5 ms·
I just bought an old ~2008 netbook that came with a fresh install of XP on it. I was shocked at how slow and unresponsive it was. I really don't imagine windows
by weavie 13y ago
I just bought an old ~2008 netbook that came with a fresh install of XP on it. I was shocked at how slow and unresponsive it was. I really don't imagine windows 8 would improve the situation at all, quite the opposite, I suspect the machine would be completely unusable.
Reinstalling Arch with XMonad as a simple display manager and the netbook is now seriously snappy. Boot time is just a few seconds from start to surfing... and that includes typing 'startx'.
Obviously few people would be techie enough or want to go through the evening it took to set it up. But really the difference between free for a working machine and $199 for a pile of sludge is a bit much in my opinion. I imagine there is a huge gap here for Linux to fill for all that old hardware that still works but needs an OS that will still work with it.
- sz4kerto 13y agoWindows 7 (and 8, and 8.1) are actually quicker than XP on most machines, given that your PC has >=1G RAM. Obviously it's difficult to beat XMonad's startup speed. However, the problem with old machines is not the OS, as the OS itself barely consumes any resources compared to browsers, for example. So you might save X MB of RAM by using XMonad instead of Gnome or Windows, but it does not help if a Chrome tab needs 100 MB (The Verge front page, for example).
- Already__Taken 13y agoI'm testing windows 8.1 on a couple samsung N145 Plus netbooks it's a lot better than 7 runs. They are still crap though, but less crap with 8 on.