Which distro would you install on a celeron 2gb ram laptop for a lay person to use?

[nossaquesapao@lemmy.eco.br]

I assumed a x64. Debian (the distro mx linux is based on) offers multiarch support, so i just had to enable it by running:

sudo dpkg --add-architecture i386 
sudo apt update

Then, to install 32-bit firefox, I first uninstalled it and then installed the 32-bit version:

sudo apt remove firefox-esr  
sudo apt install firefox-esr:i386

With the standard 64 bit version, the browser would struggle with just 2 or 3 tabs, and with the 32 bit version, she can use like 10 tabs without problems

[mwa@lemm.ee]

Oh yeah older Nvidia drivers hate Wayland.

[geoma@lemmy.ml]

Mx linux with fluxbox

[wolf@lemmy.zip]

The most important thing is not the distribution, but to enable ZRAM (or ZSWAP) and use a lightweight desktop. I am not sure how much difference a 32bit vs a 64bit distribution makes, but if possible you could take one for the team and run some trials and report your numbers (RAM usage) back here.

Of course I recommend Debian with a lightweight desktop of your choice, or Alpine.

[ratmoo@feddit.org]

Probably Fedora.

[disonantezko@lemmy.sdf.org]

This!

Even 4GB RAM is low for web browsers and they're gonna struggle, A LOT, even with just one tab open, is going to be painfully slow to not want to use it anymore.

Old laptops like this, don't have hardware video decoders for YouTube or any video in AVC or HEVC códecs that is used everywhere today.

You can use Gnumeric for spreadsheets and Abiword for docs if Libreoffice is too slow.

[disonantezko@lemmy.sdf.org]

But web browsers and video players are going to be painful with any distro.

[zod000@lemmy.ml]

I was always a fan of crunchbang when I used a couple of eee pcs as servers. It ran very light.

[lefantome@programming.dev]

Run a 32 bit distro. It is the only thing that will run well on 2 GB of RAM. It will run better than you think.

Q4OS, Antix, MX Linux, Damn Small Linux, and even pure 32 bit Debian are decent candidates. If you use Q4, give the Trinity desktop a shot.

I like Andelie Linux as well but MUSL may cause problems for an unsophisticated user.

[lefantome@programming.dev]

A 32 bit distro will make a BIG difference with that much RAM.

[lefantome@programming.dev]

Q4OS with Trinity is a great pick for this user. Alpine is great but MUSL may cause problems. And I say this as a MUSL use (Chimera Linux). You are not going to find 32 but Flatpaks and Distrobox may be too complicated. So, I would stay away from MUSL based distros with 32 bit Linux on a 2 GB system.

MX and Antix are also Debian based and have 32 bit versions.

[lefantome@programming.dev]

You would be amazed how much 32 bit helps. If you do not open too many tabs, the web should be fine. Video no problem ( at reasonable resolutions).

[lefantome@programming.dev]

How so?

32 bit pointers take up half as much RAM as 64 bit pointers. A complicated application like a web browser consumes much more memory as a 64 bit app than it does as a 32 bit app. That is true of most programs but you are really going to notice it in both desktop environment and your web browser.

[robber@lemmy.ml]

I recently had to use a friend's old 4gb macbook for some weeks because my laptop was stolen. I was surprised how well everything worked, even when using a few web apps in firefox. I think with using zram and avoiding web / electron apps where possible, you might get quite something out of a 4gb machine.

[solrize@lemmy.world]

I'm on a 4gb machine right now and it's tolerable if I don't do too many things at once, but Google Docs bogs in particular bogs it down.

[limelight79@lemm.ee]

Maybe he's going to run Links and Wordstar!

[dx1@lemmy.ml]

Last time I checked (a few years ago) Firefox has half the memory usage of Chrome, in practice.

[notagoblin@lemmy.world]

I put Antix on a 2Gb 64bit HP Atom. Worked well for notes and browsing. Oddly an SSD seemed to make little difference to performance compared to the previous HDD.
Old architecture I guess.

[captain_aggravated@sh.itjust.works]

Is Crunchbang still maintained?

[dfx4509b_2@lemmy.org]

The Goanna browsers will run on pretty low-spec hardware, and there's also h.264ify for sites like YT, unless Google blocked YT from loading on Goanna browsers.