So I got myself a laptop on the cheap, and what I'd like to do is make a very minimalist user environment so I have few distractions and also less junk running in the background (battery life isn't so great). This way I can get out of my bedroom, go to a coffeehouse and focus on getting work done, something that's tough to do on my desktop computer which has games and chats tempting me.
Was wondering if anyone uses Custom on a Linux distro that they're particularly happy with and would recommend highly. I was thinking of going with Mint or Ubuntu, but any other suggestions are very welcome. I'm pretty much a Linux newbie but I'd like to get more familiar with it.
Good Linux distro for OHRRPGCE, Gimp, etc. on a laptop?
Moderators: Bob the Hamster, marionline, SDHawk
-
Taco Bot
- Meat, Cheese, and Silicon
- Posts: 484
- Joined: Fri Jul 18, 2014 12:15 am
- Location: Santa Cruz
- Contact:
Re: Good Linux distro for OHRRPGCE, Gimp, etc. on a laptop?
You could use Tails if you wanna go all... incognito...Foxley wrote:I was thinking of going with Mint or Ubuntu, but any other suggestions are very welcome. I'm pretty much a Linux newbie but I'd like to get more familiar with it.
Last edited by Taco Bot on Fri Aug 22, 2014 5:11 am, edited 1 time in total.
Sent from my iPhone
Starting today I am trying out Lubuntu on my netbook, which is a variant of Ubuntu with the LXDE desktop environment designed for very low spec machines. This netbook is certainly one of those. Several things, especially the file browser, are far snappier than the GNOME desktop (I didn't use Unity). I think most of the stuff eating CPU in background in stock Ubuntu is the desktop GUI, so that's better too.
Upgrading from a no-longer-supported version of Ubuntu was pretty painful though.
As far as the OHRRPGCE is concerned the only Linux-relevant thing is that you need is to install TiMidity instruments so that you can play MIDI files.
Upgrading from a no-longer-supported version of Ubuntu was pretty painful though.
As far as the OHRRPGCE is concerned the only Linux-relevant thing is that you need is to install TiMidity instruments so that you can play MIDI files.
-
BMR
- Metal King Slime
- Posts: 3310
- Joined: Mon Feb 27, 2012 2:46 pm
- Location: The Philippines
- Contact:
I second Lubuntu. I'd also recommend Xubuntu, which is pretty much the same thing, but with XFCE instead of LXDE. They're both for lower spec machines (LXDE more so), so you'd prolly have luck with either of them. I'd suggest you go for Xubuntu if you want a little bit more snaz without taking too big a hit. But if you really want bare-bones, then Lubuntu is prolly the way to go.
Well, either that or find a distro that comes with Fluxbox out of the... well, box.
Well, either that or find a distro that comes with Fluxbox out of the... well, box.
Being from the third world, I reserve the right to speak in the third person.
Using Editor version wip 20170527 gfx_sdl+fb music_sdl
Using Editor version wip 20170527 gfx_sdl+fb music_sdl
I gave Lubuntu a shot, but didn't really jive with it. Then tried Xubuntu and really like it. It looks much nicer and feels a lot more modern. And I got Custom working! I had to do something to get sdlmixer, then it and Game worked like a charm. This also comes with GIMP preinstalled so I pretty much have everything I need already, which is awesome.
The battery life and heat output has been a little worrisome even with Lubuntu, I think I was actually getting better energy performance with Windows 7. So I think I'll be making a dual boot.
The battery life and heat output has been a little worrisome even with Lubuntu, I think I was actually getting better energy performance with Windows 7. So I think I'll be making a dual boot.
-
BMR
- Metal King Slime
- Posts: 3310
- Joined: Mon Feb 27, 2012 2:46 pm
- Location: The Philippines
- Contact:
I had a bit of trouble with that too on my laptop at first. But I changed a few settings with the power manager (can't remember exactly what as it was around three years ago) but after that, it worked fine. No overheating, and decent battery life. I'd suggest doing a bit of fiddling with the settings.
Being from the third world, I reserve the right to speak in the third person.
Using Editor version wip 20170527 gfx_sdl+fb music_sdl
Using Editor version wip 20170527 gfx_sdl+fb music_sdl
Yeah, LXDE is annoying me a bit, so I might switch to XFCE, especially as I used to use it years ago.
I looked around a bit and found TLP, which should improve battery life after being installed.
Basic installation, see http://www.webupd8.org/2014/03/tlp-05-r ... buntu.html
Or see here for endless additional information: http://askubuntu.com/a/285681
I'd like to try it myself, but I've misplaced my charger.
I looked around a bit and found TLP, which should improve battery life after being installed.
Basic installation, see http://www.webupd8.org/2014/03/tlp-05-r ... buntu.html
Or see here for endless additional information: http://askubuntu.com/a/285681
I'd like to try it myself, but I've misplaced my charger.
Last edited by TMC on Wed Aug 27, 2014 9:57 am, edited 1 time in total.
I gave TLP a shot, but Xubuntu is still drawing 15-16 W while idling with the dimmest screen brightness, according to PowerTOP. Lubuntu was about the same. Looked through the configuration options, but there was really nothing to be tweaked or improved upon as the defaults are as meager and performance-starved as they can go.
Meanwhile, Windows 7 drops to 9-10 W while idling with the dimmest screen, and around 12-13 while running Custom and GraphicsGale and Opera at once.
Not sure what else can be done about it! Maybe I should try removing TLP and giving laptop-mode-tools a shot?
Meanwhile, Windows 7 drops to 9-10 W while idling with the dimmest screen, and around 12-13 while running Custom and GraphicsGale and Opera at once.
Not sure what else can be done about it! Maybe I should try removing TLP and giving laptop-mode-tools a shot?
It's not something I know much about, but this thread has some interesting suggestions. How many wakeups per second do you see? What GPU/GPUs does your laptop have and what driver are you using? (Some Nvidia laptop GPUs in particular are notoriously bad under Linux; don't know whether using propriety drivers fixes that. But Intel has far and away better Linux support than AMD or nVidia) Power consumption is one thing which I would expect Windows to be better at than Linux, because of driver issues.
Interesting thread! It's a few years old though, so I think some of the info is a bit out of date. It did prompt me to check my GPU's compatibility with the open source Radeon drivers, and it's in the 'fully supported' list, so that's good.
I think I made a breakthrough discovery tonight, though. In PowerTOP, it's reporting two "Display backlighting" devices and they both use 6 to 6.5 W. Combined, that's about 12.5-13 W just for the Display backlighting, and these things totalled together show up in the Overview too. (I know this isn't right, because this is on the dimmest backlighting setting while idle, and 13 W is 1-3 W more than what Windows 7 uses in total!)
So, yeah. I have no idea how to fix this yet, but at least I'm on to something!
I think I made a breakthrough discovery tonight, though. In PowerTOP, it's reporting two "Display backlighting" devices and they both use 6 to 6.5 W. Combined, that's about 12.5-13 W just for the Display backlighting, and these things totalled together show up in the Overview too. (I know this isn't right, because this is on the dimmest backlighting setting while idle, and 13 W is 1-3 W more than what Windows 7 uses in total!)
So, yeah. I have no idea how to fix this yet, but at least I'm on to something!