Best lesser-known distribution/DE for low-end machines?

I know Debian and others can breathe life into older machines. But i wonder if there are any distros with serious optimizations that I haven’t heard of. I’ve already tried MX Linux on an old Thinkpad SL400, and didn’t see any difference from plain Debian.

Update: thanks for the great suggestions. Forgot to say many distros feel zippy and fast until you open a web browser. Appreciate your thoughts on which web browser to use too. So far I’ve had a positive experience with Thorium and Chromium.

ReversalHatchery,

If you have any expectation of privacy, you shouldn’t use chromium based browsers. Their purpose is not privacy, and google actively makes sure it will never be.

squiblet,
@squiblet@kbin.social avatar

I used to use WindowMaker on seriously underpowered laptops 10-15 years ago. Seems like it’s still just as efficient. For something more standard interface-wise you could try IceWM.

Another thing to do is build your own kernel without any features you don’t use. Not sure how much of a difference that makes exactly.

EponymousBosh,
@EponymousBosh@beehaw.org avatar

I use SpiralLinux on my old Inspiron but it’s basically just Debian with some user-friendly tweaks. I guess you could try Tiny Core or Porteus or something really small like that.

ipsirc,
@ipsirc@lemmy.ml avatar

Try: github.com/marmolak/gray386linux <– It was designed for really old hardwares.

I’ve already tried MX Linux on an old Thinkpad SL400, and didn’t see any difference from plain Debian.

Because it’s the stock Debian + custom themes/skins + some crappy useless minitools. The 99% of packages come from the official Debian repository, the rest are only the rice.

If you have newer machine than a real 386:

bbbhltz,
@bbbhltz@beehaw.org avatar

I guess it depends on what comes with the distro. If you start off with a basic Linux install and add a DE that is low on system resources, like LXQt, you can breathe life into a machine.

Bodhi, antiX and Linux Lite come to mind.

You can also start with a minimal base, Arch, Debian, Alpine, anything, and then add packages.

atomkarinca,

alpine and void linux are pretty lightweight.

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