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Article:
  Resurrect Your Old PC for Music—with Linux
Subject:   Faster Distro & WM is best
Date:   2006-11-27 13:56:59
From:   jo6pack
Response to: Faster Distro & WM is best

I am just recycling an old machine from work with 250mhz Cyrix processor and (more important) a Matrix video card recovered from a Pentium 166 box. I have tried it with Damn Small Linux and with Puppy, both of which handle the video just fine and are acceptably quick with 64mb of ram (on live cd, I have not yet installed to the hard disk). Most of the mainline distros cannot handle the video card or the ancient monitor that I use. I have downloaded Vector to try but unfortunately the keyboard config doesn't work after the system is booted (a common failing with live cds in my experience; with Knoppix or DSL use the boot option codes and don't forget that you will have to hunt for the letters 'cos it thinks you have a US keymap until you tell it otherwise) so it will have to be installed to the hard drive to see.
My personal preference for a desktop is Fluxbox without icons. I want to reduce it to a blank blue screen with no wallpaper to put the fear of God into Windows users.
Brad doesn't mention it but Knoppix is one of the few distros that doesn't assume you are on a network. The pppoe config is the best and easiest to use that there is. The same tool is in DSL. Why don't I use Ubuntu as a mainline distro? No pppoe! (and a lot more like that!) Cheers Jo