Anybody have good guides on repurposing old 32bit laptops?

carl_the_llama, 11 months ago

Okay I have some experience reviving some old 32bit computers so here is my opinion.

Tiny core is crazy fast for old hardware. Installing that thing is like ducktaping a jet engine to a bicycle, is amazing. However it brings all the problems you can expect with ducktaping a jet engine to a bicycle. To use it without going mad you need to comfortable with linux.

On second place is Debian with lxqt. It’s light, usable, the easiest to install and use. It will not blow your socks off but it will be usable. I recommend lxqt because it has better suport than lxde. For the installation I never used the graphical install only the ncurses one and in the software selection I only choose “lxqt” and “base system something”.

If you want Debian but faster to boot use Devuan with OpenRC.

Another option is Alpine, that shit is light and flexible but again you need to be comfortable with Linux. I don’t use it because wifi didn’t work.

Void is really nice, it’s an amazing project. But again I had wifi problems.

I never tried Slackware 32 but it seems like a good option. However I think it may give more headaches than other options on this list

I used arch32 and I recommend against it. The project is barely maintained I had a lot of package problems and it was really unstable.

I do not recommend using Gentoo (or LFS for that matter) for speed. The performance improvements you get from building everything from source are negligible. It’s a great project to learn linux and control freaks as myself but not for performance.

Tips: Read the Arch wiki “improving performance” page. Web browser (gui) - falkon Web browser (cli) - links (I found it more “user friendly” than lynx) Video player - mvp Terminal - xterm And I forgot the rest, sorry xD

TheAnonymouseJoker, 11 months ago

I am on Debian 12, and tried all these 4 DEs before coming back to GNOME. Since you sound adept at LXQt, can you recommend me something better than that weird network connection manager GUI that LXQt comes with? I found it extremely bad compared to what XFCE comes with, or the extremely easy ones with GNOME and KDE. It should not take 20 seconds to find and connect to a WiFi.

putoelquelolea, 11 months ago

I put PrimeOS on one - it’s an Android x86 fork. Runs pretty well

Anticorp, 11 months ago

You can turn it into a PiHole, or an Octoprint server, or a local DNS routing server, or use it to connect to Arduino devices, or just throw Arch on it with only the basics and have a fully functional laptop.

dingdongitsabear, 11 months ago

Linux Mint Debian Edition 32-bit. but like there’s no way you’re gonna do anything useful with it. source: I have a C2D, so at least double as fast, max 4 GB RAM (doesn’t use all of it), X1600 graphics. that thing is unusable for anything.

granted, if you wanna enter your thoughts in some rudimentary text editor and just go CLI only, maybe you can have a whole week before you realize it isn’t worth it. huge power draw, terrible performance, a battery that lasts half a second and a screen that you can sorta-maybe-sometimes read.

quad core laptops with IPS screens that can run up to 16 GB are like $50 nowadays. throw it out.

AlbigensianGhoul, 11 months ago

quad core laptops with IPS screens that can run up to 16 GB are like $50 nowadays. throw it out.

Feel free to send me the $50 bucks and I’ll buy one. I still won’t throw out perfectly functional hardware. Until then I’ll make use of what I have, thank you very much.

unix_joe, 11 months ago

Suckless on OpenBSD.

You might also try one of the alternate operating systems like Haiku or ReactOS. Haiku is very lightweight and supports both Qt and some Wine-based apps. Maybe K-Meleon on Haiku works for your system.

OhStopYellingAtMe, 11 months ago

I have an old thinkpad that I’ve turned into a HomeBridge/ Print server / media server / wireless backup base.

It has Ubuntu on it, an external drive shared via SMB for movies, CUPS for print serving, HoneBridge to manage all of my home automation, and another external SMB share to run automated backup from my regular laptops.

INeedMana, 11 months ago (edited 11 months ago)

Gnome is quite heavy, before you succumb to the void of choosing the best prompt format, try some other, lighter WMs. I like Fluxbox very much; XFCE is lighter than Gnome/KDE but still similar; i3 is also lightweight.
I guess there might be some light Firefox forks, or maybe even go back to iceweasel?

As for command line, check out:

• tmux
• zsh (it’s completion mechanisms are imo better than bash)
• mc
• how to define your shortcuts as functions inside every login shell, instead of using aliases which are easier but have limitations

Btw, slackware still maintains x32
And there’s also arch32

housepanther, 11 months ago

Put a distro like Arch 32 bit and use it like a small, low-power consumption web server.

Dougtron007, 11 months ago

I always like running Lubuntu on stuff like this. I have a netbook running an older Atom CPU and 2GB of DDr2. It runs very well on Lubuntu.

behohippy, 11 months ago

For the really old stuff, I used to do NetBSD. I’m sure their 32bit x86 support is still top notch.