Distribution Release: Legacy OS 2023

[Moderator Brian Masinick]

DistroWatch has announced the availability of Legacy OS 2023.

What I found particularly interesting about this release is that it is “a project originally targeting older hardware, has returned after several dormant years. The distribution was once a member of the Puppy Linux family, but has shifted its base to antiX while maintaining the same IceWM user interface.”

See the announcement at https://distrowatch.com/?newsid=11743 along with the description and links to download the software.

Brian
Or "The Mas"

[Member andyprough]

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That certainly is a beautiful Icewm setup.

[Moderator Brian Masinick]

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andyprough wrote:

That certainly is a beautiful Icewm setup.

I just clicked on the image a moment ago; you’re right! I look forward to giving this one a spin!
Now that my download and Live USB Maker is complete, I’ll be trying it out soon!

Brian
Or "The Mas"

[Moderator Brian Masinick]

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I logged into Legacy OS 2023 and indeed it IS antiX – it’s little more than a very nice graphical implementation of antiX.
In many places it properly credits antiX, including places where they copy the default antiX menu.
There is customization of the appearance and possible addition of a few packages, but there’s no mistaking it from antiX.

Along those lines, unless I use my USB on one of my other systems, it’s not going to be a plug-in effort on the USB; like antiX, the newest kernel is a 5.10 kernel, which doesn’t work with my wireless network, so only Bluetooth shows up. To fix this, I need to retrofit newer kernels and the entire library that supports my wireless card. I should, however, be able to test this and even install it if I wish on a couple of my other systems.

I’ll start with my Dell Inspiron 5558; this instance could be perfect to use Live on that hardware!

Brian
Or "The Mas"

[Member punranger]

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https://www.antixforum.com/forums/topic/legacyos-2023-x64-released-based-on-antix/

antiX linux: The best way to revive an old computer - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JCTaUAP6sSg

[Moderator Brian Masinick]

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Ah, THAT’S more like it!

I’m here with Legacy OS 2023 on my Dell Inspiron 5558.

I had to modify:

cat /etc/inxi.conf 
B_ALLOW_UPDATE='true'

Now I can update the information tool even before this is installed:

Before the change:

Info:
  Processes: 177 Uptime: 9m Memory: 7.68 GiB used: 1.8 GiB (23.4%)
  Shell: Bash inxi: 3.3.19

inxi -U
Starting inxi self updater.
Using curl as downloader.
Currently running inxi version number: 3.3.19
Current version patch number: 00
Current version release date: 2022-06-16
Updating inxi in /usr/bin using main branch as download source...
Validating downloaded data...
Successfully updated to main branch version: 3.3.24
New main branch version patch number: 00
New main branch version release date: 2022-12-27
To run the new version, just start inxi again.

inxi -b
System:
  Host: LegacyOS1 Kernel: 5.10.57-antix.1-amd64-smp arch: x86_64 bits: 64
    Desktop: IceWM v: 3.3.0 Distro: Legacyos-2023_x64
Machine:
  Type: Laptop System: Dell product: Inspiron 5558 v: N/A serial: 43ZW062
  Mobo: Dell model: 086DKN v: A00 serial: /43ZW062/CN1296359805AF/
    UEFI: Dell v: A18 date: 12/30/2019
Battery:
  ID-1: BAT0 charge: 30.1 Wh (100.0%) condition: 30.1/41.4 Wh (72.6%)
CPU:
  Info: dual core Intel Core i7-5500U [MT MCP] speed (MHz): avg: 2395
    min/max: 500/3000
Graphics:
  Device-1: Intel HD Graphics 5500 driver: i915 v: kernel
  Device-2: NVIDIA GK208BM [GeForce 920M] driver: nvidiafb v: kernel
  Device-3: Suyin Integrated_Webcam_HD type: USB driver: uvcvideo
  Display: x11 server: X.Org v: 1.20.11 driver: X: loaded: modesetting
    unloaded: fbdev,vesa dri: iris gpu: i915 resolution: 1366x768~60Hz
  API: OpenGL v: 4.6 Mesa 20.3.5 renderer: Mesa Intel HD Graphics 5500 (BDW
    GT2)
Network:
  Device-1: Intel Wireless 3160 driver: iwlwifi
  Device-2: Realtek RTL810xE PCI Express Fast Ethernet driver: r8169
  Device-3: Intel Bluetooth wireless interface type: USB driver: btusb
Drives:
  Local Storage: total: 561.74 GiB used: 2.99 GiB (0.5%)
Info:
  Processes: 177 Uptime: 13m Memory: 7.68 GiB used: 1.77 GiB (23.0%)
  Shell: Bash inxi: 3.3.24

Brian
Or "The Mas"

[Moderator Brian Masinick]

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All of that took place on my “live” instance of Legacy OS; it won’t “stick”, but it’s easy enough to do.
This is a pleasant instance of antiX that will work nicely on systems that the available kernels support.

Here is a quote from the Legacy OS 2023 x64 file:///usr/share/legacyos-help/index.html:
“LegacyOS Forum

Currently LegacyOS doesn’t have a Users Forum. LegacyOS has always been developed by myself in my spare time. As most issues you might be experiencing could also be being experienced by antiX Users, visiting the antiX forum and searching for the problem may provide the answer you need.

The antiX Forum is under no obligation to answer any posts you might post there, seeing LegacyOS isn’t an official antiX release.”

It would be nice if those of us who know something about this could be “kind” in our forum if we know the answer, this person is nice enough to give our
project full credit, and it is a very nice take on our distribution. I’ll help if I know the answer.

Brian
Or "The Mas"

[Member gsm]

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I have been playing with the latest version 2023 of Legacy OS. A little problem was that i could not use Ventoy to boot the live system. The boot loader could not find the initial system, while there is no such problem with Antix. With Rufus everything works fine.
The installation is exactly as with Antix and without any trouble. The system looks very nice and has a complete set of useful apps already installed.
Unfortunately the installed Legacy OS is not absolutely perfect. For my very old HP Mini 110 netbook a default kernel version 4.9 would have been a better choice.
Kernels 5.x do not support the R8101 ethernet adapter and may have issues with an old Nvidia GPU in one of my HP notebooks.

Some little flaws i found:
The Applications menu entry is missing right after the installation, but is back again after all updates are installed.
– The Software installer is inconsistent when trying to install a different kernel version.
– When Wine is being installed an error appears telling that one of the files to be installed is not the correct version. So Wine can’t be used.

Gerrit

[Moderator Brian Masinick]

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Installed on an old Thinkpad X201.

Works well!

Brian
Or "The Mas"

[Member andyprough]

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The popular Linux youtuber Distrotube did a very positive review of LegacyOS today on his channel. Looks like about 8,000 people have already watched it, and another few hundred on odysee.com: https://odysee.com/@DistroTube:2/revive-that-old-computer-with-legacy-os:7

That’s some pretty good publicity, both for Legacy and for antiX.

[Moderator Brian Masinick]

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Nice publicity for both distributions.
Thanks John for using antiX for your nice looking efficient distribution!

Brian
Or "The Mas"

[Moderator Brian Masinick]

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I also installed Legacy OS 2023 on my Dell Inspiron 5558 laptop, and I briefly enabled the antiX repo to make a few of my own customizations – adding Firefox Release and removing Firefox ESR, then modifying the taskbar with the Firefox icon in place of the general Web icon and directly call Firefox instead of the desktop invocation of the Web Browser. Once complete I disabled the antiX repo so the changes would come through as expected in Legacy OS 2023 to retain the remaining features.

I am happy with the result; now I have a slightly different look and feel to what’s still essentially antiX, with John’s appealing additions and a few of my own tweaks.

Brian
Or "The Mas"

[Author]

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