Frugal OS

[j]

I have a friend with a 5 year old or so PC sans a working OS.

I think this may be a: 2.66 GHz Celeron D 330, 256 MB RAM, 60 GB Hard
Drive, DVD/CD-RW Drive.

Owner just needs email, internet, word processor and ability to
download images from a camera. She's not computer savvy.

So, I'm thinking Linux. Maybe Mint Debian with Mate (32 bit)?
Something else?

Jeff

[John Weiss]

j wrote:

> Owner just needs email, internet, word processor and ability to
> download images from a camera. She's not computer savvy.
>
> So, I'm thinking Linux. Maybe Mint Debian with Mate (32 bit)?
> Something else?

The Ubuntu distributions are fairly complete with a good GUI. If Libre
Office isn't included, it should be a quick download away. Ubuntu is
Debian based.

[Michael Black]

On Wed, 8 May 2013, j wrote:

> I have a friend with a 5 year old or so PC sans a working OS.
>
> I think this may be a: 2.66 GHz Celeron D 330, 256 MB RAM, 60 GB Hard Drive,
> DVD/CD-RW Drive.
>

That's not really "old". Up until this past October, I was using the 1GHz
hand me down that I got in December of 2003, it came with 256megs but
eventually I got it up to the max of 512megs.

Then I moved to this 3GHz computer, which is faster but is lacking even a
slot for a video card, just the PCI bus. It has 2gigs of RAM.

If you can find more ram to stuff into that, I doubt it's particularly
"ancient".

One thing, I have three 320gig SATA drives sitting around, found in cable
and satellite boxes that had hard drive recording ability, people just
tossing them out. The first time I didn't realize there was a hard drive
in the box, then later I was watching. But this "new" computer lacked a
sata bus, so I'm just using an old drive I had sitting around.

> Owner just needs email, internet, word processor and ability to download
> images from a camera. She's not computer savvy.
>
> So, I'm thinking Linux. Maybe Mint Debian with Mate (32 bit)?
> Something else?
>

I know nothing of WIndows. Linux is linux, there is variation between
distributions but they all pull from the same pool of kernel, utilities
and applications. The real difference is the installer, and the
philosophy. Once you've installed, and configured, there isn't a lot of
difference between distributions. SOme try to be "Windows-like" but one
could just as easily configure any linux distribution to be that way.

One thing, I used to use KDE with the 1GHz computer, admittedly I wsa
using a not up to date release of my favorite distribution. But when I
moved to this 3GHz computer, I went to the latest release, and found KDE
sluggish. I'm not sure whether things were turned on that shouldn't have
been turned on or what, considering this computer is 3 times as fast and
has 4 times the RAM of the old one, I noticed a sluggishness when I'd
expect things to zip around. So I dropped th XCFE, which is as fast, if
not faster, than KDE on the old computer. I didn't spend time seeing if
there were things to turn off.

But that is a factor. Some distributions, especially the more popular,
don't give a choice of Desktop, so perhaps one that uses KDE will be
sluggish.

Michael

[SMS]

The CPU is fine, it's the 256MB that's going to cause you problems.

Just don't try to install Ubuntu. I had a similar system that used to
have '98. Ubuntu would not install with only 256MB of RAM. After I added
some RAM (to 512MB) Ubuntu 12.04 would install (but 12.10 would not).
512MB is still really not enough, and the system is quite slow.

Try Lubuntu 12.04 instead.

[j]

Thanks.

I've burned her a disk with Lubuntu 12.04 alternate (has low RAM
option), and another with Mint 14 MATE.

I booted off the DVD, Mint 14 onto my desktop box. I like it. If she can
scrape up more RAM... this would really work for her.

I've got a buddy running XP on 128MB, it wouldn't take more RAM (it
wouldn't recognize more than 128). It's hard to describe what a
miserable experience that is!

Jeff
>

[j]

On 5/8/2013 10:15 PM, Michael Black wrote:> On Wed, 8 May 2013, j wrote:
>
>> I have a friend with a 5 year old or so PC sans a working OS.
>>
>> I think this may be a: 2.66 GHz Celeron D 330, 256 MB RAM, 60 GB Hard
>> Drive, DVD/CD-RW Drive.
>>
> That's not really "old". Up until this past October, I was using the
> 1GHz hand me down that I got in December of 2003, it came with 256megs
> but eventually I got it up to the max of 512megs.
>
> Then I moved to this 3GHz computer, which is faster but is lacking even
> a slot for a video card, just the PCI bus. It has 2gigs of RAM.
>
> If you can find more ram to stuff into that, I doubt it's particularly
> "ancient".

I think it uses DDR. I have none here, only DDR2, and some other misc.
The box is probably circa 98, which ain't bad.

>
> One thing, I have three 320gig SATA drives sitting around, found in
> cable and satellite boxes that had hard drive recording ability, people
> just tossing them out.

How about that.

The first time I didn't realize there was a hard
> drive in the box, then later I was watching. But this "new" computer
> lacked a sata bus, so I'm just using an old drive I had sitting around.

I think they have cards for that. I have a $20 device that converts any
kind of HD to USB. Nice for sucking up old data, or plugging one in for
a backup.

>
>> Owner just needs email, internet, word processor and ability to
>> download images from a camera. She's not computer savvy.
>>
>> So, I'm thinking Linux. Maybe Mint Debian with Mate (32 bit)?
>> Something else?
>>
> I know nothing of WIndows. Linux is linux, there is variation between
> distributions but they all pull from the same pool of kernel, utilities
> and applications. The real difference is the installer, and the
> philosophy. Once you've installed, and configured, there isn't a lot of
> difference between distributions. SOme try to be "Windows-like" but one
> could just as easily configure any linux distribution to be that way.
>
> One thing, I used to use KDE with the 1GHz computer, admittedly I wsa
> using a not up to date release of my favorite distribution. But when I
> moved to this 3GHz computer, I went to the latest release, and found KDE
> sluggish. I'm not sure whether things were turned on that shouldn't
> have been turned on or what, considering this computer is 3 times as
> fast and has 4 times the RAM of the old one, I noticed a sluggishness
> when I'd expect things to zip around. So I dropped th XCFE, which is as
> fast, if not faster, than KDE on the old computer. I didn't spend time
> seeing if there were things to turn off.

Amazing how much a desktop uses. I rather like the LXDE on the Pi. That
apparently will run on 256MB!

Jeff

[SMS]

On 5/9/2013 9:26 AM, j wrote:

> I think it uses DDR. I have none here, only DDR2, and some other misc.
> The box is probably circa 98, which ain't bad.

Obsolete RAM is quite expensive. I did buy some recently from Micron.

> > One thing, I have three 320gig SATA drives sitting around, found in
> > cable and satellite boxes that had hard drive recording ability, people
> > just tossing them out.
>
> How about that.

DirecTV and Dish charge you a lot if you don't return the set top boxes
when you cancel service. I'm sure Comcast is the same way, so why would
people throw out these boxes?

[Michael Black]

On Thu, 9 May 2013, SMS wrote:

> On 5/9/2013 9:26 AM, j wrote:
>
>> I think it uses DDR. I have none here, only DDR2, and some other misc.
>> The box is probably circa 98, which ain't bad.
>
> Obsolete RAM is quite expensive. I did buy some recently from Micron.
>

It took me some time to find RAM to move my previous 1GHz computer from
256 to 512 RAM. I either finally found it at a garage sale, or pulled it
out of some computer on the sidewalk, finally the grade of discards beinc
recent enough to upgrade my computer.

Another issue is that the older the computer, the harder it is to fill up
with RAM. That 1GHz computer had only 2 slots, and the manual said
"512megs max". So even if it could do more than 512, I owuld have had to
find two 512meg DIMMs. Since that came towards the end of one cycle, it's
harder to find. You can get more RAM for less, but it won't fit into the
old machines.

>> > One thing, I have three 320gig SATA drives sitting around, found in
>> > cable and satellite boxes that had hard drive recording ability, people
>> > just tossing them out.
>>
>> How about that.
>
> DirecTV and Dish charge you a lot if you don't return the set top boxes when
> you cancel service. I'm sure Comcast is the same way, so why would people
> throw out these boxes?
>
>

I'm begining to think because they don't know otherwise. Around here,
it's pretty common to see cable and satellite boxes in the garbage. But I
have seen four of those with hard drives, a mix of cable and satellite
boxes. But then last week, I found a fancy router/wifi box that Bell
distributes to customers, and I'm not sure those are bought outright
either.

So I suspect people may be tossing them when they are finished (ie moving)
and either they find out they did bad later, or the company doesn't find
them.


I've found plenty of DSL interface boxes, mostly cheap, yet I can't help
but wonder why the person is tossing it. If they've paid for it, they'll
need it at their new place. If they rent it, they need to return it.

Or maybe soe of the stuff is left behind when they move out, and the new
people just toss it without thinking.

The two boxes with hard drives I found last year (and I have a feeling I
looked over one that had a hard drive and I skipped it without realizing),
one needed an internet connection to do anything, so I didn't hook it up
(because I did wonder of its status). The other worked fine without a
conenction, Someone's collection of UK history, UK comedy, some episodes
of Frasier and maybe one season of "Mad Men" and some porn. You don't see
tha latter very often.

Michael

[Michael Black]

On Thu, 9 May 2013, j wrote:

> On 5/8/2013 10:15 PM, Michael Black wrote:> On Wed, 8 May 2013, j wrote:
>>
>>> I have a friend with a 5 year old or so PC sans a working OS.
>>>
>>> I think this may be a: 2.66 GHz Celeron D 330, 256 MB RAM, 60 GB Hard
>>> Drive, DVD/CD-RW Drive.
>>>
>> That's not really "old". Up until this past October, I was using the
>> 1GHz hand me down that I got in December of 2003, it came with 256megs
>> but eventually I got it up to the max of 512megs.
>>
>> Then I moved to this 3GHz computer, which is faster but is lacking even
>> a slot for a video card, just the PCI bus. It has 2gigs of RAM.
>>
>> If you can find more ram to stuff into that, I doubt it's particularly
>> "ancient".
>
> I think it uses DDR. I have none here, only DDR2, and some other misc. The
> box is probably circa 98, which ain't bad.
>>
>> One thing, I have three 320gig SATA drives sitting around, found in
>> cable and satellite boxes that had hard drive recording ability, people
>> just tossing them out.
>
> How about that.
>
> The first time I didn't realize there was a hard
>> drive in the box, then later I was watching. But this "new" computer
>> lacked a sata bus, so I'm just using an old drive I had sitting around.
>
> I think they have cards for that. I have a $20 device that converts any kind
> of HD to USB. Nice for sucking up old data, or plugging one in for a backup.

Yes they do. And I had a gift card and I was going to order the cheapest
one (which isn't stocked at the stores connected to the website) and they
say they can't ship here because the instructions are only in English. A
weird interpreation of the province's language laws.

I've put it off because that 20.00 might as well be used on a computer
that has the interface built in. So I'm just waiting for something to
turn up, the real problem now is that I can no longer tell much about a
computer from the outside, they've all become so generic.

It's like that time I wanted to add more USB ports, I was all set to buy a
hub and then a computer lying on the sidewalk had a card inside that added
four USB ports via the PCI bus. The hub wasn't very much, but I liked the
card better.

It seems like used computers have become harder to find. No longer on the
sidewalk, it seems like more people are sending them to e-waste recycling.
Or maybe they've hit enough of a plateau so people are not as quick to
dump the old for the new. I did find a 3GHz computer on the sidewalk, but
it's no better than this one, and no more RAM and no SATA ports. I've
found a few computers outside a computer store, complete with the
obligatory bad capacitors (which are harder to replace than in LCD
monitors), and they sit.

>> >>> Owner just needs email, internet, word processor and ability to
>>> download images from a camera. She's not computer savvy.
>>>
>>> So, I'm thinking Linux. Maybe Mint Debian with Mate (32 bit)?
>>> Something else?
>>>
>> I know nothing of WIndows. Linux is linux, there is variation between
>> distributions but they all pull from the same pool of kernel, utilities
>> and applications. The real difference is the installer, and the
>> philosophy. Once you've installed, and configured, there isn't a lot of
>> difference between distributions. SOme try to be "Windows-like" but one
>> could just as easily configure any linux distribution to be that way.
>>
>> One thing, I used to use KDE with the 1GHz computer, admittedly I wsa
>> using a not up to date release of my favorite distribution. But when I
>> moved to this 3GHz computer, I went to the latest release, and found KDE
>> sluggish. I'm not sure whether things were turned on that shouldn't
>> have been turned on or what, considering this computer is 3 times as
>> fast and has 4 times the RAM of the old one, I noticed a sluggishness
>> when I'd expect things to zip around. So I dropped th XCFE, which is as
>> fast, if not faster, than KDE on the old computer. I didn't spend time
>> seeing if there were things to turn off.
>
> Amazing how much a desktop uses. I rather like the LXDE on the Pi. That
> apparently will run on 256MB!
>

Somebody was talking about something new being added that runs in the
background, and uses up memory. I'm not fussy, but launching KDE seemed
slower than on the older computer, and it certainly took up more ram than
I thought was right. I would have expected the greater ram and greater
clock speed to offset the more recent software.

Michael

[j]

On 5/9/2013 10:45 PM, Michael Black wrote:
> On Thu, 9 May 2013, j wrote:
>
>> On 5/8/2013 10:15 PM, Michael Black wrote:> On Wed, 8 May 2013, j wrote:

<snip>

> It seems like used computers have become harder to find. No longer on
> the sidewalk, it seems like more people are sending them to e-waste
> recycling. Or maybe they've hit enough of a plateau so people are not as
> quick to dump the old for the new.

That I think is true. Computers are fast enough for most people.

But also, desktops are in decline and have been for many years:

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887324695104578414973888155516.html

So, first laptops, then smartphones and now iPads have scavenged
desktops market.

Most people don't need the power of a desktop and probably can't break
way from their smartphones to use one!

I don't know where all the memory goes. I remember when 4 megs was a
lot, and a lot of money, and that was windows!!!

Jeff
>
> Michael
>

[The Real Bev]

On 05/09/2013 07:45 PM, Michael Black wrote:

> On Thu, 9 May 2013, j wrote:
>
>> On 5/8/2013 10:15 PM, Michael Black wrote:> On Wed, 8 May 2013, j wrote:
>>
>> The first time I didn't realize there was a hard
>>> drive in the box, then later I was watching. But this "new" computer
>>> lacked a sata bus, so I'm just using an old drive I had sitting around.
>>
>> I think they have cards for that. I have a $20 device that converts any kind
>> of HD to USB. Nice for sucking up old data, or plugging one in for a backup.
>
> Yes they do. And I had a gift card and I was going to order the cheapest
> one (which isn't stocked at the stores connected to the website) and they
> say they can't ship here because the instructions are only in English. A
> weird interpreation of the province's language laws.

Anything here that tickles your fancy? http://dx.com/s/sata+usb+adapter

The advantage is that you can use loose drives for backing up your main
system or whatever else you might want a removable drive for.

> I've put it off because that 20.00 might as well be used on a computer
> that has the interface built in. So I'm just waiting for something to
> turn up, the real problem now is that I can no longer tell much about a
> computer from the outside, they've all become so generic.
>
> It's like that time I wanted to add more USB ports, I was all set to buy a
> hub and then a computer lying on the sidewalk had a card inside that added
> four USB ports via the PCI bus. The hub wasn't very much, but I liked the
> card better.

Unfortunately, old USB ports/hubs (USB rather than USB2 or USB3) are
agonizingly slow.

> Somebody was talking about something new being added that runs in the
> background, and uses up memory. I'm not fussy, but launching KDE seemed
> slower than on the older computer, and it certainly took up more ram than
> I thought was right. I would have expected the greater ram and greater
> clock speed to offset the more recent software.

The nice thing about KDE is that it does a lot of stuff for you that
might not be all that easy to configure without it, at least on the
5-year-old (maybe more) Acer laptop that we got at a significant
discount at Circuit City because it was the demo model and wouldn't boot
into Windows :-) I never did figure out how to make the camera work,
but Skype did it right off the bat.


--
Cheers, Bev
----------------------------------------------
"Luge strategy? Lie flat and try not to die."
-- Carmen Boyle
Olympic Luge Gold Medal winner - 1996

[Bob F]

j wrote:

>
> I don't know where all the memory goes. I remember when 4 megs was a
> lot, and a lot of money, and that was windows!!!

I once payed $35/megabyte for 8 megabytes. And that was a really good price.

[sms]

I think the increase in disk drive capacity is what's more amazing. I
remember working for a company where the _servers_ had a whopping 16.5MB
hard drive (by the time I worked there they were up to 289MB). Of course
they were networking microcomputers that had no hard disk at all, Apple
II, Commodore Pet, and early IBM PC.

[Michael Black]

It's hard to say which is more improved. After all, my first hard drive,
in late 1993, wsa only 80megs. When I started using Linux in mid-2001, it
was with a 2gig hard drive. That whole 200MHz Pentium with 32megs of RAM
and the 2gig drive I bought to run Linux was $150 used, less than the
80meg hard drive was new in 1993.

The next computer was a 1GHz computer with 256megs of RAM and a 20gig
hard drive, a hand me down given to me in late 2003.

I can get a 16gig USB flash drive for 9.99, I got a 32gig USB flash drive
for 15.00 a few months ago, Canadian prices. Not as dense as hard drives
have become, but as big or bigger than I was used to in hard drives a
decade ago, and for a lot less money.

I've started using USB flahs drives as write only backup. They are
handier than waiting for enough gigs to fill a DVDR (or fussing with
multiple writes).

I have an 8gig MP3 player that for 30.00 more I was able to add 16gigs a
few years ago (and if I'd waited, I'd spend the same amount now on a 32gig
microSD card for it). Nobody would have imagined having that kind of
storage so cheap and dense that you could just keep music on it.

And like I said, people are tossing 320gig hard drives out in the form of
satellite and cable boxes. I've found 80gig hard drives in computers
lying on the sidewalk.

The only thing I'm not feeling is the price of RAM. Since I'm not using
a new computer, the cheapest and highest density RAM isn't within my
realm, a tradeoff since I'd have to spend on a new computer to make use of
it (and it would probably come with some outrageously large amount of RAM
to begin with).

I did once buy a DIMM for that 200GHz Pentium, I forget what size it was,
but it was only $20 more than a decade ago. And I ended up throwing away
half of it, because the computer didnt' see the other half. And even then,
it was still a cheap way to get that much RAM.

Michael

[j]

I bought at $25/MB and that was an astoundingly cheap price! I had a
friend who payed almost double that.

I had an XT. The first computer I built was a 386-40, I think 80MB HD
and 4 megs of RAM. Woohoo. It was a screamer.

Every HD I bought was about the same price. Whether it was an 80MB or a
2TB. About the same for MB/CPU combos, whether it was a 386-40 or an i5.

Other peripherals have gotten way cheaper.

Jeff