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submitted 1 year ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

I want to revive an old Lenovo laptop with an AMD A6 2.6GHz and 4GB ram, what would be the best option for a DE?

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[-] [email protected] 30 points 1 year ago

PSA no matter how light your distro, any modern app or webpage will use all that power

[-] [email protected] 23 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

I usually go with Xfce.

[-] [email protected] 13 points 1 year ago

That's fast enough to run the latest Linux Mint with Cinnamon. I have two laptops with the exact same cpu speed (passmark score) and 4 GB of ram. With 2 GB swap file you will be in business.

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[-] [email protected] 12 points 1 year ago

I'm running Kubuntu on less than that on a desktop and it works just fine.

[-] [email protected] 11 points 1 year ago

If you are still using X, get Fluxbox, very lightweight, requires some config, but that is fairly easy.

[-] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago

+1 for Fluxbox!

It’s such an underrated WM

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[-] [email protected] 10 points 1 year ago

LXQt, XFCE Or a window manager, they’re all lightweight.

[-] [email protected] 8 points 1 year ago

If you don’t need a full desktop environment, check-out IceWM.

I recently checked-out Trinity ( essentially KDE 3 modernized ) and was surprised how decent it was. I used it in Q4OS but it may be available in your distro.

[-] [email protected] 7 points 1 year ago

I use IceWM on antiX. Seems to be a good mix of low resource usage and aesthetics.

[-] [email protected] 7 points 1 year ago
  • the big guns: Gnome or Plasma
  • the middle tier: Xfce or LXQt
  • the lightweights: tiling window managers (and there’s a LOT to choose from)
  • the alternative crowd: Mate, Cinnamon, Regolith
[-] [email protected] 5 points 1 year ago

I think gnome and KDE Plasma are just too heavy. And I would use a WM if it was for me, in fact that what I use in my daily driver but it is for someone not that tech savvy. I may check one from the alternative crowd tho. Thanks for the answer

[-] [email protected] 5 points 1 year ago

plasma is surprisingly performant

[-] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago

I seem to remember hearing about Plasma having similar memory usage to XFCE. Don’t quote me on that lol

[-] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago

Try KDE Plasma, you can strip out a ton of it, for example XOrg entirely, baloo, animations, etc.

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[-] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago

OP asked for desktop env, and tiling window managers are... Well only window managers and not desktop environments...

[-] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago

I like MATE. It feels familiar. (I’m a GNOME user 😅)

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[-] [email protected] 7 points 1 year ago

Its fairly difficult to find "up-to-date" performance / RAM comparisons of Linux Desktop environments, but here's a decent one from 2019 comparing memory usage of different Ubuntu flavors.

The most surprising thing is that despite KDE Plasma's reputation as being more ram-hungry, it actually used less ram than XFCE, meaning its developers have been making performance a focus.

[-] [email protected] 5 points 1 year ago

I would go mx linux fluxbox

[-] [email protected] 5 points 1 year ago

A window manager like i3 or Openbox. If you are curious what that's like, then try out Bunsenlab Linux. (XFWM4 is also a great choice, but it requires some know how to properly rip out the rest of Xfce, like the relatively heavy desktop and the panel)

[-] [email protected] 5 points 1 year ago

KDE plasma. From my experience it uses less resources than lxqt and xfce and works out of the box while lxqt and xfce required extra work to get wifi, screen brightness controls and audio working. I can have 10+ tabs in a chromium based browser open without lag on an old laptop with 2GB ram and 1.33 - 1.83GHz 4 core intel atom from 10 years ago.

[-] [email protected] 8 points 1 year ago

s/chromium/Firefox/g

[-] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago

You could try Niri. I have tested it with a ~10 year old notebook with a 1st gen Core i5 cpu.

But, even newest Gnome runs smooth on this machine.

[-] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

Xfce, LXQt or just install JWM and enjoy the 30 Mb idle RAM usage

[-] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago

LXQt, XFCE, Maté, TDE. Any of them will do. Which you choose depends on personal preference and how large an ecosystem you want—LXQt has only a few basic applications, TDE has pretty much everything that was in KDE3, the others are somewhere in between.

[-] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago

I love OB with tint2 and conky , no de needed.

[-] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago

If it was for me I could use something like that. But I don't think the person I'll give the pc to would be able to lol

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[-] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago
[-] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago

Your biggest problem is going to be the 4 GB of RAM. Saving a few hundred megs on the DE will help but not much. If you run a web browser ( and I cannot imagine using a computer without one ) that RAM is going to fill up fast.

Honestly, I would use a 32 bit distro on that hardware.

Q4OS with Trinity, Antix, Adelie, and DSL are all pretty decent options.

[-] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago
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[-] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago

Does Xfce count as light? It's got plenty of features. Should fit in 4gb well enough though.

[-] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago

If xfce doesnt count as light I don't know what would

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[-] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

There are many options, but I'd say on those specs anything will run more or less fine with some tweaks/settings.

Personally I would go with KDE Plasma, because I feel most comfortable with it. It can be pretty light on system ressources when configured properly. Disable all the visual stuff (animations, blur, anti aliasing) and some of it's background modules (baloo and some other stuff that you personally don't need).

But you should take the one you are familiar with and find out how you can tweak it to be more light. Cheers

[-] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago

I have tested KDE plasma in my main pc for a few weeks now and the ram consumption seems pretty high and have too many options. I'm looking for something light and easy to use (not many options) since the pc is going to be used by someone not very tech savvy.

[-] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

Measuring RAM usage is extremely tricky, because programs will use more than they need, if there is lots of unused RAM available. Check out https://www.linuxatemyram.com if you want to learn more.

For me KDE Plasma uses over a gig on my main PC after a fresh boot. But it also ran perfectly fine on a 512MB ancient laptop.

[-] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago

Moksha Desktop environment Bodhi Linux

[-] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago

Or Fedora Budgie Edition

[-] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago

Probably lxqt. https://lxqt-project.org/ Very lightweight yet a full-on DE (minus bells and whistles). Found on most Linux distros repositories.

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[-] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago

Does not answer your question, and someone already mentioned it in a thread, but don't forget zram when only 4GBs are available.

[-] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago
[-] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago

XFCE or LxQT but i have a preference for XFCE if it is for normal use.

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[-] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

For something with that little memory, I would use a minimal window manager; you'll want every megabyte of memory if you want to have any chance at running something like a javascript-capable browser without constantly hammering swap. fvwm, cwm, jwm, and ratpoison are all small window managers I enjoy; but do your own research into what window manager is the best for you.

[-] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago

I have a thumb drive with Mint Mate installed on it and it runs fine on a 4gb i5 - 3rd gen.

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this post was submitted on 06 Jul 2024
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