Debian 12 works efficiently with older desktop computers.

[conclave]

Over the past few weeks I have installed Debian 12 on two computers that are over ten years old.

One is a Dell Dimension E521 with older AMD and the 3.2 limit of available usable memory theoretically, 4gb of DDR2 Ram technically. This computer was bought at a garage sale for $5. I took off the Windows Vista that was on the computer when purchased that I was locked out of and using all the memory. First time around installing was able to get an older version of Ubuntu installed and then Debian 9 along with Linux Mint 18. These operating systems ran very sluggish even post adding a 2gb older graphic card and maxing out the RAM at 4GB. The graphic drivers for Debian 9 were a lot of trial and error and any DVDs played on the media players had a lot of hesitation and lagging behind. I recently erased Debian 9 and Mint from this machine and tried a live version of Debian 12. Noticed the graphic display for the first time did not require any special installation of drivers or other configuration that required a lot of looking around and trial with error to find something that would work. The machine seems to run more efficiently on Debian 12 than it did years ago with older operating systems, not a speed demon by any means yet a lot better performance and less problems.

The second machine is an older HP compaq with a Pentium D that also has a version of Debian 9 that I use with a full set of repository discs I purchased on-line, along with Fedora 30 again with it's repository discs. I keep these installed on the partitions of this machine's hard drive since I have the DVD sets for using without an internet connection. This machine also has Windows XP professional and some older software I like to use with older hardware input devices. I decided to shrink the Debian 9 partition by 50GBs and add Debian 12 after trying it out with a live version and finding it worked very well. I had to hold my breath when installing concerned about the OS prober missing one or more of the other operating systems upon creating a grub.config file. All did go well with no aggravating problems. I went back and forth between the Debian 9 version and the 12 to discover that the latest version of Debian works better and more efficient. Again the drivers for playing DVDs like movies and TV series work normally with no lagging or slowing motion in 12. The graphic display driver with an older 2GB AMD Radeon add on card was automatically provided through installation of the operating system with no problems. Now I have an operating system that has support for security updates that will make using these computers on the internet safer and in some cases at all possible. I was using a stand alone version of Firefox on the Debian 9 to go onto the internet for this computer since the default version available with Debian 9 no longer was supported or updated. The stand alone version may have provided some security updates for the browser by using the same procedure as Firefox installed on Windows yet any other necessary changes needed for security purposes were not supported or available for Debian 9.

All I can say is thank you to the Debian team for providing a winner of an operating system with version 12.

[Soapm]

My video server was a Intel DX4 100 which ran great with little ram. I upgraded for 64 bit, otherwise I may still be using that motherboard.

[debcub]

Over the past few weeks I have installed Debian 12 on two computers that are over ten years old.
...

Thank you, conclave, my old laptop (SAMSUNG product: 300E4C/300E5C/300E7C v: 0.1) works great again, with Debian 12 Cinnamon
Cheers, debcub

[010101]

My 12 year old toshiba can not handle the load of MS Windows 11 - not even close. But It does run debian 12 with room to spare. How crazy is that?!


EDIT: At installation, about 8GB of my hard drive was used. With Firefox and a few small programs, 7% of my 250 GB drive was used!

With no other software in run, this OS was using about 48% on my ram!

With debian 12, after installing Tor, and a file manager, I’m using about 4% of my total drive! And with nothing in run, I use less than 25% of my ram!

Man, that is just CRAZY!

[None1975]

How crazy is that?!

Because it is Linux, not a Windows malware.

[010101]

How crazy is that?!

Because it is Linux, not a Windows malware.

You got that right. Don't get me started on Microsoft... Trashing MS is one of my favorite things to talk about.

[BBQdave]

Over the past few weeks I have installed Debian 12 on two computers that are over ten years old.

One is a Dell Dimension E521 with older AMD and the 3.2 limit of available usable memory theoretically, 4gb of DDR2 Ram technically. ...Windows Vista...

The second machine is an older HP compaq with a Pentium D... Windows XP professional...

...All I can say is thank you to the Debian team for providing a winner of an operating system with version 12.

My hardware (in signature) is not quite as old as yours - and I upgraded memory and drive, but it's the fasted machine (and oldest) in my home
Originally came with Windows 7, which I wiped immediately - didn't even log in. Loaded Fedora Linux and wiped the drive of Windows.

Since then I've had Fedora Linux, Ubuntu and Debian loaded. Debian 12 is excellent on this machine

[Nili]

On my then OptiPlex-330 from 2007 E8600 Core 2 Duo
Debian worked as a fine wine from 2015 to 2022.
A netinst ISO associated with openbox/tint2 or dwm/spectrwm it will probably go quitly nice until the end of the decade for the potato PC's.

[hogrbe]

I still have Debian 10 running on a Compaq EVO (i386) with BIOS dating 2003. It's faster than XP. I haven't tried Debian 12 on a i386 machine yet, but that day may come.

[Uptorn]

I've had Bookworm installed on a POS decade old single core laptop with only 2 gigabytes memory and, aside from booting up, once everything is loaded it is responsive. You wouldn't even know the computer was so old. I am convinced that as long as you have a CPU (x86) that has SSE3 and is 64 bit (either Intel EMT or amd64 proper) that it will run fine under Debian. Or any linux, generally. The entire notion that computers "only last 5 years" is absolute industry propaganda.

[CrackedShell]

A friend just gave me an old Gateway laptop that she was getting rid of because the hopelessly borked and unsupported Windows 7 install would no longer boot. I installed Debian 12 on it and it is running like new. I did have some wrinkles to iron out, but got everything working in short order. Laptop is not as old as some of the hardware mentioned in this thread, but kudos to GNU/Linux and Debian for allowing older hardware to have a second life.

While this older Gateway computer will not win any performance prizes, it is perfectly functional as a laptop for general home computing, office and schoolwork, and simple coding. Computers generally far outlast the crappy Windows installations they are sadly infected with. Most old computers in my experience no longer work because the bloated and outdated Windows installations grind to a halt. The hardware is usually just fine once the corrupted OS is replaced with a solid stable Linux distro like Debian.

[CrackedShell]

How crazy is that?!

Because it is Linux, not a Windows malware.

So true!! I am so glad to no longer live under Microsoft tyranny!! I have used many Linux Distros over the years, and I would take ANY Linux over Windoze Malware!! It is just so sad and unfathomable to me that MS garbage is forced onto so many people.

[CrackedShell]

From my Raspberry Pi conky: I know it is puerile, but I just could not help myself!!

Conky.png (170.1 KiB) Viewed 17686 times