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[Installation] Best Debian iso to download for old laptop

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mikedeb
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[Installation] Best Debian iso to download for old laptop

#1 Post by mikedeb »

Hi,
I have an old laptop Asus K50IP: Intel® Core 2 Duo 3 GB DDR2-SDRAM 320 GB NVIDIA GeForce G205M.
I'd like to figure out which debian ISO should I install on it.
Maybe the 32 bit is the way to go.
Is this the right iso?

https://cdimage.debian.org/debian-cd/cu ... etinst.iso

Thanks

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Re: [Installation] Best Debian iso to download for old laptop

#2 Post by jmgibson1981 »

I'm of the opinion that you should always use the higher of 2 versions. That cpu is 64 bit capable. I can't picture any possible benefit to using 32 bit other than an extremely minor more efficient use of the ram. Either will work though.

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Re: [Installation] Best Debian iso to download for old laptop

#3 Post by mikedeb »

jmgibson1981 wrote: 2023-04-01 15:22 I'm of the opinion that you should always use the higher of 2 versions. That cpu is 64 bit capable. I can't picture any possible benefit to using 32 bit other than an extremely minor more efficient use of the ram. Either will work though.
so it would be:

https://cdimage.debian.org/debian-cd/cu ... etinst.iso

I need a version as light as possible.
LXDE, LXQt, Mate e XFCE, which one is the lightest?

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Re: [Installation] Best Debian iso to download for old laptop

#4 Post by steve_v »

As mentioned, 32bit will use slightly less memory... but it's probably* not worth it, as i686 is becoming a sunset architecture at this point.
Otherwise, I'd try LXDE first. It is (or was, at least historically) very slightly lighter than LXQT, and both of those are considerably lighter than XFCE or Mate. You may miss features from a more "complete" DE though.

That recommendation may be inverted to some extent if you will be making heavy use of GTK3 (and especially pygtk3) components in LXDE, at which point LXQT (and QT5) will probably offer better performance... So long as you try not to pull in half of KDE with it.
These days XFCE is actually more memory-hungry than a minimal KDE/Plasma desktop, largely owing to its switch to GTK3 and reliance on "light" (in LoC only) python applications... But I digress.

Your biggest problem, IME, will be RAM. Specifically the insane memory consumption of modern web browsers (and applications that embedd them), and the internet obesity epidemic in general. There's not a lot to be done about that unfortunately, and depending on what applications you intend to run, choice of desktop/WM may well be inconsequential.
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Re: [Installation] Best Debian iso to download for old laptop

#5 Post by mikedeb »

Ok, I'll go for the 64 bit then.
Yes, you're right, Ram is a problem along with memory consumption of modern web browsers and stuff related to them.
Anyway, I found that Falkon Browser is lighter and run smoothly mostly. Of course, you don't have all those features of the other main Browsers out there.

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Re: [Installation] Best Debian iso to download for old laptop

#6 Post by stevepusser »

Is Falkon even maintained any longer? Oh, there is a new release after lo, these many years after 3.1.0. 22.12.3 is the current one, but upstream Debian is still on 22.12.1...If only anyone knew how to backport that one, or even 22.12.3!

Maybe Seamonkey or Pale Moon browsers, or even Netsurf would also be good choices...

You could also take a look at antiX, a Debian derivative specifically targeted at older machines, yet kept current. Or maybe MX Linux Fluxbox edition... Those are Live ISOs, so they can be run off the installation USB or DVD before you try an install.
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Re: [Installation] Best Debian iso to download for old laptop

#7 Post by steve_v »

stevepusser wrote: 2023-04-01 18:15many years after 3.1.0. 22.12.3 is the current one, but upstream Debian is still on 22.12.1
3.1.0? Sheesh, I know stable is supposed to be crusty, but that's ridiculous.
FWIW, falkon 22.12.3 is very usable. Not sure I'd really call it "light" since it's qtwebengine (AKA slightly-aged chromium), but then nothing is if you want it to work properly with the current sorry state of the internet.
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Re: [Installation] Best Debian iso to download for old laptop

#8 Post by stevepusser »

I just used the bookworm template to build the latest Falkon 23.03.80 for MX 21/Bullseye, but it seemed to have an outdated Recommends for libsvtav1enc0, which I can't find still existing in any Debian repos, as it's now libsvtav1enc1. I also backported svt-av1 1.4.1 to Bullseye to get that library, and Falkon does run. (svt-av1...is it a "fast enough" AV1 encoder?) If Falkon won't even run without the package, I would make it an explicit dependency, not just recommended. Original bug report: https://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugrepo ... ug=1012065

I'm going to additionally do those Falkon builds for development MX 23/ Bookworm, which are built on generic Debian bookworm schroots using pbuilder.
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Re: [Installation] Best Debian iso to download for old laptop

#9 Post by stevepusser »

A bit off-topic: Since a hero also backported Qt 6 for bullseye-backports, I've been porting that over for MX 21, too. I noticed that the Strawberry Music Player has started recommending Qt 6 builds instead of 5, to enable more features. I did a Qt 6 builds for MX 21 and 23, but it looked terrible on XFCE until I installed qt6-gtk-platformtheme, which let it use the current GTK3 theme in XFCE.

IDK if Falkon supports or gets any advantages from Qt 6; I suppose a look at their docs would help.
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Re: [Installation] Best Debian iso to download for old laptop

#10 Post by BBQdave »

mikedeb wrote: 2023-04-01 17:51Yes, you're right, Ram is a problem along with memory consumption of modern web browsers and stuff related to them.
Depending on how many applications you have open, a modern browser may still not be an issue with 3GB of RAM.
Firefox is 1.8GB with multiple tabs open. Firefox plus Google Chrome (multiple tabs open) is 2.4GB.
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Re: [Installation] Best Debian iso to download for old laptop

#11 Post by sunrat »

3GB RAM should be enough for desktop and browser. I have KDE Plasma, Firefox, music player, and some autostarted background processes running atm and free shows 1.7GB used. Any DE except Gnome should work fine.
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Re: [Installation] Best Debian iso to download for old laptop

#12 Post by BBQdave »

sunrat wrote: 2023-04-04 03:33Any DE except Gnome should work fine.
Hey, where's that Gnome GUI Goodness :D
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Re: [Installation] Best Debian iso to download for old laptop

#13 Post by steve_v »

BBQdave wrote: 2023-04-04 16:27Gnome GUI Goodness
Personal preference in UI "design" aside *gag* , Gnome is slow, bloated, and thoroughly unsuitable for old hardware.
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Re: [Installation] Best Debian iso to download for old laptop

#14 Post by BBQdave »

https://www.windowmaker.org/ may be an option, depending on how involved the OP wants to get.

Modern browsers, as mentioned, is the challenge for resources. Depending on the needs of the OP, Lynx (text based browser) is an option.
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Re: [Installation] Best Debian iso to download for old laptop

#15 Post by Shamak »

Ten months ago I was running a 2008 computer on Bullseye with the Gnome desktop. A Core 2 Duo with 4 GB of ram. Absolutely no problems. Of course I don't keep multiple tabs open nor do I run multiple applications at once. But it ran well. But I guess that extra gigabyte of ram made a difference.

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Re: [Installation] Best Debian iso to download for old laptop

#16 Post by BBQdave »

Shamak wrote: 2023-04-05 15:03 Ten months ago I was running a 2008 computer on Bullseye with the Gnome desktop. A Core 2 Duo with 4 GB of ram. Absolutely no problems. Of course I don't keep multiple tabs open nor do I run multiple applications at once. But it ran well. But I guess that extra gigabyte of ram made a difference.
You beat me to it. Had an old Thinkpad, Core 2 Duo and 4GB of ram. Ran GNOME fine. I did have to watch what I had open, but it was nice :)
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Re: [Installation] Best Debian iso to download for old laptop

#17 Post by lindi »

There are ways to cut down memory usage without changing the user experience much. See for example viewtopic.php?p=757308#p757308

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