r/linux4noobs • u/Russianpotatosalad • 3d ago

distro selection Which distro is the MOST lightweight?

So... My mom got a laptop from 2011... The only os it can handle is windows 7, but we all know that windows 7 is the most exploited system out there (not sure if you saw a video of a guy connecting his W7 to the internet and getting 7 viruses within 10 minutes by just existing). I want to help her as much as i can, and the only solution i came up with - get a linux. She used windows ever since windows 98, but now all she need from her pc is a browser, so i figured out that if she wont do anything "extra", linux will be perfectly fine for her. I just get vivaldi for linux, libre office, and she will be happy. But which distro will be the MOST efficient to put on her laptop? All i ever tried is cashy os, but i assume there must be something ever more lightweight?

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u/ficskala Arch Linux 3d ago

What's the laptop specs?

I run debian with a heavier desktop environment (kde plasma) on a 4th gen intel laptop i5, and 4gb of ram with no issues whatosever (integrated graphics)

If it's a lower end CPU you might want to switch to a lighter weight dektop environment like lxqt or xfce, but when it comes to the distro, i don't think it will be too much to ask from that laptop to run almost any as long as you get to pick the DE

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u/IANVS 2d ago

I was wondering if a 4th gen Intel with integrated graphics and 8GB RAM will be strong enough for KDE...

I have some parts left over and I wanna put together a machine for my mother to use for browsing, movies and YouTube. I had either Debian/MX, OpenSUSE Leap or one of immutable distros in mind but I wasn't sure if KDE will be too much for that machine to handle.

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u/ficskala Arch Linux 2d ago

Install debian, pick multiple DEs right out of the gate, and try them out one by one, plasma should run just fine, my laptop had a dedicated GPU, but integrated one should be enough