- This topic has 14 replies, 6 voices, and was last updated Nov 6-9:42 pm by Brian Masinick.
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voider
Hello, antiX community. I just wanted to say thank you for your awesome distro, I see you put a lot of effort on it and it pays! I have a very old Acer Travelmate 290 (Intel M, 1 core @ 1,4 Ghz, 512 Mb RAM) which still barely worked, but obviously it can’t run a proprietary, up to date SO and the default, preinstalled one lost support a while ago… So I tried antiX, and it goes just fine! It can now surf the web, play music and videos, write text, read PDFs and all the usual stuff a modern machine can do (with the obvious limitations), and it does all of that reasonably fast and under the memory limit before swap, with an up-to-date core system and apps! I just wrote a small review with some of my experience (in Spanish) to share some of my early impressions. Once again, thank you and keep on with your awesome distro!
Xecure
Great article.
One thing you write that a lot of people forget about, (mainly first world countries or people that have enought money to play the “consumism” game)Además, permite que personas e incluso comunidades con recursos económicos muy escasos puedan utilizar equipos informáticos económicos, antiguos y/o aún obsoletos de forma útil y segura.
Translation: In addition, it allows people and even communities with very limited economic resources to use cheap, old and / or even obsolete computer equipment in a useful and safe way.It is funny to see how in the Debian keynote linked by Mr. Masinick, the Debian team spoke about wanting more countries and communities being “represented”, but push for updating all computers and servers and don’t really think about support for old hardware. The last moves by the Debian-gnome team pushing for removing gtk2 and python2.7 from the repos for the next Bullseye release in favor of gtk3 and python3, which are more resource demanding, removes lots of old but very resource efficient programs from the repos. Would computers like the one described by voider continue to be supported and work in future Debian releases? Last update to Buster had many Graphic cards become obsolete, as BobC demostrated in his tests. Anyway, no more doom and gloom.
Thanks for the review. A lot of people miss the SpaceFM file manager and the many cli programs available in antiX.
Welcome to the community!
antiX Live system enthusiast.
General Live Boot Parameters for antiX.ModdIt
Hallo Voider, xecure,
The facit on debian is really bitter, called the universal operating system but forgetting that most of world populace is poor
and needing to use harware as long as possible. That should be done anyway where possible to reduce environmental damage.I am low pension single father, more lucky than many because I can pay our bills. Big but, and the reason I support antix is
so many people can not afford modern computers and food. Plenty in the school my daughter goes to not even enough food.We are in Germany, a very rich country, poverty is growing very fast, people living under Bridges in old cars, in terrible housing.
The rich and face Mask racketeers are making millions in the covid pandemic. Others are losing all they worked for, seeing their kids hungry.
Not comparable to what I have seen in Asia, or from USA, but hurting.You think german rich help others, you are more likely to get help from a street musician or beggar than the owner familys of Aldi or BMW,
same goes for most others sitting on gold chairs and looking down on less fortunate. So called middle class are no better.
Brian Masinick
Hallo Voider, xecure,
The facit on debian is really bitter, called the universal operating system but forgetting that most of world populace is poor
and needing to use harware as long as possible. That should be done anyway where possible to reduce environmental damage.I am low pension single father, more lucky than many because I can pay our bills. Big but, and the reason I support antix is
so many people can not afford modern computers and food. Plenty in the school my daughter goes to not even enough food.We are in Germany, a very rich country, poverty is growing very fast, people living under Bridges in old cars, in terrible housing.
The rich and face Mask racketeers are making millions in the covid pandemic. Others are losing all they worked for, seeing their kids hungry.
Not comparable to what I have seen in Asia, or from USA, but hurting.You think german rich help others, you are more likely to get help from a street musician or beggar than the owner familys of Aldi or BMW,
same goes for most others sitting on gold chairs and looking down on less fortunate. So called middle class are no better.I’m really sorry to hear this. Though I realize that there are plenty of difficulties in many areas it’s still discouraging to hear that there’s not only difficulty there is also greed and selfish behavior in many places.
While there are several distributions that I like, antiX has always had a special place in my heart. Not only is it useful to me on old cast-off computer systems, it’s helpful for many people who may not be able to use computer systems otherwise.
One laptop per child is something I have followed in the past too. I think that antiX is even more relevant because it applies to a wider range of people and users.
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Brian MasinickBrian Masinick
Each time we help each other out with antiX, consider that it may help in a small way or large way to allow people access to information, which could lead to better opportunities in life.
Wishing health and wellness to everyone, and a future with hope and opportunity.
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Brian MasinickThank you both, Xecure and Moddlt. I see this is a welcoming community as well. 🙂
Xecure: I’m not really into GNU/Linux proselytism, mostly because I don’t like to argue and, anyway, I think it’s kind of hard to convince someone, no matter how wrong that someone may be, of something that he/she is not convinced already. 😉 But I have my own, pro-Free Software ideas and I try to make my point if I feel like it, and sure I agree with you. As an ecologically minded individual, and worried about the suffering caused by poverty, I think that anything that can help with one or the other issue has to be defended… And antiX, I believe, does its part in both: keeps old, cheap machines from being thrown to the garbage bin (ecology), and helps people with low income to keep using cheap hardware (may be useful to people in need, then). And does that in a nice, useful an fun to play with way. I mean, I’m really enjoying making my way through the endless menus, options and apps, GUI or CLI (BTW, the CLI “control center” is pure art!). I think it’s an excellent distro with a wonderful software selection. Funny thing is, there are lots of “legacy” software, unmantained maybe (ROX, Dillo and so on) which still work, for their use cases, extraordinarily well. So “don’t throw away that ‘legacy’ software yet!” XD
Moddlt: sure, I live in Europe too and I’m not close to rich myself, but the opposite… I’ll tell you something that happened to me and I think it’s related with something you say. A couple of years ago I went to a place, a “technology supermarket”, to buy a new laptop, which I needed for school and so on. So I choose a very cheap model with an Intel Celeron on it, not very performant but energy-saver and… did I already say cheap? When I told the salesperson I wanted that model, he started to complain with my choice, saying that I would have problems with that, it would be slow, it would even freeze, that I would come back for a change of laptop and so on. What he didn’t know was that I was going to install some GNU/Linux in it, so no matter how cheap the laptop was, it was going to perform admirably. As it really does. People are buying too expensive, state-of-the-art computers for doing what, check their social networks, watch some movies or TV shows and copy kitchen recipes? My cheap laptop is more than capable of that and then some. And by now I have installed GNU/Linux distros (I usually choose antiX or MX Linux, depending on the machine) to a lot of friends and related people who had old computers and/or problems with performance, computer viruses and so on. So I agree with you, we better help each other, I can’t say some rich people are helping or will be willing to help, but I won’t be sitting on the ground waiting for that kind of help in case I need it. The “help” from the antiX community, I have it today. 😉
Greetings!
Each time we help each other out with antiX, consider that it may help in a small way or large way to allow people access to information, which could lead to better opportunities in life.
Wishing health and wellness to everyone, and a future with hope and opportunity.
As I just said, I already helped a bunch of people with old/problematic computers installing some GNU/Linux distros on them (antiX and MX mostly). People are usually amazed that their “garbage” hardware comes back to life… The devs, contributors and all the communities in distros like antiX made that possible, so I can only say again, thanks! Best wishes for you too, Mr. Masnick. 🙂
Brian Masinick
marcelocripe
Hi Voider,
Welcome to antiX Linux.
Thank you for sharing your experience using antiX and also informing your computer hardware. The article on your blog about antiX was very good. Congratulations!
If you have other test results on this computer using other Linux distributions you can share your experiences at the link: https://www.antixforum.com/forums/topic/system-requirements-for-antix-and-other-debians/
In addition to everything that has already been said by you and colleagues about antiX, I think it is worth emphasizing the importance of this forum and the active participation of so many colleagues with great experience and patience of equal size. Without the support of the most experienced, it is impossible for a beginner to venture into this “world of Linux distributions”, I recognize this and I highly value it!
Xecure, is one of the things that make antiX and this forum better every day. (Thank you!)
Regarding what was mentioned by Moddlt, it is no different here in Brazil, poverty and misery only increase … The dollar today (05-11-2020) U $ 1.00 is equivalent to R $ 5.53 (Reais – currency), food prices are already 4 or 5 times more expensive. Bearing in mind that with exchange rates at this level, it favors producers to import and receive in dollars, resulting in a shortage of the domestic market and an increase in prices for the population. You don’t have to be an economist to understand this. The excuse for everything, now called “Covid-19”, but this model has been applied for more than 4 years, another two years of exponential increase in poverty and unemployment are expected.
With antiX Linux we can save many computers from being thrown away.
If the Debian community is following programmed or forced obsolescence in technology, we must continue on the opposite path. Commercial Linux distributions already do this, which is unfortunate.
Long live antiX Linux!
Or better …
Eternal life to antiX Linux!
marcelocripe
(Original text in Brazilian Portuguese)———-
Olá Voider,
Seja bem vindo ao antiX Linux.
Agradeço por você compartilhar a sua experiência no uso do antiX e ainda informar o hardware do computador. Ficou muito bom a matéria do seu blog sobre o antiX. Parabéns!
Se você tiver outros resultados de testes neste computador utilizando outras distribuições Linux poderá compartilhar a suas experiências no link: https://www.antixforum.com/forums/topic/system-requirements-for-antix-and-other-debians/
Além de tudo que já foi dito por você e pelos colegas sobre o antiX, eu acho que é válido ressaltarmos a importância deste fórum e da participação ativa de tantos colegas com grande experiência e de paciência de igual tamanho. Sem o apoio dos mais experientes, é impossível para um iniciante se aventurar neste “mundo das distribuições Linux”, eu reconheço isso e dou muito valor!
O Xecure, é um dos que tornam o antiX e este fórum cada dia melhor. (Muito obrigado!)
Sobre o que foi citado pelo Moddlt, não é diferente aqui no Brasil, a pobreza e a miséria só aumentam … O dólar hoje (05-11-2020) U$ 1,00 equivale a R$ 5,53 (Reais – moeda Brasileira), os preços dos alimentos já estão 4 ou 5 vezes mais caros. Haja vista que com câmbio neste patamar, favorece aos produtores importarem e receberem em dólar, resultando no desabastecimento do mercado interno e o aumento dos preços para a população. Não é preciso ser um economista para compreender isso. A desculpa para tudo, agora se chama “Covid-19”, mas este modelo já vem sendo aplicado a mais de 4 anos, espera-se outros dois anos de aumento exponencial da pobreza e do desemprego.
Com o antiX Linux podemos salvar muitos computadores de serem jogados no lixo.
Se a comunidade Debian está seguindo a obsolência programada ou forçada de tecnologia, temos que continuar no caminho oposto. As distribuições Linux comerciais já fazem isso, isto é lamentável.
Vida longa ao antiX Linux!
Ou melhor …
Vida eterna ao antiX Linux!
marcelocripe
(Texto original em Português do Brasil)Hi, Marcelo. Thank you for your welcome and kind words. 🙂
I haven’t tried any other distro in my Acer Travelmate and, initially, I won’t, I’m really happy with antiX performance and it’s a little bit of a mess installing something new here… But I’ll try to help in other forum places if I think I have something useful to say. I’m not a tech wizard really, just an user with a bit of experience, so don’t expect too much! 🙂
And I agree with you, I see changes in the GNU/Linux ecosystem which go against, directly or indirectly, supporting legacy hardware (dropping 32 bit support in “mainstream” distros, using new protocols and all kinds of software each time more resource-hungry and so on), and that doesn’ take into account, or seems to mind, that there are lots of people in the world who can’t afford new, better hardware. So a distro like antiX is more than needed today, I hope, as you said, it will last forever! 🙂
Best wishes.
PPC
@voider – sorry for the late welcome!
For you, and for any other newbies with use computers with less than 1 Gig of RAM, here are some tips:If you run antiX on a 512Mb machine and use it for web browsing, I would advise you to try installing “badwolf” browser (you can install it with “sudo apt install badwolf”)- it’s very basic, but runs on very low RAM, and if you turn on the “JS” (Java Script) button, you can browse even modern websites and usually avoid using your Swapfile (that slows the system down). For viewing Youtube videos, use Smtube, available out of the box. For e-mail, avoid web-mail, and use the very lean Claws e-mail client.
For viewing videos, if you experience any slow down with higher resolution videos, use MPV video player and search on-line on how to optimize your video playback for your own system (my crappy old single core netbook, with 1 Gig of RAM and not much faster that your computer, can play full HD videos in a mostly fluid way. Anything below that plays incredibly well)
For listening to music, reading PDF’s, viewing images, accessing e-mail, etc, the default antiX apps work wonders even in single core machines with less than 1G of RAM, but usability for common tasks like basic web browsing is very limited on systems with less than 512Mb – not even antiX can perform those miracles 🙂
For reading e-books (in epub format, etc) you can install Calibre (that’s huge and also manages e-books) or try using fbreader. There’s even epub readers that work in your terminal (like https://github.com/wustho/epr)!
For writing- LibreOffice Writer works great, but it can be slow to start and take a bit of RAM… You can try installing FreeOffice (it looks like a MS Word clone, has great file compatibility and runs on way less than 100 Mb of RAM, but I’m not sure if it’s available for 32 bits) or (for simple texts) Abiword (that’s very light but not very feature rich and doesn’t have very good file compatibility)
P.
@voider,
If i am not mistaken you can max your ram to 1GB. PC2100 DDR Ram. That is a highly recommended upgrade.
If you have a slot free you could plug in another 512 MB module, that might give a slight performance improvement
over a 1 GB module in one slot. pls check what is fitted and advise.## i just checked my parts bin.
If you like to reveal the country you live in so i can check if postage is not crazy.
I can offer you a pair of 512 MB Laptop memory modules FOC.
they were kept from an upgrade, stored static protected so should be fine.
Rest would be PM after that.I am sure a service manual for your device will be available somewhere in the depths of the internet.
Something well worth having just in case it is needed.Brian Masinick
Keeping processes in memory is extremely important to make a system responsive. Web-based processes tend to consume a lot of memory.
One of my systems has 8 GB of RAM and I have never seen it swap. I tend to keep only what I am actively working on loaded; this also helps performance because the disk and the CPU are over a decade old.
I do have plenty of memory, disk space and multiple processors and that helps the aging hardware still perform acceptably. It’s never blazing fast but it is able to handle my routine tasks.
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Brian MasinickPPC: Thank you for your kind welcome and suggestions. As I said before, I have some experience with Free Software (GNU/Linux mostly, but I have used some *BSD or Haiku too). For web browsing, Firefox is OK if I just open tabs one by one or just a few… Dillo and Netsurf are of course much less resource hungry, but you know the limitations those have. I think Palemoon is a better fit, opens almost anything and is lighter than Firefox. I have tried almost whatever browser you can name, including Badwolf. 🙂 For YT, I usually stream vids with mpv/vlc, or use youtube-dl and play them offline (this is my prefered option for audio only). As for a mail client, my phone has me covered. 😉 And sure, the antiX apps ecosystem is just great, I just love the apps included, GUI or CLI. I prefer using CLI if I have a good alternative, and apps like youtube-dl, mocp, wordgrinder, links, htop… or plain POSIX utilities are staples in my daily work. I have both a Void Linux and a Kiss Linux installs in which I don’t even have a toolbar, dektop icons, launchers or even a file manager… I startx because I need to browse the web mostly, but I use plain CLI mostly, and lots of keyboard shortcuts to manage everything (Openbox+st in Void glibc, sowm+st in Void musl and Kiss Linux). antiX, as it is, is almost a “luxurious” distro for me! 😀
Moddlt: Sure, one full Gb RAM should be a game changer in my Travelmate, but I can say I’m happy as it is… And we have three other machines at home, all of them cheap ones for sure, but more than powerful enough (two Celeron+4 Gb RAM laptops, onez four-core AMD with 8 Gb desktop) for my family needs (we don’t use them for gaming, for instance). Anyway, I’m overwhelmed for your kind offer, thank you very much! Sure someone out there has more need than I have of that RAM module, but I feel almost overwhelmed for your generosity, honestly thanks again! BTW, I’m from Mallorca, maybe you have heard about the place… 🙂
Thank you everybody, I hope I can contribute with my limited knowledge trying to help here, in this forum. I’m not too good with coding, sadly, but I can also offer my help as a translator (English to Spanish and/or Catalan) for any antiX project, and/or writting documentation or whatever.
Best wishes!
Brian Masinick
Catalan – that immediately caught my attention. Way back in the 1990s I used to work in a UNIX development organization. Our team was involved with language translations, internationalization and localization. I worked on a project that helped us add quite a few additional languages to our existing collection, as well as improve both the translations, key mappings, accelerators, and other features specific to localization.
Catalan was one language variant that I had never heard of until that project. The work itself wasn’t too complex; what made it interesting was the interaction with European and Asian counterparts who worked together with me to get the job done. They performed the translations and other localization work; I gave them the “C locale” files, automated the process to send this information to them, receive their translations, build them into our UNIX build, and send them the localized UNIX kit to test, and repeat as needed until the work was complete.
Our company sold hardware and software, plus support services, so completing this work helped us win business for some businesses that operated in several countries.
I enjoyed the project and made several new friends in various parts of the world. To this day, I enjoy interacting with people from much different backgrounds, so thank you for the privilege of sharing some “happy times” I have previously enjoyed and I hope that the antiX project is equally helpful to you!
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Brian Masinick
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