I want to revive an old Lenovo laptop with an AMD A6 2.6GHz and 4GB ram, what would be the best option for a DE?

    • Crying4625@lemmy.mlOP
      1·
      2 months ago

      I was debating myself between those 2. I like xfce, and they announced recently that they have plans to move to Wayland but maybe I’ll give LXQT a try to see what it is like. Thanks for the answer

  • Eugenia@lemmy.mlEnglish
    13·
    2 months ago

    That’s fast enough to run the latest Linux Mint with Cinnamon. I have two laptops with the exact same cpu speed (passmark score) and 4 GB of ram. With 2 GB swap file you will be in business.

  • Zier@fedia.io
    12·
    2 months ago

    I’m running Kubuntu on less than that on a desktop and it works just fine.

  • cerement@slrpnk.net
    9·
    2 months ago
    • the big guns: Gnome or Plasma
    • the middle tier: Xfce or LXQt
    • the lightweights: tiling window managers (and there’s a LOT to choose from)
    • the alternative crowd: Mate, Cinnamon, Regolith
    • Crying4625@lemmy.mlOP
      5·
      2 months ago

      I think gnome and KDE Plasma are just too heavy. And I would use a WM if it was for me, in fact that what I use in my daily driver but it is for someone not that tech savvy. I may check one from the alternative crowd tho. Thanks for the answer

      • folkrav@lemmy.ca
        4·
        2 months ago

        I seem to remember hearing about Plasma having similar memory usage to XFCE. Don’t quote me on that lol

        • krash@lemmy.ml
          1·
          2 months ago

          Got any guides on how to strip plasma down to the bare necessities? I have it on a machine with 4 GB RAM, but I don’t know how to optimize it for such old hardware.

          • boredsquirrel@slrpnk.net
            2·
            2 months ago

            I updated this project once. This is a very good start on what packages you need.

            There are metapackages different for each distribution, like plasma-meta on Arch or plasma-workspace on Fedora.

            This may be too bloated, but leaving out some core components (like infocenter or display) may result in random Systemsettings pages missing.

            Also on Fedora, the “Netinstall” “minimal” variant is impossible to include wireless packages (“hardware support” group) so it is easier to start from a normal KDE install and just remove things you dont need.

            Some things are also settings like balooctl disable && balooctl purge

  • LeFantome@programming.dev
    9·
    2 months ago

    If you don’t need a full desktop environment, check-out IceWM.

    I recently checked-out Trinity ( essentially KDE 3 modernized ) and was surprised how decent it was. I used it in Q4OS but it may be available in your distro.

  • Dessalines@lemmy.ml
    6·
    2 months ago

    Its fairly difficult to find “up-to-date” performance / RAM comparisons of Linux Desktop environments, but here’s a decent one from 2019 comparing memory usage of different Ubuntu flavors.

    The most surprising thing is that despite KDE Plasma’s reputation as being more ram-hungry, it actually used less ram than XFCE, meaning its developers have been making performance a focus.

  • Sina@beehaw.org
    6·
    2 months ago

    A window manager like i3 or Openbox. If you are curious what that’s like, then try out Bunsenlab Linux. (XFWM4 is also a great choice, but it requires some know how to properly rip out the rest of Xfce, like the relatively heavy desktop and the panel)

  • LeFantome@programming.dev
    5·
    2 months ago

    Your biggest problem is going to be the 4 GB of RAM. Saving a few hundred megs on the DE will help but not much. If you run a web browser ( and I cannot imagine using a computer without one ) that RAM is going to fill up fast.

    Honestly, I would use a 32 bit distro on that hardware.

    Q4OS with Trinity, Antix, Adelie, and DSL are all pretty decent options.

    • Possibly linux@lemmy.zipEnglish
      1·
      2 months ago

      What’s wrong with 4Gb? It works fine for light usage and you can enable swap to a SSD for when you want something a little memory hungry like a lot of tabs.

      • LeFantome@programming.dev
        1·
        2 months ago

        I used a system with 6 GB daily until not long ago. I had to constantly restart my web browsers to reclaim memory. RAM was a constant issue. A 32 bit distro made things a lot better.

  • Deckweiss@lemmy.world
    4·
    2 months ago

    There are many options, but I’d say on those specs anything will run more or less fine with some tweaks/settings.

    Personally I would go with KDE Plasma, because I feel most comfortable with it. It can be pretty light on system ressources when configured properly. Disable all the visual stuff (animations, blur, anti aliasing) and some of it’s background modules (baloo and some other stuff that you personally don’t need).

    But you should take the one you are familiar with and find out how you can tweak it to be more light. Cheers

    • Crying4625@lemmy.mlOP
      2·
      2 months ago

      I have tested KDE plasma in my main pc for a few weeks now and the ram consumption seems pretty high and have too many options. I’m looking for something light and easy to use (not many options) since the pc is going to be used by someone not very tech savvy.

      • Deckweiss@lemmy.world
        3·
        2 months ago

        Measuring RAM usage is extremely tricky, because programs will use more than they need, if there is lots of unused RAM available. Check out https://www.linuxatemyram.com if you want to learn more.

        For me KDE Plasma uses over a gig on my main PC after a fresh boot. But it also ran perfectly fine on a 512MB ancient laptop.