt work out actually
I use twin (console based, very retro) and blackbox for something
lightweight.
–
Cheers Malcolm °¿° (Linux Counter #276890)
openSUSE 12.2 (x86_64) Kernel 3.4.11-2.16-desktop
up 1 day 9:25, 4 users, load average: 0.36, 0.14, 0.10
CPU Intel i5 CPU M520@2.40GHz | Intel Arrandale GPU
Will it fit for his dad?:\
Yeah that wont be for him, he is an old school windows user.
He cant even get windows 7 without me mucking about with it.
Now about suse studio, I think I may go with it as it seems to be kind of easy but how do I get test drive to work?
I have this error:
Connection timed outTestdrive needs Flash enabled and access to ports 843 and 5900 - 5908
On Thu 29 Nov 2012 01:36:01 AM CST, MadmanRB wrote:
malcolmlewis;2507421 Wrote:
> I use twin (console based, very retro) and blackbox for something
> lightweight.
>
> –
> Cheers Malcolm °¿° (Linux Counter #276890)
> openSUSE 12.2 (x86_64) Kernel 3.4.11-2.16-desktop
> up 1 day 9:25, 4 users, load average: 0.36, 0.14, 0.10
> CPU Intel i5 CPU M520@2.40GHz | Intel Arrandale GPU
Yeah that wont be for him, he is an old school windows user.
He cant even get windows 7 without me mucking about with it.
Now about suse studio, I think I may go with it as it seems to be kind
of easy but how do I get test drive to work?
I have this error:
Connection timed outTestdrive needs Flash enabled and access to ports
843 and 5900 - 5908
Hi
Is networking turned on? Never seen either of those errors…
–
Cheers Malcolm °¿° (Linux Counter #276890)
openSUSE 12.2 (x86_64) Kernel 3.4.11-2.16-desktop
up 1 day 10:21, 3 users, load average: 0.04, 0.04, 0.09
CPU Intel i5 CPU M520@2.40GHz | Intel Arrandale GPU
On Thu 29 Nov 2012 01:26:01 AM CST, conram wrote:
malcolmlewis;2507421 Wrote:
> I use twin (console based, very retro) and blackbox for something
> lightweight.
>
Will it fit for his dad?:\
Hi
Blackbox should be… just needs to be configured though…the hard
part.
–
Cheers Malcolm °¿° (Linux Counter #276890)
openSUSE 12.2 (x86_64) Kernel 3.4.11-2.16-desktop
up 1 day 10:22, 3 users, load average: 0.10, 0.06, 0.09
CPU Intel i5 CPU M520@2.40GHz | Intel Arrandale GPU
Yeah I dont want anything that hard for him.
Any more suggestions?
Recently I have good experiences with RazorQT. It runs KDE apps fine, without loading the entire KDE infrastructure. A 76 year old friend of my dad loves it.
http://www.salixos.org/wiki/index.php/Home
I am running the LXDE version on an old laptop mainly for web-surfing. It is stable and really fast.
Yeah am considering salix actually, I just dont have too much experience with slack thus why I am divided on it.
I am more of “work with what I know” kind of guy sadly, I would have to work with it for a longer period of time before I could give it to him so if he had issues I can tell him what to do.