Linux Mint 13 Maya. The ideal for a Netbook

[Nemo]

My romance with this distro dates back several versions. Although, I must admit, that in my insatiable curiosity, I was unfaithful on several occasions. However, it was always the standard by which I measured my "other" conquests. Mint does this better, Mint is faster doing this, Mint is simpler…
After much wandering, I decided to try again the sweetness of its benefits, in its version 12. But she, as suspicious as she is, was not willing to satisfy me. She did strange things with the screen brightness, she didn't move with the same ease and fluidity that had conquered me, etc.

The fact is that seeing that our relationship was impossible, I returned to the barren wasteland of searching for other distros, that would soothe me like "she" did. I certainly tried many. And I went from those that were little less than labyrinths (Arch) to the heavy and clumsy (Ubuntu), passing through the "here I catch you, here I kill you" of Slax. All without finding the same sensation that this distro had given me in its day.

During this entire period, my faithful and suffering Netbook has seen all colors. From the one that didn't recognize even its mother. To the one that recognized all the components perfectly, but was unable to make anything work.

The fact is that recently I discovered that my beloved distro had been admitted to a health center and had been cured of all the ailments that afflicted her. With tears in my eyes and almost unable to believe it, I downloaded what I thought would be the most suitable for my faithful and suffering companion of toils and travels, my decrepit Netbook.

I couldn't believe it! They had done it! She was again the same distro that had conquered my heart!
In just over 40 minutes, the entire system was installed, updated and with my work programs ready for battle.
Now everything flows in this little one, from which I write these words. It seems to have regained even the vigor of yesteryear, which I thought was lost forever. Even sometimes, when changing applications, it seems that the webcam gets wet. Perhaps excited by the joy of being light again, as in its youth.

I can only have good words for this distro, which after some years, has reinvented itself to achieve the same results that made me fall in love with her. Simplicity with elegance. Efficiency but from the simplicity of configurations. Fluidity without frills.

In summary, a distro for those people who seek something more than impressive effects when closing a window or who want to see the screen with thousands of icons or multicolored bars. Although it can also do that, since it supports Compiz, it is not its maximum in this life.
It is for people who seek in a distro a quick start or shutdown. That while working with it, everything functions as it should. That by simply searching the name of a program in the menu search box, it responds: "You don't have it installed but if you want, I can install it with just one click. Or I can search for information on the Internet, in Wikipedia, in the dictionary or at the end of the world... but you keep working."

If the hardware of your equipment is of the Hight End type... but from 2000, but you still like the soft sound of its processor. Give it another chance. Introduce it to this beauty.
Its demands are very reasonable, you won't have to mortgage your house to be able to buy new components. You only need an X86 processor for the 32-bit versions or X64 for both. 512 MB, although nobody likes to go through hardships, better 1 GB. In addition, you must provide it with a good place to live, with 5GB on your hard drive it will have more than enough. As for the graphics card, with one that is capable of displaying 800x600 it is already enough, at least in the Mate version. Cinnamon may be a bit more demanding. And of course, in some way you will have to install it on your computer, therefore, a CD/DVD drive or USB ports from which to install it.

By the way, since you've come this far, press the Respond button and write something. Even if it's bad. ;D

Best regards

[cobito]

It's clear that this version of Mint has been inspiring for you. I totally understand how you feel. The truth is that it's the perfect distro for low-performance PCs but the aesthetics are so well taken care of that it could easily compete with the most "posh" desktops around.

I've been curious and reading on other sites I've seen that it uses its own desktop environment (fork of gnome) which, without a doubt, gives it a touch of distinction that few distros can boast. I'll save this thread to try it out in a couple of weeks when I have time because it could be a good option for the netbooks that I "manage" (understand that I'm the geek who "fixes" them when they "break").

By the way, good prose.

[Yorus]

If I'm not mistaken, it uses Cinnamon, intended for all those who are not convinced by "Unitys" and "Gnome Shells". The truth is that these Mint guys really put in the effort. On my "retro" Athlon XP, the Linux distro that has worked best so far has been Mint 12 Lxde, recommended precisely by the author of this well-crafted branch.

[Sylver]

Hello Nemo

Since you have encouraged me to respond, I will say that this distro looks exquisite, although I have been away from the
Linux field for some time due to free time reasons… :nono: Nevertheless, for the next retro gadget that I rescue (probably resurrect an old P-II or similar), I promise to try out some version of Mint to see how it goes, which makes me think that it would be very good to add a "minimum requirements" section to this well-worked branch to see if my plan as a bacteriologist professor is viable xD

Congratulations on the branch and thanks for always enlightening us in such a complete and cheerful way ;D

Best regards!

[Nemo]

@Cobito. I recommend you try it. You may like or dislike its appearance, but its good performance and stability are undeniable.

@Yorus. This one offers almost a better user experience with the Mate desktop, than with LXDE. The Cinnamon environment is a bit more special with certain graphics. I have used Mate and I have no doubt in recommending it.

@Silver. Added section of minimum requirements to the main post. If you meet them, it is undoubtedly a very good option for those who do not have much experience with Linux or are terrified of having to face a terminal.

Best regards.

[Sylver]

Perfect, thank you very much Nemo
I doubt I can install it on a P-II, so it will have to be on the next P-IV that I restore

Best regards

[amd125]

Very cool post. Soon I might get an old laptop donated to me. Let's see if it works ¬¬ and I can put something like this on it :cry:

[cobito]

I am sure that Mint can run well on PCs with 256 mb ram. It should be noted that the modules that are loaded for a P2 consume much less memory than those loaded for a modern PC. In fact, I have seen systems with KDE 4 consuming less than that amount.

[Sylver]

Do you believe it cobito? I might launch myself on a suicide mission with a P-II in about a week or so and I'll tell you if it has exploded :ugly:

[cobito]

@Sylver:

Do you believe it cobito? I might launch myself on a suicide mission with a P-II in about a week or so and I'll tell you if it has exploded :ugly:

You will have a waiting time longer than you are used to, but more due to lack of processor than RAM. The PC should run acceptably well. Although you should forget about things like watching videos from Youtube, having several tabs open and so on. In general, a p2 has become obsolete, but because of the speed of the micro more than lack of resources.

A couple of years ago I installed mandriva 2010 KDE 4 on a Celeron 700 (with such a bad chipset that it went worse than a P2 at 400 MHz) with 256 mb of ram and it was a completely functional PC.

Maybe I will also launch myself this summer to do some tests. I am itching to see to what extent the requirements of Linux are due to a kernel and window managers that have become monstrous or is a "trap" of hardware manufacturers who develop morbid drivers now that we live in times when hardware resources are abundant everywhere.

[Nemo]

All in all, what have you got to lose, 40 minutes while it installs and updates? I think it's worth it.
I think that when the minimum requirements for a system are set, they are set to work with all the features and a minimum of fluidity. To the extent that you don't reach it, it will lose performance, but even if it goes slower, it will work.

Best regards.

[Sylver]

The man by force has to go much worse than my P-III Coppermine at 900Mhz, which defended itself with 300 and some RAM
Nevertheless, I will try to lower the system consumption to the maximum and to upgrade all that I can the hardware to achieve an approximation of the balance on both sides.

[Yorus]

@cobito:

You will have a waiting time longer than you are used to, but more due to lack of processor than RAM.

I am used to seeing many people who, when saying that something consumes few resources, only look at the RAM, it was about time someone commented on the micros ;D. In both my Athlon XP and the C7, the RAM is not a problem (1Gb in both), the problem is caused by the micros themselves and the graphics, but especially the former.

[cobito]

@Yorus:

I'm used to seeing many people who, when saying that something consumes few resources, only look at the RAM, it was about time someone commented on the CPUs ;D. In both my Athlon XP and the C7, the RAM is not a problem (1Gb in both), the problem is caused by the CPUs themselves and the graphics, but especially the former.

Those of us who are old dogs and still have machines from when we were young in service, suffer from the same thing. And, although it pains me to say it, Linux (along with the X server) is guilty of being a CPU hog above other systems like Windows XP.

But it's also true that the fault does not lie with the Kernel but with the graphics servers and desktop environments, no matter how light they may be (or are considered). Because as you rightly said, nowadays light means low RAM consumption.

Puff what a desire I'm getting to dust off a 386, a 486, a Pentium, and a Pentium 2 to see how the Kernel adapts.

[Nemo]

Get out the rag kid, get out. ;D let's see how those old men fight ;D

Best regards

[Yorus]

That would indeed be quite an optimization job.

[cobito]

@Nemo:

Get out the rag little one, get it out. ;D let's see how those old-timers fight ;D

Best regards

Let's see how summer turns out…

@Yorus:

That would indeed be quite an optimization job.

When Linus programmed the kernel, he did it on a 386 and optimized it to run on this micro. In theory, the kernel evaluates the needs of the system and, depending on the hardware, activates or deactivates the necessary modules, with the exception of a few basic ones that will start anyway. If the ancestral code of Linus is still in the current kernel, if I choose a precompiled distro for i386 (like Debian) and if I disable all unnecessary modules, I see no reason why it shouldn't work on a 386. Ummm…

But well, this topic was about Mint. Let's not hijack it.

[Yorus]

Today I installed it on my laptop, specifically the one that uses 64-bit Mate and…

... god!, finally!, a normal desktop like Ubuntu 10.04! (for me the best Ubuntu until they messed with Unitys & Co.

Nemo, as in your case it has been a install and done, picking up the drivers for my graphics (an HD7470m) and with everything needed for the laptop there at hand and working (temperatures, power plans, battery status...). Seriously, the latest distributions made me feel uncomfortable, although I was more or less getting the hang of Fedora 16 with Gnome Shell, but having this fork of Gnome 2 (not "classic" modes as those of Ubuntu) and my beloved Apt... ains!, I have no words ;D

[Nemo]

I am very happy. It seems that I have not been the only one, who has had tears in his eyes, when rediscovering the pleasure of everything working as it should and at the first try. :fuckyea:

Congratulations!!! ;D

Best regards.

[Sylver]

Now it's my turn for the high-risk experiment... :ugly:
Downloading Linux Mint 13 Maya MATE 32 bits and while reactivating the old P-II at 333Mhz with 256Mb of RAM... This promises companions

Saludos!