Thank you all for the comments/feedback. i didn't realized how many people actually use Linux. I think my next Linux project may be installing it on an old Dell Optiplex.
If I could reliably get the windows apps I need every day to work under Linux I would join you But Wine is unreliable and using a virtual machine is a pain Some apps are just essential to me
After our house burned down in 2013, a friend gave me her sons old laptop he used in Iraq in 2006. I installed Linux Mint on that old beast and it was a good system. It really helped out in getting things done for the rebuild and then some, with VLC player. I'm currently typing away, after watching your video on my, circa 2013, eleven year old Dell 7010 SFF (4th gen intel CPU, 16GB RAM... and I forget the Radeon video card in it) with current Linux Mint 21.3 Cinnamon as it's OS and it's been my daily driver for a long time now. I even watch Plex on it. No drama, few and rare hiccups, which usually involve the printer. Printers! ...Imagine that! lol I'm refurbishing a Dell 3050sff for my sister right now. She works very long days, is care taker for our mom and a grandmother that has the baby often on her off days. Her evening entertainment normally is only with a smart phone and a tablet and she knows nothing about computers beyond that. She's going to get a great system with Linux Mint and a good sized monitor to watch movies and such with. Plus, she will have Free tech and user support from her big brother. I live some 1500 miles away. I wish I could do more for her. As for Linux for desktops; From my understanding, Linux has jumped to about 4% of use globally, from 2%, while Windows enjoys over 70% of the desktop market, globally. Apple has most of the remainder. (servers are a whole different story. Linux and Red Hat Linux seem to dominate the market.) Come October of 2025, the global E-Waste is going to become a very large problem - like, the size of certain states are large, type of problem, at least. (Say, Thank You Microsoft!) These soon to be non - compliant for Windows 11 computers, still have tremendous life and use in them, as you just demonstrated. For myself, I've found that the Super Penguin just Rocks! Plus, it's free. Donations are all that's asked for and not required. No muss, no fuss.
Hi, Similar to my story, my daily machine is a Lenovo core2duo, which i purchased new in 2010 or 2013. While it runs Win 10 fine the major updates take some time as hdd is 100% anywhere from 10 to 45 minutes, luckily it is only about 2 or 3 times a year - i may clone the drive to a new SSD and see if it helps, but the drive is sound and healthy. Eco waste is a issue, i have machines in the garage going back as far as Pentium 100, they all work fine, there is a mini lan hub connection for about 4 desktops and 4 laptops ( Pentium 100 / 200 , P4, Pentium M ) N=Most of these machines can run linux 32bit fine, some do need the PAE versions, however while i have spare HDD and SSD they all run the original software, but i do have swap drives with dual boot Eco waste again, the climb in resources required makes hardware obsolete, at work they scraped everything older than gen 6 intel Other than modern day internet / security / youtube, these machines work fine they way they were designed, oh - most cant render full time video without being choppy or laggy - VLC is good but wont make up for older and slower processor - my P100 does not have MMX - i think the P200 does If your machine is to old for Linux Mint you can try Linux Puppy
@@georgemaragos2378 That's how I got started on Linux. It was 2010 and an old Micronics tower from 2001 or 2002 that had many virus's on it, thanks to my son. I stumbled upon Wary Puppy Linux, and it rocked at helping to cleanup that old beast! I'm going to try out MX linux on that old laptop from 2006. The battery pack is dead, but I'm just curious. I might play with some other light weight distro's as well and see what happens.
@@NorthernChimp Nope. A Fujitsu Lifebook C Series, with a Pentium 4, boasting Win XP installed (at the time) It has an older Linux Mint version on it ATM. I forgot how heavy thing is! lol I pulled it out of storage shortly after posting. Out of curiosity, I'm going see what this old beast has left in it.
Just a recommendation for both Windows and Linux with this hardware. You might be able to improve your RUclips performance quite a bit by using the H264ify extension. Older machines especially have trouble with the default VP9 video codec used in RUclips. With the extension you can make the browser automatically request the h.264 codec that many older machines have hardware decoding for.
Good advice. That laptop cannot display 1080p, so he should have had it set to 720p anyway. Unless he connects it to a larger display he won't gain anything by going above 720p. This is from a review "The 17.3-inch LED-backlit display has a resolution of 1,600x900 pixels; that's good enough to support 720p HD playback, but not full HD."
You a legend bro, i was wondering why youtube was struggling at times while movie sites plays witout buffering ...i just installed tiny10 on my 32bit sony vaio thas been shelved for the past eight years due to some display damaged with its screen. I decided to install tiny10 and i couldn't believe that it works pretty well for streaming except youtube...after installing the extension problem solved. Its used as the media player with my tv
That is the BEST distro to start with! I've tried most Debian based distros and always come back to Mint. I've been using it on my main computer for close to 8 years and love how rock solid reliable it is.
A while back now, I completed 3 master's degrees on a $100 Toshiba laptop which came with Vista. I installed Linux Mint on it and that machine worked very well. I still have it and it is still running Linux.
On top of installing linux, upgrading to an SSD if it doesn't have one already helps a ton. Old RAM is still somewhat cheap so maxing out the memory and upgrading to an SSD makes it feel like a whole different computer. QOL improvment even if you're not gaming on it. I did this to an AMD A6 laptop and it became my mobile workstation for 2 years. It's currently running Fedora Kinoite.
@@bbgarnettTotallyNotABot Yes thank you for the reminder. It was so helpful. Maybe... there are people on the internet that don't believe an ssd makes that much of a difference. Well here is me agreeing with the video (motions to the video) 🫢...🙄
Good advice upgrade old laptops or desktops with some Ram, minimal 8 for smooth use and a SSD, 128 at least for boot and local files. If you have lack of money consider Chinese from Aliexpress. A nice brand for this would be Goldenfir. But there are more.
The youtube video playback is mostly limited by the old CPU/GPU. I find videos tend to run a bit smoother in Chrome on linux. Linux Mint was what made me finally ditch windows and use it full time, I've been running on it for over 2 months now, although I prefer the XFCE4 version. For such an older laptop I would recommend to install the XFCE4 version as it uses less resources. IF you run on new hardware and some of the hardware doesn't work properly it can sometimes help to update the kernel. That can be easily done from the update manager by selecting View->Kernels and selecting the kernel with the highest version number (atm that's 6.5), clicking on the install button and rebooting. I liked that you showed all the steps you took and also which issues you encountered. It gives people a good representation on what to expect.
Same here on my 17" Vaio. Get 8GB RAM and a 500GB SSD and you're on your way. By the way, you didn't seem to go into the BIOS and set the loading priority to "Enable external drive" before hitting the install button on-screen.
I bought a low end Lenovo laptop mainly for just surfing the net and basic tasks. It came with win11 and it is painfully slow. Going to try live booting a few distros and pick one I like. Mint is certainly in the mix.
My Toshiba laptop is 17 years old, Core 2 Intel, 4gb DDR2. I am dual booting Linux Mint 21.3 and Mint 20.3. It has been running many Linux distros dual booted with windows, etc., for over 10 years, the only thing ever replaced has been the battery. No it is not a rocket ship but it runs quite well to this day. This started as a fun project and morphed into my dumping Windows totally and running Linux on all my systems, might not work for many and most but works for me.
As for the dropped frames on youtube vidoes, there's not a ton you can do there. The processor in that laptop is a low-powered, mobile processor that wasn't anywhere near top of the line even when it was new, so you're never going to get optimal playback on high-quality streaming videos no matter what OS you use. You can try a lighter-weight Linux distro that uses a less power-consuming desktop than Cinnamon, like XFCE or LXQT, and of course you can always lower the video quality to 720 or 480p, but you're never going to get smooth 4k or even 1440p playback on a laptop that weak and that old.
On low-resource machines, Debian-based distros usually perform even better. If they are also accompanied by lightweight desktops interfaces like xfce or lxde, old machines seem to fly. In addition to heating up less and booting as if they were computers twice as powerful. On an i5-i2500 machine from 2011, which I am writing to you, I have installed MX Linux in its xfce version. It runs much faster than with Windows 7 that came with it, in all activities. It heats up much less, meaning it also consumes less. I have even installed a VMWare Player with a "Windows 7 Ultimate" for a Legacy Windows program that I need and all ok, even speed. MX Linux is a desktop-oriented distribution as simple as Mint, but Debian based. I have tweaked the UI desktop interface a lot... almost unrecognizable. It looks almost nothing like the default configuration. It has turned out very beautiful and elegant at my eyes. There is a bit of a learning curve to get used to (very basic), but as with everything, don’t?. Furthermore, once overcome it is forever. And most importantly: without telemetry, recalls, and future intrusions into my privacy. I feel much freer. I feel much more at peace and comfortable with digital life. No longer be at the expense of the whims and interests of the large corporations in power. I have taken control 100% of my computer. I understand that for many people it is the least of priorities. For me it has been like going back to the beginning as far as sensations are concerned. It is worth overcoming yourself if you are aware of what your privacy, control and digital freedom are worth. Mint also has a version that uses xfce as the main desktop interface. Although being based on Ubuntu, it is slightly less optimized for very low-resource machines. But it is also an very interesting option.
@@FarmerRiddick Good luck. If you have any problem with the sound or hardware, try to see if it is resolved by changing to the Kernel that comes with SystemD. It is not the default one, but in my case it has solved a problem of losing sound when the PC returned from Suspend state.
An i5-2500 is three times as fast as this laptop. MX Linux should go airborne on that system, it's meant for far slower systems. Lean Linux distros are not necessary for either, but I understand the preference.
@@drewnewby The System becomes quieter. The CPU fan, which I have adjusted on the motherboard to minimize the rpms for a safe processor temperature range, even work at less load, that alone makes it worth. And since the desktop graphical environment is very pleasant. -I have heavily adapted it to my taste-, and functionality is complete, is a win-win for me. However precisely because it is a combination especially suitable for low-resource computers, I pointed it out to consider if anyone wish.
Ah, great vid. And Linux Mint is my Favorite Distro, use it for a old Dell Optiplex 790 for RUclips/Movies/Some Backup gaming... And after you got everything installed, you need to do the updates and such, Mint run's much better with them. Remember, the Terminal is you're friend, Linux is very user friendly, it's just Picky about who it's friends are XD
I have been using Linux for years. I only have 1 machine that uses windows and that is my game machine. For the average user Linux is great. The machine I built for my Mom Is using Linux and she has absolutely no issues with it.
I can see a jump in Linux usage when they drop Windows 10 support, but what I believe will be most likely is that some people will flock to cut-down Windows 11 versions, like Tiny11 and MiniOS, to keep their computers running
I never buy new PC's or laptops only refurb's,the first thing I do is then install Linux on them. I have been using Linux for years but finally got rid of any Windows machines in the mid 2010's. I have been running various Linux distro's only ever since.
Started on Mint 5 years ago. Eventually settled on ArcoLinux running i3wm. Still have Mint on my backup machine. I prefer rolling release, TWM's, and pixel perfect control of application windows. Only a bigger, better, faster GPU can solve frame rates in HD. Stick to 720p. FYI, it's noob, not knob, also it's Mah-tey, and pre-emptively, it's soo-doo, not soo-doh. :) Welcome to Linux.
i have nothing against Linux Mint, its a solid distro for begginers (I am a windows lifelong user, with little experience on MacOS and Linux, for context), but I think the best distro for people migrating from Windows is Zorin OS. It has a far more attractive interface, I have yet to encounter driver incompatibility issues across a wide range of hardware, and it is smooth as heck. A sample list of computers I have installed Zorin in: 1. desktop computer running a Core 2 duo, with 4gb DDR3 RAM and booting from an old HDD. 2. Thinkpad X61 with Core 2 Duo, with 4gb DDR2, booting from SATA SSD. 3. Compaq CQ57, with an old dual-core AMD processor, 4GB DDR3 RAM, and a HDD. 4. 2011 MacBook Pro, powered by Core i7, 12GB DDR3, booting from SATA SSD.
@@basicdadtech Linux distros are quite the rabbit hole, regarding variety 😝 and Zorin is not even one of the most esoteric ones; Zorin OS got quite a bit of coverage in RUclips when the 17th version was released, precisely because it was so friendly for OS migrants.
If you are a complete Linux beginner use a distro that is popular so you can easily get support. That means Debian, Ubuntu, and Mint. The same goes for Fedora and Arch but they need extra things to be setup.
@@neofox2526 as I said, I have nothing against Mint. I have used, and it is great, I just find it bland in comparison. Regarding long term support, the fact that Zorin is on its 17th version, and the developer simultaneously offers three different versions (Core, Pro and Education - there is also Lite, but they tend to lag a bit releasing updates for that one) should indicate how serious their are about it. Regarding popularity, there has been quite some coverage on internet, but it has been sporadic. However, most reviewers have praised what it offers for people who transition. Note: your comment and advice are valid points, and I keep the updated ISO for Linux Mint in my computer to occasionally use precisely for that reason. Have not used Ubuntu for quite a while, however
I always say that if the machine came with W-7, install Zorin Core, and if it came with W-10 then go with Mint Cinnamon. Your transition either way will be seamless.
Very awesome video! I had also a old Samsung laptop which runned originally Windows 7. Later on I installed Linux Mint on it and it runned like a charm on it.
I'm running Linux Mint Cinnamon on a Microsoft Surface Pro 3 that I bought for $60 on EBay. The cpu is a 4th generation I7 which was useable on windows 10 but sluggish after I installed 11. Mint flies on this little device. Not only do I use it for RUclips, but I also stream live baseball game webcasts with no problems. Mint is my friend!
IMOP it is the easiest for a beginning user to install and figure out. So easy to build a live drive and try out or install. There are so many good distros to choose from but Mint is one of the easiest for a newbie to start out with.
bought my first Windows desktop in 1993, and owned or used every version from 3.1 to 11, with the exception of 95. I started using Linux Mint last July and removed Windows from the last computer I had it installed on last month. Other than gaming, which I'm not into, and a small number of specialty apps, which I don't use, I find Linux much more user friendly, and less intrusive. I'm running 3 different Linux distros on computers as old as a Core 2 Duo from 2009, and it runs fine on old hardware. With the direction Microsoft is taking Windows, I don't see myself ever going back!
My old pc went to Nirvana i had to use 4 core 8 threads pc with 32gb ram, everything lower than that is just annoying and makes no fun to work on it and it is so cheap, i bought a new pc for like $350 with 8 core 16 thread, i just upgraded the ram to 48gb ram, personally i would not run a pc lower than 8c16t and minimum of 48gb ram, Windows 11 is so fast. And now you get the same system for like $250 even lower.
Most of those old laptops did not have a resolution of f 1920 x 1080, which is needed for 1080p . If it is something like 1280 x 720, there is no advantage to setting anything above 720p. This quality won't improve. 720p will run on that without frame drops. I found this on an old review about that laptop. The 17.3-inch LED-backlit display has a resolution of 1,600x900 pixels; that's good enough to support 720p HD playback, but not full HD.
What really makes the difference in performance on old laptops like this are two things (in addition to installing Linux): 1) Adding ram 2) Replacing the spinning hard drive with a SSD I upgraded an old Toshiba laptop (13 or 14 years old) by doing those two things and I still use it today. It runs VERY well (nearly 3 times as fast as it did previously using the original hardware). I went with Xfce instead of Cinnamon. The cost to upgrade it was UNDER $65.00 by purchasing the new parts from Amazon. I bought a 500gb SSD for $37.00 and doubled the ram to 8gb for $20.00.
I have one slower than this one, i make it fly using Arch with a very minimal installation and everything with hardware acceleration. If you have anything newer than a 775 and don't want to watch 4k videos you will be fine for most uses just putting one SSD and Linux Mint with XFCE.
That CPU has a very good iGPU (for it's age). Try toggling hardware acceleration on/off for video playback in Firefox. Does it play 720p ok? I noticed the CPU is pegged at 100% usage..definitely try hardware acceleration to get the iGPU helping in youtube. Edit. Your ram usage is way over 6 GB. Hmm.
I purchased a used computer with Linux Mint and what I really like it over Windows is how much quicker everything loads as well as how much is integrated. I switched over from Windows 7. The only challenge was learning the software, but was well worth it :)
This is a good video. A real Linux Mint install. I have been using Linux Mint for a while. I stopped using windows 10 when Microsoft decided to declare my older PC obsolete. I built a new PC that has only had Linux Mint. My older "obsolete" PC is my print server.
I have been daily deiving linux for 3 years now, never fully went back to windows but I still duolboot it sometimes for programs that absolutely do not run on linux. Like VR
That is not old, that is ancient my brother, a 2 core in 2024 is a no go. You get 8 core 16 thread 1st Generation Ryzen Cpu System for like $200 and it will be 100 smoother. How do you even enjoy working on that thing.
@@ibobeko4309 it still does the job and will far into the future, and you would be amazed at what just upgrading the HDD to a quality SSD can do for ancient computers, it breathes new life into them.
I've been using Linux for well over 10 years now. Full-time for about half of that. I mainline Linux Mint Cinnamon but I've tried many distros over the years. I always find myself coming back to Mint though.
I use Linux Mint on a former Windows laptop that ran Windows 10. It did not have an SSD hard drive, and there was a problem (unfixed to my knowledge) that caused the disk to be at 100% usage and bogged down the system to distraction. I bought and installed an SSD and also Linux (experimenting with several distros). I also had an older MacBook Air. I put WATT OS on it (small footprint but nice and fast on that system…cool distro). I’m definitely a Linux fan.
It works great for me. Quite speedy even on my older laptop. Very little clutter, but I still can do everything I need to do. Might not be as feature-rich as MX Linux or Antix, but it's very much worth a try!
I found mint to quickly bloat up when i installed software on a 2012 laptop with 6GB of memory and an old i5. Zorin ran better and so did Debian 12. I then clean installed windows 10 with a custom debloated ISO and it ran better than any of the Linux OSes
Truth. Linux fan boys don't want to hear that. I've yet to see a functional Linux that's faster than a streamlined Windows install. The only exception is the Google Cloudready OS but that's a different animal, it's basically a cloud OS not a full desktop OS so it's not an equal comparison.
I'm noticing that. I installed the newest mint cinnamon on 2 laptops. The fresh install is idling under 2 GB. The laptop I just installed a bunch of software on is using 3.6GB.
It's easy to call this an old, low performance laptop, but it's also important to mention Windows 10 will run fine on a laptop with half it's performance, Linux even less. This particular laptop isn't much of a challenge for either OS, though it's a likely a common laptop generation to consider starting to experiment with Linux.
I used to work at Free Geek Toronto and while there I developed a standard installation process manual based on how they were installing it. I have since used that to install Linux Mit on over 100 different machines from Pentium 3's up to Multi CPU former servers now turned into computer workstations. I have never come across a machine that I could not successfully install on. There are some fine points in regard to older IBM laptop due to proprietary devices but other than that it's totally smooth. Linux mint has evolved rendering some steps less relevant.
You might try to see if there is another driver for the video hardware. I believe it will find a better one in the Mint (driver update) section. Thanks for the upload.
Got you beat, my Toshiba/L/T came with Win Vista installed. Hdwe Intel. Core2 4GB DDR2. Loaded Win 7 pro after a year then started dual booting an early Ubuntu distro as an experiment, it was so fun that eventually blew Win 7 out altogether and went straight on with Linux. The old girl is now running Mint 21.3, still runs like a clock, the only thing ever changed was the battery, all other hdwe is stock, yes I bought the laptop brand new, way way back
I've tried Linux a few times over the years but always end up back on Windows due to gaming. I know Valve and Proton have made it easier to game but I still had a rough time trying to install games off GoG
The heroic games launcher makes it simple to install GoG games, it automatically handles Proton like Steam. You can install it on Windows to see for yourself.
I have been using a linux of some type, since the '90s. Right now I am dual booting, mint 21.3, and win 10 on this hp 6300 series desktop. It works well for me, I do not game at all I also have a dell that Dual boot win 11 and mint. I do not use it very much, I have not tried to use windows 11 much. As far as video goes, I think some laptops allow use to borrow some ram from your board ram, or you may be able to find an add on upgrade video card. Welcome to the club!
LMDE works fine on two core AMD Athlon with 3GB DDR3. I put a cheapest cooling stand under and connected a wired keyboard and mouse to it so I don't feel it's heat. Best of all there is so many free and really good software and no retarded adds.
Mint is a great distro for starting on Linux. I'm still a noob after a couple years using it on my old laptop. I decided on Mint because the GUI looks similar to navigate like Windows 10. So the learning curve is not a huge gap in some areas. Also, the best part about moving to Linux is that when you set it up, it does not prompt you to have a user account ready like Windows 11 does.
I run the latest Linux mint on my 2008 white MacBook, and it runs well. I also use it on an old Dell inspiron that shipped with Windows Vista. I have switched to Linux and have no intention of switching back to windows.
Ive been running linux mint on an old laptop for a few weeks and its great. If your running an old mechanical HDD though i would recommend at least upgrading to an SSD
I just did the same thing on a 2011 macbook pro. works great. I can utilize ancient 16 bit and 32 bit software and hardware (e.g. Iomega jaz units) with no problems.
I had the same issue on restart. Trying continue testing instead of restarting and then select shutdown. This seems to eliminate those endless errors which never stop, even if you leave the computer running for 12 hours.
I've heard that Linux Mint Cinnamon edition is one of the nicest versions available. I have a couple pf older laptops I will install it on. For email, watching RUclips, or creating a document it seems perfect for that .
Last week i tried manjaro 24, it has the cleanest Desktop and was very fast and it supported everything from my Bluetooth stick, my wlan stick, printer, everything out of the box. What you could do make a usb stick with different version of Linux and tried it, you start from the usb without installing, it is is called live usb, if you like you can install it.
I've been running Mint on my laptops after trying windows 11 and hating it. Did have to do some tweaking to get my fingerprint reader and video hardware acceleration working but other than that it's been pretty painless. I'm not new to Linux but haven't run it as a desktop OS in a while and it's certainly gotten a lot easier than it was even a few years ago. Nice to see so many people at least giving Linux a shot, especially on older hardware keeping it from becoming ewaste. I think the issue you were seeing with dropped frames is probably lack of hardware video acceleration or possibly missing drivers, you can check in Firefox if hardware video acceleration is enabled and there are guides out there on how to check if hardware acceleration is working and using H264ify if needed (as someone else mentioned).
Overall Linux is snappier and more responsive on old hardware, but it is still limited by its components. That machine should do fine though as basic task machine for many years, with some emulation thrown in. Video playback might be limited, you might be able to squeeze a bit more out if you ran the CPU governor in performance mode (by default it will be in a sort of balanced mode) but at a cost of battery life, which i doubt this has much of tbh... If you head over to the linux mint forums and search "Permanently set CPU governor to 'Performance'?" you will find information on how to do this if you're interested.
I've also tried Linux Mint, it's a great distro for people who want something that works out of the box, you can also check resource usage with system monitor, it took me 1.3gb on idle with Linux Mint with Cinnamon(The default Desktop Environment)
For the dropped frames, something to check -- In firefox, under Edit Settings | General, scroll down to Performance and uncheck "Use hardware acceleration when available". No idea if that will help in your case, but something to try. I've had to turn off hardware acceleration in several other video playback programs too, like Celluloid, etc.
About 2 weeks ago I put a second SSD in my SFF OptiPlex 7010 so I could install Linux Mint and dual boot with Windows 10. I'm very impressed, it will make a good Windows replacement when my OptiPlex reaches EOL for Win10.
Cinnamon Edition could be a bit much for this machine. Usually, if the hardware isn't recent, you can start out with a KDE based distro like Kubuntu, which is a bit lighter than Cinnamon or Gnome based stuff. If that's still too much, try LXQT, then XFCE. If that's still too much I'd go straight to something like AntiX that's based on a window manager.
OK, just to clarify, I also don't watch RUclips at full-screen, unless I want to zoom into fine detail, I totally forgot to mention it in my first comment. Until I repeat the experiment at full-screen, my results won't mean much. Anyway, I just tried my old AMD A-series laptop on RUclips at 480p. It lost only 8 out of over 9000 frames. At 720p it lost 32 out of 17000 frames, and it was more noticeable. Again, this was not full-screen, so I'll get back to you in a while on that.
My neighbor had Windows 8 and I installed an SSD and Linux Mint. Gave him about 15 minutes of instruction and he is still using it. Note: He barely knew how to use Windows and only uses the PC for browsing, emails, and RUclips videos.
The dropped frames in RUclips are down to the laptop's graphics capabilities, not the OS. I have an old Lenovo i3 laptop of a similar age (originally a Windows 7 machine) which now runs Linux Mint perfectly well, and it's as useful as it was when it was new. Booting is quick and everyday tasks are handled snappily, so it's now a handy backup computer.
Yes, and you also get the option to install alongside an existing OS for a dual-boot system. Most Linux installers include a disk management option as well, so you can partition your drive before installation.
watching this on Firefox on my HP ProBook 645 laptop, with AMD A10 pro processor, 8GB ddr3 ram, 128GB SSD, installed with Linux Mint 21.3 XFCE.. I have some initial hiccups with the setup but after updating, it worked just fine.. much faster than when its in Windows11.. but on my observation, the Cinnamon version is much better than the XFCE.. but still xfce is a little snapier. I only game on this laptop on various nintendo game emulators and it worked just fine.. Watching 720p - 1080p videos and youtube is still smooth..
i would buy more ram, used ddr3 ram is so cheap and it will a make huge difference. I had A10 system for 1 week, when my system broke down, with Windows 10, that thing was very slow.
You can get better frame rate with chrome. While Linux users like me like to promote Firefox, the reality is, for yt, chrome is twice as fast. So consider installing it and setting up the res to 480p or so.
@EugeniaLoli I installed Chrome and was able to zero dropped frame rates when watching 720p video. 1080p still had dropped frames. But I can live with 720p. Thank you.
Even though it is clean install of the (Latest Version) you should still run updates. Open terminal and run sudo apt update Then when that is done run sudo apt upgrade.
You could try installing the Zen Kernel. I don't know how much it would increase in performance; but it might help a little or drastically. I think it varies from the research i've done on it.
I have a very old laptop with AMD E450 APU, bit more older than yours. In use it for my Linux experiments. Yesterday I installed Linux Mint XFCE on it before that I was running Linux Lite on it. My main laptop runs Windows. Balena Etcher always ruin my laptop. Whenever I make a installation media through it never make it run with MBR. I have to use Rufus on Windows. Why can't give user a choice to format installation disk on MBR or GPT? I wish if Rufus had a Linux version.
The first thing which I do after Linux Mint restarts is to enable the firewall and then install all of the updates and then check the notifications. After you removed the flash drive did you press the enter key? I prefer Linux Mint Mate as it's more stable and uses fewer resources and it has been my daily driver for several years.
My wife has an old i3 2120 Toshiba laptop, is was as slow as on Win 7, I put Ubuntu on it and it sings, she loves it, does everything she wants. I think the main cause of it being slow was all the Toshiba crap that it had to load. But anyway it's running fine with Ubuntu, takes us less space, is faster and easy to use.
@@JoshuaTheRUclipsGuy2000 You can try different live versions, if you see it supports everything than you can install it. I would try Debian it has one best support and lowest hardware requirements.
Don't be afraid of the command line. It can be intimidating, but stick with it. Soon you will be entering linux commands in the windows command line lol! I built a PC with linux mint on it, but unfortunately my school only recognizes winows or mac OS's so I don't use it for a daily driver like I want
You probably have a 4GB module and a 2GB module such that the RAM is 6GB and thereby maybe on 5GB is available once 1Gb is taken up by the APU graphics. If you put more RAM in it _(such as swapping that 2GB for a 4Gb or more)_ so you have at least 8GB _(which, do remember, will be 7GB once the APU has taken its graphic RAM of 1GB),_ then you will find a few eSports games run OK on low settings. However, the RAM will generally improve performance for other software too, including allowing a few web-browser tabs and a little improvement to video playback which should be noticeable even if not perfect. Try to match the CAS timings written on the old 4GB RAM module chips stick to the ones on a new 4GB RAM stick you pair with it. You can actually put 2 of 8GB modules in the laptop to get 16GB which ends up being 15GB since the 1GB is taken by the APU graphics. Those laptops can take a DDR3 SODIMM of either 1600MHz when doubled data rate (pc3-12800) or 1866MHz RAM type PC3-14900 SODIMM and the speed difference is not generally noticed. Just ensure the RAM is compatible since high density RAM in terms of Intel versus AMD can be fussy _(so they don't all work hence trial and error)._ The UltimateBootCD_UBCD538 can test and benchmark RAM _(as can Hirens_CD)_ and Linux Mint can test RAM too, as many a distro can. Having at least the 8GB _(i.e. 7GB with 1GB taken for graphics APU)_ will help BSD such as GhostBSD run better too, f you desire something similar to linux as a test (or OpenIndiana). My comment has no hate in it and I do no harm. I am not appalled or afraid, boasting or envying or complaining... Just saying. Psalms23: Giving thanks and praise to the Lord and peace and love. Also, I'd say Matthew6.
From my experience, Linux works for very basic users and very advanced users 😁 Problematic are the people who need to do something more specific, but do not have the knowledge.
That looked easy, so I've tried your tutorial to the letter. Sadlly it did not work. I'm wondering if a stage has been missed out. Balena Etcher does not accept the file. On the liunuxmit site ,it mentions verifi the ISO image, but there is no mention of that in your video
Hey. Sorry it didn't work for you. This was my first time trying out Linux myself. Yeah I didn't verify the ISO image but when Balena Etcher flashes it to the USB it does Validate it.
CPU and graphic card are weak for RUclips video, esp. fullscreen. Get SmTube and Smplayer but Celluloid or VLC will work, too. Mint has two more distros on their website. Xfce and MATE. Both of them are lighter than Cinnamon.
The screen is probably only 720. No point doing 1080. If you install the H264 , which is a Firefox add on, it will use it to decode videos. Not the more recent VP8 that modern machines us.
if you try it out from usb drive and change/update settings - is there a way to install Mint based on how you have tested things out? or will you have to resetup everything after officially install it?
Random thoughts: It's possible the SanDisk USB wasn't compatible with the laptop because it's designed for USB 3.0. I've not had any trouble with SanDisk 32 GB USB 2.0 flash drives. After installing Linux Mint the USB read error is because Mint "ejected" the USB but is trying to read from it. This isn't supposed to happen but should be harmless. Most Windows 7-era laptops won't have an SSD installed unless they've been upgraded. Mint doesn't require an SSD but will run pretty slowly if you're still using the original drive that came with the laptop. Dropped frames in RUclips is expected with such an old CPU at 1080p, especially at 60 fps. 1080p 30 fps videos should be OK, otherwise try lowering RUclips's playback quality to 720p. The laptop probably only has a 1366x768 screen anyway, so 720p will be fine.
i have used a plethora of linux distros on my i5 4th gen w/ 8gb ddr3 and ssd laptop, and none of them made the RUclips playback any better than Windows 10 or 11, they performed even worse in this aspect. i've tried enabling/disabling hardware acceleration using all the instructions of the Arch linux wiki and never got close to how Windows handles youtube with more ease.
@@basicdadtech back then (more than 2 years since i've used linux desktop) i used to like Manjaro the most and Linux mint a close second. nowadays i just use debloated windows11 with christitus utility.
![KSI - Dirty [Official Visualiser]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/VoDh1h1dPUE/mqdefault.jpg)
Thank you all for the comments/feedback. i didn't realized how many people actually use Linux. I think my next Linux project may be installing it on an old Dell Optiplex.
It works really well, have Linux Mint Debian Edition running without issues on a Dell Optiplex 7020
I've been using Linux for over ten years. Getting rid of Windows was one of the best decisions I've ever made. 🙂
If I could reliably get the windows apps I need every day to work under Linux I would join you
But Wine is unreliable and using a virtual machine is a pain
Some apps are just essential to me
Yes true, I had the same, 5 years ago...👍
10 years later, he's still installing his web browser.
@@wadewilson6628 nah unless he is using gentoo else it installs in 10 seconds
Compatibility of foreign language keyboard layout is buggy as hell
After our house burned down in 2013, a friend gave me her sons old laptop he used in Iraq in 2006. I installed Linux Mint on that old beast and it was a good system. It really helped out in getting things done for the rebuild and then some, with VLC player.
I'm currently typing away, after watching your video on my, circa 2013, eleven year old Dell 7010 SFF (4th gen intel CPU, 16GB RAM... and I forget the Radeon video card in it) with current Linux Mint 21.3 Cinnamon as it's OS and it's been my daily driver for a long time now. I even watch Plex on it. No drama, few and rare hiccups, which usually involve the printer. Printers! ...Imagine that! lol
I'm refurbishing a Dell 3050sff for my sister right now. She works very long days, is care taker for our mom and a grandmother that has the baby often on her off days. Her evening entertainment normally is only with a smart phone and a tablet and she knows nothing about computers beyond that.
She's going to get a great system with Linux Mint and a good sized monitor to watch movies and such with.
Plus, she will have Free tech and user support from her big brother. I live some 1500 miles away. I wish I could do more for her.
As for Linux for desktops;
From my understanding, Linux has jumped to about 4% of use globally, from 2%, while Windows enjoys over 70% of the desktop market, globally. Apple has most of the remainder. (servers are a whole different story. Linux and Red Hat Linux seem to dominate the market.)
Come October of 2025, the global E-Waste is going to become a very large problem - like, the size of certain states are large, type of problem, at least. (Say, Thank You Microsoft!)
These soon to be non - compliant for Windows 11 computers, still have tremendous life and use in them, as you just demonstrated.
For myself, I've found that the Super Penguin just Rocks!
Plus, it's free. Donations are all that's asked for and not required. No muss, no fuss.
Hi, Similar to my story, my daily machine is a Lenovo core2duo, which i purchased new in 2010 or 2013. While it runs Win 10 fine the major updates take some time as hdd is 100% anywhere from 10 to 45 minutes, luckily it is only about 2 or 3 times a year - i may clone the drive to a new SSD and see if it helps, but the drive is sound and healthy.
Eco waste is a issue, i have machines in the garage going back as far as Pentium 100, they all work fine, there is a mini lan hub connection for about 4 desktops and 4 laptops ( Pentium 100 / 200 , P4, Pentium M ) N=Most of these machines can run linux 32bit fine, some do need the PAE versions, however while i have spare HDD and SSD they all run the original software, but i do have swap drives with dual boot
Eco waste again, the climb in resources required makes hardware obsolete, at work they scraped everything older than gen 6 intel
Other than modern day internet / security / youtube, these machines work fine they way they were designed, oh - most cant render full time video without being choppy or laggy - VLC is good but wont make up for older and slower processor - my P100 does not have MMX - i think the P200 does
If your machine is to old for Linux Mint you can try Linux Puppy
@@georgemaragos2378 That's how I got started on Linux.
It was 2010 and an old Micronics tower from 2001 or 2002 that had many virus's on it, thanks to my son.
I stumbled upon Wary Puppy Linux, and it rocked at helping to cleanup that old beast!
I'm going to try out MX linux on that old laptop from 2006. The battery pack is dead, but I'm just curious. I might play with some other light weight distro's as well and see what happens.
Was it one of those compromised ThinkPads that where distributed to the whole American army in Iraq? Did you make sure it was sanitized?
@@NorthernChimp Nope. A Fujitsu Lifebook C Series, with a Pentium 4, boasting Win XP installed (at the time) It has an older Linux Mint version on it ATM.
I forgot how heavy thing is! lol
I pulled it out of storage shortly after posting. Out of curiosity, I'm going see what this old beast has left in it.
Sangat benar.. linux telah menyumbang dalam penyelamatan dari sampah elektronik khususnya komputer.... Memang microsoft penjahat dunia
Just a recommendation for both Windows and Linux with this hardware. You might be able to improve your RUclips performance quite a bit by using the H264ify extension. Older machines especially have trouble with the default VP9 video codec used in RUclips. With the extension you can make the browser automatically request the h.264 codec that many older machines have hardware decoding for.
neat I didn't know that, will try it out next time I'm on a slow machine
Good advice. That laptop cannot display 1080p, so he should have had it set to 720p anyway. Unless he connects it to a larger display he won't gain anything by going above 720p. This is from a review "The 17.3-inch LED-backlit display has a resolution of 1,600x900 pixels; that's good enough to support 720p HD playback, but not full HD."
You a legend bro, i was wondering why youtube was struggling at times while movie sites plays witout buffering ...i just installed tiny10 on my 32bit sony vaio thas been shelved for the past eight years due to some display damaged with its screen. I decided to install tiny10 and i couldn't believe that it works pretty well for streaming except youtube...after installing the extension problem solved. Its used as the media player with my tv
That is the BEST distro to start with! I've tried most Debian based distros and always come back to Mint. I've been using it on my main computer for close to 8 years and love how rock solid reliable it is.
Linux Mint , Ubuntu Cinnamon are probably the easiest, as one gets used to linux then you can switch to lighter window managers
Zorin OS is great for begginers too
I've been running Mint now for over 2 years as my daily driver. It can do everything I need an OS to do
Mint is not only the best for beginners but also one of the 3 best Distros imo.
A while back now, I completed 3 master's degrees on a $100 Toshiba laptop which came with Vista. I installed Linux Mint on it and that machine worked very well. I still have it and it is still running Linux.
On top of installing linux, upgrading to an SSD if it doesn't have one already helps a ton. Old RAM is still somewhat cheap so maxing out the memory and upgrading to an SSD makes it feel like a whole different computer. QOL improvment even if you're not gaming on it. I did this to an AMD A6 laptop and it became my mobile workstation for 2 years. It's currently running Fedora Kinoite.
@ 4:30
@@bbgarnettTotallyNotABot Yes thank you for the reminder. It was so helpful. Maybe... there are people on the internet that don't believe an ssd makes that much of a difference. Well here is me agreeing with the video (motions to the video) 🫢...🙄
Good advice upgrade old laptops or desktops with some Ram, minimal 8 for smooth use and a SSD, 128 at least for boot and local files. If you have lack of money consider Chinese from Aliexpress. A nice brand for this would be Goldenfir. But there are more.
The youtube video playback is mostly limited by the old CPU/GPU. I find videos tend to run a bit smoother in Chrome on linux. Linux Mint was what made me finally ditch windows and use it full time, I've been running on it for over 2 months now, although I prefer the XFCE4 version. For such an older laptop I would recommend to install the XFCE4 version as it uses less resources. IF you run on new hardware and some of the hardware doesn't work properly it can sometimes help to update the kernel. That can be easily done from the update manager by selecting View->Kernels and selecting the kernel with the highest version number (atm that's 6.5), clicking on the install button and rebooting. I liked that you showed all the steps you took and also which issues you encountered. It gives people a good representation on what to expect.
Mint can revive any old laptop I just used it on my 20 yrs old vaio and it’s never been better 🎉
Same here on my 17" Vaio. Get 8GB RAM and a 500GB SSD and you're on your way. By the way, you didn't seem to go into the BIOS and set the loading priority to "Enable external drive" before hitting the install button on-screen.
I bought a low end Lenovo laptop mainly for just surfing the net and basic tasks. It came with win11 and it is painfully slow. Going to try live booting a few distros and pick one I like. Mint is certainly in the mix.
Zorin is another good choice
My Toshiba laptop is 17 years old, Core 2 Intel, 4gb DDR2. I am dual booting Linux Mint 21.3 and Mint 20.3. It has been running many Linux distros dual booted with windows, etc., for over 10 years, the only thing ever replaced has been the battery. No it is not a rocket ship but it runs quite well to this day. This started as a fun project and morphed into my dumping Windows totally and running Linux on all my systems, might not work for many and most but works for me.
As for the dropped frames on youtube vidoes, there's not a ton you can do there. The processor in that laptop is a low-powered, mobile processor that wasn't anywhere near top of the line even when it was new, so you're never going to get optimal playback on high-quality streaming videos no matter what OS you use. You can try a lighter-weight Linux distro that uses a less power-consuming desktop than Cinnamon, like XFCE or LXQT, and of course you can always lower the video quality to 720 or 480p, but you're never going to get smooth 4k or even 1440p playback on a laptop that weak and that old.
On low-resource machines, Debian-based distros usually perform even better. If they are also accompanied by lightweight desktops interfaces like xfce or lxde, old machines seem to fly. In addition to heating up less and booting as if they were computers twice as powerful.
On an i5-i2500 machine from 2011, which I am writing to you, I have installed MX Linux in its xfce version. It runs much faster than with Windows 7 that came with it, in all activities. It heats up much less, meaning it also consumes less. I have even installed a VMWare Player with a "Windows 7 Ultimate" for a Legacy Windows program that I need and all ok, even speed.
MX Linux is a desktop-oriented distribution as simple as Mint, but Debian based. I have tweaked the UI desktop interface a lot... almost unrecognizable. It looks almost nothing like the default configuration. It has turned out very beautiful and elegant at my eyes. There is a bit of a learning curve to get used to (very basic), but as with everything, don’t?. Furthermore, once overcome it is forever. And most importantly: without telemetry, recalls, and future intrusions into my privacy.
I feel much freer. I feel much more at peace and comfortable with digital life. No longer be at the expense of the whims and interests of the large corporations in power. I have taken control 100% of my computer. I understand that for many people it is the least of priorities. For me it has been like going back to the beginning as far as sensations are concerned. It is worth overcoming yourself if you are aware of what your privacy, control and digital freedom are worth.
Mint also has a version that uses xfce as the main desktop interface. Although being based on Ubuntu, it is slightly less optimized for very low-resource machines. But it is also an very interesting option.
Thanks for the great info.
@@basicdadtech I'll have to MX Linux a shot.
@@FarmerRiddick Good luck. If you have any problem with the sound or hardware, try to see if it is resolved by changing to the Kernel that comes with SystemD. It is not the default one, but in my case it has solved a problem of losing sound when the PC returned from Suspend state.
An i5-2500 is three times as fast as this laptop. MX Linux should go airborne on that system, it's meant for far slower systems. Lean Linux distros are not necessary for either, but I understand the preference.
@@drewnewby The System becomes quieter. The CPU fan, which I have adjusted on the motherboard to minimize the rpms for a safe processor temperature range, even work at less load, that alone makes it worth. And since the desktop graphical environment is very pleasant. -I have heavily adapted it to my taste-, and functionality is complete, is a win-win for me.
However precisely because it is a combination especially suitable for low-resource computers, I pointed it out to consider if anyone wish.
Ah, great vid.
And Linux Mint is my Favorite Distro, use it for a old Dell Optiplex 790 for RUclips/Movies/Some Backup gaming...
And after you got everything installed, you need to do the updates and such, Mint run's much better with them. Remember, the Terminal is you're friend, Linux is very user friendly, it's just Picky about who it's friends are XD
I run latest Linux Mint XFCE on my MacBookPro from 2008. It runs fine!
I run Mx Linux on an Acer laptop from 2008 with 2 giga ram. It runs well.
I run TinyCore Linux on a 2001 IBM laptop with 512MB of RAM. It runs great!
how many of you can smoothly run RUclips 1080p?
I have been using Linux for years. I only have 1 machine that uses windows and that is my game machine. For the average user Linux is great. The machine I built for my Mom Is using Linux and she has absolutely no issues with it.
I can see a jump in Linux usage when they drop Windows 10 support, but what I believe will be most likely is that some people will flock to cut-down Windows 11 versions, like Tiny11 and MiniOS, to keep their computers running
@@guaiqueritech Windows 11 LTSC is out
@@guaiqueritechyea, everybody want to switch from a gui to cli to install programs etc...wake up, we are live in 2024!
I never buy new PC's or laptops only refurb's,the first thing I do is then install Linux on them. I have been using Linux for years but finally got rid of any Windows machines in the mid 2010's. I have been running various Linux distro's only ever since.
Started on Mint 5 years ago. Eventually settled on ArcoLinux running i3wm. Still have Mint on my backup machine. I prefer rolling release, TWM's, and pixel perfect control of application windows.
Only a bigger, better, faster GPU can solve frame rates in HD. Stick to 720p.
FYI, it's noob, not knob, also it's Mah-tey, and pre-emptively, it's soo-doo, not soo-doh. :) Welcome to Linux.
i have nothing against Linux Mint, its a solid distro for begginers (I am a windows lifelong user, with little experience on MacOS and Linux, for context), but I think the best distro for people migrating from Windows is Zorin OS. It has a far more attractive interface, I have yet to encounter driver incompatibility issues across a wide range of hardware, and it is smooth as heck.
A sample list of computers I have installed Zorin in:
1. desktop computer running a Core 2 duo, with 4gb DDR3 RAM and booting from an old HDD.
2. Thinkpad X61 with Core 2 Duo, with 4gb DDR2, booting from SATA SSD.
3. Compaq CQ57, with an old dual-core AMD processor, 4GB DDR3 RAM, and a HDD.
4. 2011 MacBook Pro, powered by Core i7, 12GB DDR3, booting from SATA SSD.
I will have to check out Zorin. There is just so many different versions of Linux. I didn’t realize it until I made this video.
@@basicdadtech Linux distros are quite the rabbit hole, regarding variety 😝 and Zorin is not even one of the most esoteric ones; Zorin OS got quite a bit of coverage in RUclips when the 17th version was released, precisely because it was so friendly for OS migrants.
If you are a complete Linux beginner use a distro that is popular so you can easily get support. That means Debian, Ubuntu, and Mint. The same goes for Fedora and Arch but they need extra things to be setup.
@@neofox2526 as I said, I have nothing against Mint. I have used, and it is great, I just find it bland in comparison.
Regarding long term support, the fact that Zorin is on its 17th version, and the developer simultaneously offers three different versions (Core, Pro and Education - there is also Lite, but they tend to lag a bit releasing updates for that one) should indicate how serious their are about it.
Regarding popularity, there has been quite some coverage on internet, but it has been sporadic. However, most reviewers have praised what it offers for people who transition.
Note: your comment and advice are valid points, and I keep the updated ISO for Linux Mint in my computer to occasionally use precisely for that reason. Have not used Ubuntu for quite a while, however
I always say that if the machine came with W-7, install Zorin Core, and if it came with W-10 then go with Mint Cinnamon. Your transition either way will be seamless.
Very awesome video! I had also a old Samsung laptop which runned originally Windows 7. Later on I installed Linux Mint on it and it runned like a charm on it.
I'm running Linux Mint Cinnamon on a Microsoft Surface Pro 3 that I bought for $60 on EBay. The cpu is a 4th generation I7 which was useable on windows 10 but sluggish after I installed 11. Mint flies on this little device. Not only do I use it for RUclips, but I also stream live baseball game webcasts with no problems. Mint is my friend!
For $60 that is a steal.
IMOP it is the easiest for a beginning user to install and figure out. So easy to build a live drive and try out or install. There are so many good distros to choose from but Mint is one of the easiest for a newbie to start out with.
I'm using Linux since 2012. First Ubuntu, then Mint, now PopOS.
How is PopOs, is it stabil and you play games on it ?
bought my first Windows desktop in 1993, and owned or used every version from 3.1 to 11, with the exception of 95. I started using Linux Mint last July and removed Windows from the last computer I had it installed on last month. Other than gaming, which I'm not into, and a small number of specialty apps, which I don't use, I find Linux much more user friendly, and less intrusive. I'm running 3 different Linux distros on computers as old as a Core 2 Duo from 2009, and it runs fine on old hardware.
With the direction Microsoft is taking Windows, I don't see myself ever going back!
My old pc went to Nirvana i had to use 4 core 8 threads pc with 32gb ram, everything lower than that is just annoying and makes no fun to work on it and it is so cheap, i bought a new pc for like $350 with 8 core 16 thread, i just upgraded the ram to 48gb ram, personally i would not run a pc lower than 8c16t and minimum of 48gb ram, Windows 11 is so fast. And now you get the same system for like $250 even lower.
I like Mint because Flak packages have been added to the software store without having to manually add it.
Linux Mint user here since 2020. So far, so good.
Most of those old laptops did not have a resolution of f 1920 x 1080, which is needed for 1080p . If it is something like 1280 x 720, there is no advantage to setting anything above 720p. This quality won't improve. 720p will run on that without frame drops. I found this on an old review about that laptop.
The 17.3-inch LED-backlit display has a resolution of 1,600x900 pixels; that's good enough to support 720p HD playback, but not full HD.
What really makes the difference in performance on old laptops like this are two things (in addition to installing Linux):
1) Adding ram
2) Replacing the spinning hard drive with a SSD
I upgraded an old Toshiba laptop (13 or 14 years old) by doing those two things and I still use it today. It runs VERY well (nearly 3 times as fast as it did previously using the original hardware). I went with Xfce instead of Cinnamon.
The cost to upgrade it was UNDER $65.00 by purchasing the new parts from Amazon. I bought a 500gb SSD for $37.00 and doubled the ram to 8gb for $20.00.
I have one slower than this one, i make it fly using Arch with a very minimal installation and everything with hardware acceleration.
If you have anything newer than a 775 and don't want to watch 4k videos you will be fine for most uses just putting one SSD and Linux Mint with XFCE.
That CPU has a very good iGPU (for it's age). Try toggling hardware acceleration on/off for video playback in Firefox. Does it play 720p ok? I noticed the CPU is pegged at 100% usage..definitely try hardware acceleration to get the iGPU helping in youtube. Edit. Your ram usage is way over 6 GB. Hmm.
Thanks for the tip.
I purchased a used computer with Linux Mint and what I really like it over Windows is how much quicker everything loads as well as how much is integrated. I switched over from Windows 7. The only challenge was learning the software, but was well worth it :)
I've tried Linux Mint Cinnamon & it's a nice build. I'm currently using the Cinnamon Spin of Fedora Linux.
I run Solus on a HP Chromebook from 2013 (Celeron, 4Gb RAM), only change is replacing the 16Gb SSD with 128Gb. Works fine.
This is a good video. A real Linux Mint install. I have been using Linux Mint for a while. I stopped using windows 10 when Microsoft decided to declare my older PC obsolete. I built a new PC that has only had Linux Mint. My older "obsolete" PC is my print server.
I have been daily deiving linux for 3 years now, never fully went back to windows but I still duolboot it sometimes for programs that absolutely do not run on linux. Like VR
I have an old hp 6730b that after Win7 EOL happened I put LMDE 6 on it and it runs awesome and now I can get many more years of life out of it.
That is not old, that is ancient my brother, a 2 core in 2024 is a no go. You get 8 core 16 thread 1st Generation Ryzen Cpu System for like $200 and it will be 100 smoother. How do you even enjoy working on that thing.
@@ibobeko4309 it still does the job and will far into the future, and you would be amazed at what just upgrading the HDD to a quality SSD can do for ancient computers, it breathes new life into them.
I've been using Linux for well over 10 years now. Full-time for about half of that. I mainline Linux Mint Cinnamon but I've tried many distros over the years. I always find myself coming back to Mint though.
I use Linux Mint on a former Windows laptop that ran Windows 10. It did not have an SSD hard drive, and there was a problem (unfixed to my knowledge) that caused the disk to be at 100% usage and bogged down the system to distraction. I bought and installed an SSD and also Linux (experimenting with several distros). I also had an older MacBook Air. I put WATT OS on it (small footprint but nice and fast on that system…cool distro). I’m definitely a Linux fan.
How is WATT OS ?
It works great for me. Quite speedy even on my older laptop. Very little clutter, but I still can do everything I need to do. Might not be as feature-rich as MX Linux or Antix, but it's very much worth a try!
I found mint to quickly bloat up when i installed software on a 2012 laptop with 6GB of memory and an old i5. Zorin ran better and so did Debian 12. I then clean installed windows 10 with a custom debloated ISO and it ran better than any of the Linux OSes
Truth. Linux fan boys don't want to hear that. I've yet to see a functional Linux that's faster than a streamlined Windows install. The only exception is the Google Cloudready OS but that's a different animal, it's basically a cloud OS not a full desktop OS so it's not an equal comparison.
I'm noticing that. I installed the newest mint cinnamon on 2 laptops. The fresh install is idling under 2 GB. The laptop I just installed a bunch of software on is using 3.6GB.
It's easy to call this an old, low performance laptop, but it's also important to mention Windows 10 will run fine on a laptop with half it's performance, Linux even less. This particular laptop isn't much of a challenge for either OS, though it's a likely a common laptop generation to consider starting to experiment with Linux.
I used to work at Free Geek Toronto and while there I developed a standard installation process manual based on how they were installing it. I have since used that to install Linux Mit on over 100 different machines from Pentium 3's up to Multi CPU former servers now turned into computer workstations. I have never come across a machine that I could not successfully install on. There are some fine points in regard to older IBM laptop due to proprietary devices but other than that it's totally smooth. Linux mint has evolved rendering some steps less relevant.
You might try to see if there is another driver for the video hardware. I believe it will find a better one in the Mint (driver update) section. Thanks for the upload.
Got you beat, my Toshiba/L/T came with Win Vista installed. Hdwe Intel. Core2 4GB DDR2. Loaded Win 7 pro after a year then started dual booting an early Ubuntu distro as an experiment, it was so fun that eventually blew Win 7 out altogether and went straight on with Linux. The old girl is now running Mint 21.3, still runs like a clock, the only thing ever changed was the battery, all other hdwe is stock, yes I bought the laptop brand new, way way back
I've tried Linux a few times over the years but always end up back on Windows due to gaming. I know Valve and Proton have made it easier to game but I still had a rough time trying to install games off GoG
Yeah. I feel like I wouldn’t use it for gaming.
The heroic games launcher makes it simple to install GoG games, it automatically handles Proton like Steam. You can install it on Windows to see for yourself.
Use the heroic launcher, it works pretty good for most of my games.
I have been using a linux of some type, since the '90s. Right now I am dual booting, mint 21.3, and win 10 on this hp 6300 series desktop. It works well for me, I do not game at all
I also have a dell that Dual boot win 11 and mint. I do not use it very much, I have not tried to use windows 11 much.
As far as video goes, I think some laptops allow use to borrow some ram from your board ram, or you may be able to find an add on upgrade video card.
Welcome to the club!
Try another Browser, switch on hardware acceleration in settings or get h264ify browser addon, but you might lose the highest resolution.
LMDE works fine on two core AMD Athlon with 3GB DDR3. I put a cheapest cooling stand under and connected a wired keyboard and mouse to it so I don't feel it's heat. Best of all there is so many free and really good software and no retarded adds.
Mint is a great distro for starting on Linux. I'm still a noob after a couple years using it on my old laptop. I decided on Mint because the GUI looks similar to navigate like Windows 10. So the learning curve is not a huge gap in some areas. Also, the best part about moving to Linux is that when you set it up, it does not prompt you to have a user account ready like Windows 11 does.
I run the latest Linux mint on my 2008 white MacBook, and it runs well. I also use it on an old Dell inspiron that shipped with Windows Vista. I have switched to Linux and have no intention of switching back to windows.
Ive been running linux mint on an old laptop for a few weeks and its great. If your running an old mechanical HDD though i would recommend at least upgrading to an SSD
I just did the same thing on a 2011 macbook pro. works great. I can utilize ancient 16 bit and 32 bit software and hardware (e.g. Iomega jaz units) with no problems.
Running mint in 2 of my older pc’s. Works great for what I use them for. My main pc is windows 10 pro, I do a lot of file sharing between them.
I had the same issue on restart. Trying continue testing instead of restarting and then select shutdown. This seems to eliminate those endless errors which never stop, even if you leave the computer running for 12 hours.
YOO NEW VID DROPPED WWWWW
Wow. You are quick!
@@ericg4255 he is such a great youtuber i always click the notification
I've heard that Linux Mint Cinnamon edition is one of the nicest versions available. I have a couple pf older laptops I will install it on. For email, watching RUclips, or creating a document it seems perfect for that .
Last week i tried manjaro 24, it has the cleanest Desktop and was very fast and it supported everything from my Bluetooth stick, my wlan stick, printer, everything out of the box.
What you could do make a usb stick with different version of Linux and tried it, you start from the usb without installing, it is is called live usb, if you like you can install it.
I've been running Mint on my laptops after trying windows 11 and hating it. Did have to do some tweaking to get my fingerprint reader and video hardware acceleration working but other than that it's been pretty painless. I'm not new to Linux but haven't run it as a desktop OS in a while and it's certainly gotten a lot easier than it was even a few years ago. Nice to see so many people at least giving Linux a shot, especially on older hardware keeping it from becoming ewaste.
I think the issue you were seeing with dropped frames is probably lack of hardware video acceleration or possibly missing drivers, you can check in Firefox if hardware video acceleration is enabled and there are guides out there on how to check if hardware acceleration is working and using H264ify if needed (as someone else mentioned).
Overall Linux is snappier and more responsive on old hardware, but it is still limited by its components. That machine should do fine though as basic task machine for many years, with some emulation thrown in. Video playback might be limited, you might be able to squeeze a bit more out if you ran the CPU governor in performance mode (by default it will be in a sort of balanced mode) but at a cost of battery life, which i doubt this has much of tbh... If you head over to the linux mint forums and search "Permanently set CPU governor to 'Performance'?" you will find information on how to do this if you're interested.
@leerobinson8709 Thanks for the tip. I'll check that out.
I've also tried Linux Mint, it's a great distro for people who want something that works out of the box, you can also check resource usage with system monitor, it took me 1.3gb on idle with Linux Mint with Cinnamon(The default Desktop Environment)
For the dropped frames, something to check -- In firefox, under Edit Settings | General, scroll down to Performance and uncheck "Use hardware acceleration when available". No idea if that will help in your case, but something to try. I've had to turn off hardware acceleration in several other video playback programs too, like Celluloid, etc.
Thanks for the tip. Someone had suggested installing Chrome. I did and when I set the resolution to 720p got no dropped frames.
Use Linux daily for 5 years or more. I am pretty happy with it and never looked back at Windows.
About 2 weeks ago I put a second SSD in my SFF OptiPlex 7010 so I could install Linux Mint and dual boot with Windows 10. I'm very impressed, it will make a good Windows replacement when my OptiPlex reaches EOL for Win10.
I use mint on older laptops. my min spec for comfort is 4 core, 8 GB ram, and xfce.
Cinnamon Edition could be a bit much for this machine. Usually, if the hardware isn't recent, you can start out with a KDE based distro like Kubuntu, which is a bit lighter than Cinnamon or Gnome based stuff. If that's still too much, try LXQT, then XFCE. If that's still too much I'd go straight to something like AntiX that's based on a window manager.
OK, just to clarify, I also don't watch RUclips at full-screen, unless I want to zoom into fine detail, I totally forgot to mention it in my first comment. Until I repeat the experiment at full-screen, my results won't mean much. Anyway, I just tried my old AMD A-series laptop on RUclips at 480p. It lost only 8 out of over 9000 frames. At 720p it lost 32 out of 17000 frames, and it was more noticeable. Again, this was not full-screen, so I'll get back to you in a while on that.
The xfce version probably would have ran a little bit better since it is a little lighter on resources
You did what i fear to do on a 100$ laptop lol.. Can't wait until next Thursday to do the same
LOL. There’s nothing to fear.
My neighbor had Windows 8 and I installed an SSD and Linux Mint. Gave him about 15 minutes of instruction and he is still using it. Note: He barely knew how to use Windows and only uses the PC for browsing, emails, and RUclips videos.
The dropped frames in RUclips are down to the laptop's graphics capabilities, not the OS.
I have an old Lenovo i3 laptop of a similar age (originally a Windows 7 machine) which now runs Linux Mint perfectly well, and it's as useful as it was when it was new. Booting is quick and everyday tasks are handled snappily, so it's now a handy backup computer.
Would like a Ubuntu comparison.
if you have multiple drives (in/attached) to the device - are you given the option to select which drive to wipe and install Mint to?
Yes.
Yes, and you also get the option to install alongside an existing OS for a dual-boot system. Most Linux installers include a disk management option as well, so you can partition your drive before installation.
Is that a mechanical drive in the laptop? I have an older laptop with a celery cpu and boots faster with an SSD
It is an SSD.
@@basicdadtech wow it seems so slow, it is Sata1, Sata2?, pretty sure it is not Sata3. Is the latest bios installed already?
Been using Linux a long time, daily drive it on my desktop.
watching this on Firefox on my HP ProBook 645 laptop, with AMD A10 pro processor, 8GB ddr3 ram, 128GB SSD, installed with Linux Mint 21.3 XFCE.. I have some initial hiccups with the setup but after updating, it worked just fine.. much faster than when its in Windows11.. but on my observation, the Cinnamon version is much better than the XFCE.. but still xfce is a little snapier. I only game on this laptop on various nintendo game emulators and it worked just fine.. Watching 720p - 1080p videos and youtube is still smooth..
i would buy more ram, used ddr3 ram is so cheap and it will a make huge difference. I had A10 system for 1 week, when my system broke down, with Windows 10, that thing was very slow.
You can get better frame rate with chrome. While Linux users like me like to promote Firefox, the reality is, for yt, chrome is twice as fast. So consider installing it and setting up the res to 480p or so.
@EugeniaLoli I installed Chrome and was able to zero dropped frame rates when watching 720p video. 1080p still had dropped frames. But I can live with 720p. Thank you.
@@basicdadtech As I mentioned in my comment above. H264ify will most likely help in either Firefox or Chromium/Chrome. It's available for both.
When I try to flash from drive it says error. I tried downloading different Linux operations but same error. Says that it’s not a function
You could try Linux Mint XFCE. It might improve the dropped frames in RUclips issue. Maybe try it using a usb flash drive first?
Even though it is clean install of the (Latest Version) you should still run updates. Open terminal and run sudo apt update Then when that is done run sudo apt upgrade.
Batocera linux is a good one to make a retro game play machine if thats your need. Skips needing a full gui install
Try disabling hardware acceleration in your browser settings to help with video playback 😊
You could try installing the Zen Kernel. I don't know how much it would increase in performance; but it might help a little or drastically. I think it varies from the research i've done on it.
I have a very old laptop with AMD E450 APU, bit more older than yours. In use it for my Linux experiments. Yesterday I installed Linux Mint XFCE on it before that I was running Linux Lite on it. My main laptop runs Windows.
Balena Etcher always ruin my laptop. Whenever I make a installation media through it never make it run with MBR. I have to use Rufus on Windows. Why can't give user a choice to format installation disk on MBR or GPT?
I wish if Rufus had a Linux version.
“I was a little concerned” yeah average Linux user experience
LOL. 😂
The first thing which I do after Linux Mint restarts is to enable the firewall and then install all of the updates and then check the notifications. After you removed the flash drive did you press the enter key? I prefer Linux Mint Mate as it's more stable and uses fewer resources and it has been my daily driver for several years.
My wife has an old i3 2120 Toshiba laptop, is was as slow as on Win 7, I put Ubuntu on it and it sings, she loves it, does everything she wants. I think the main cause of it being slow was all the Toshiba crap that it had to load. But anyway it's running fine with Ubuntu, takes us less space, is faster and easy to use.
Can other Linux distros, like Ubuntu, Pop OS, and Zorin OS, be installed on this laptop, and other older laptops?
I think any of those would work. Just check the minimum requirements for each OS.
@@basicdadtech OK.
@@JoshuaTheRUclipsGuy2000 You can try different live versions, if you see it supports everything than you can install it. I would try Debian it has one best support and lowest hardware requirements.
Don't be afraid of the command line. It can be intimidating, but stick with it. Soon you will be entering linux commands in the windows command line lol! I built a PC with linux mint on it, but unfortunately my school only recognizes winows or mac OS's so I don't use it for a daily driver like I want
You probably have a 4GB module and a 2GB module such that the RAM is 6GB and thereby maybe on 5GB is available once 1Gb is taken up by the APU graphics. If you put more RAM in it _(such as swapping that 2GB for a 4Gb or more)_ so you have at least 8GB _(which, do remember, will be 7GB once the APU has taken its graphic RAM of 1GB),_ then you will find a few eSports games run OK on low settings. However, the RAM will generally improve performance for other software too, including allowing a few web-browser tabs and a little improvement to video playback which should be noticeable even if not perfect. Try to match the CAS timings written on the old 4GB RAM module chips stick to the ones on a new 4GB RAM stick you pair with it. You can actually put 2 of 8GB modules in the laptop to get 16GB which ends up being 15GB since the 1GB is taken by the APU graphics. Those laptops can take a DDR3 SODIMM of either 1600MHz when doubled data rate (pc3-12800) or 1866MHz RAM type PC3-14900 SODIMM and the speed difference is not generally noticed. Just ensure the RAM is compatible since high density RAM in terms of Intel versus AMD can be fussy _(so they don't all work hence trial and error)._ The UltimateBootCD_UBCD538 can test and benchmark RAM _(as can Hirens_CD)_ and Linux Mint can test RAM too, as many a distro can. Having at least the 8GB _(i.e. 7GB with 1GB taken for graphics APU)_ will help BSD such as GhostBSD run better too, f you desire something similar to linux as a test (or OpenIndiana).
My comment has no hate in it and I do no harm. I am not appalled or afraid, boasting or envying or complaining... Just saying. Psalms23: Giving thanks and praise to the Lord and peace and love. Also, I'd say Matthew6.
You’re right. It’s 4 and 2 GB. I wasn’t sure if this laptop would take 16 GB. If I find some cheap RAM I’ll try it.
Try with xfce, and find an os without systemd.
That did spead up things on my 2012 laptop
I use Linux for 30 yrs
From my experience, Linux works for very basic users and very advanced users 😁 Problematic are the people who need to do something more specific, but do not have the knowledge.
That looked easy, so I've tried your tutorial to the letter. Sadlly it did not work. I'm wondering if a stage has been missed out. Balena Etcher does not accept the file. On the liunuxmit site ,it mentions verifi the ISO image, but there is no mention of that in your video
Hey. Sorry it didn't work for you. This was my first time trying out Linux myself. Yeah I didn't verify the ISO image but when Balena Etcher flashes it to the USB it does Validate it.
Just use rufus or ventoy
or try YUMI Multiboot USB Software .
I tried Cinnamon but kept getting Grub errors. Also a noob, so don't know what that is but it refused to load. Fatal error.
CPU and graphic card are weak for RUclips video, esp. fullscreen.
Get SmTube and Smplayer but Celluloid or VLC will work, too.
Mint has two more distros on their website. Xfce and MATE. Both of them are lighter than Cinnamon.
There's another edition of mint , its called LMDE. Linux mint Debian edition. Mint runs off Ubuntu which based off Debian.
The screen is probably only 720. No point doing 1080. If you install the H264 , which is a Firefox add on, it will use it to decode videos. Not the more recent VP8 that modern machines us.
if you try it out from usb drive and change/update settings - is there a way to install Mint based on how you have tested things out? or will you have to resetup everything after officially install it?
Doesn't save any data at all. So yes, you have to start again. Just install and play with it.
Consider use Mint LMDE6, more stable!
I use Linux Mint but I build a Modern PC with it have not use to old of a laptop I think 2016 for my kiddos laptop and it is also on mint
Random thoughts:
It's possible the SanDisk USB wasn't compatible with the laptop because it's designed for USB 3.0. I've not had any trouble with SanDisk 32 GB USB 2.0 flash drives.
After installing Linux Mint the USB read error is because Mint "ejected" the USB but is trying to read from it. This isn't supposed to happen but should be harmless.
Most Windows 7-era laptops won't have an SSD installed unless they've been upgraded. Mint doesn't require an SSD but will run pretty slowly if you're still using the original drive that came with the laptop.
Dropped frames in RUclips is expected with such an old CPU at 1080p, especially at 60 fps. 1080p 30 fps videos should be OK, otherwise try lowering RUclips's playback quality to 720p. The laptop probably only has a 1366x768 screen anyway, so 720p will be fine.
i have used a plethora of linux distros on my i5 4th gen w/ 8gb ddr3 and ssd laptop, and none of them made the RUclips playback any better than Windows 10 or 11, they performed even worse in this aspect. i've tried enabling/disabling hardware acceleration using all the instructions of the Arch linux wiki and never got close to how Windows handles youtube with more ease.
@turbografx.16 which distro do you like the best?
@@basicdadtech back then (more than 2 years since i've used linux desktop) i used to like Manjaro the most and Linux mint a close second. nowadays i just use debloated windows11 with christitus utility.
Yes