[wplug] Distro selection assistance

[Rick Reynolds]

Dane Miller wrote:

>David Harper wrote:
>  
>
>>I am trying to install a light weight version of linux on a Sony VAIO
>>N505VE
>>    
>>
>
>just remember, light weight == reduced features
>
>You probably only need to go light weight on the desktop
>environment/window manager, not the whole distro.    Do a minimum
>install of your favorite distro, then instead of Gnome or KDE, use
>something like iceWM or fluxbox.  Your session manager (where you login)
>will automatically let you choose among the installed window managers.
>
>Ubunutu provides many window managers.  Check out:
>http://packages.ubuntu.com/breezy/x11/
>  
>

I think I'd agree with these sentiments.  I'm looking to create a backup 
server and I don't want to spend money on a hard drive for the system (I 
will be buying large hard disks for the actual backup space, 
obviously).  I have a 10GB drive lying about and I wondered if it would 
suffice for a minimal install.  I was able to install a small baseline 
Debian system in under 500MB, and I wasn't even really doing a package 
by package inspection.  I just picked the "fileserver" precanned config.

As another datapoint, I just found out about a distro called Damned 
Small Linux (http://www.damnsmalllinux.org/).  I found a vmware packaged 
virtual machine of it and booted it up to see what it was like.  I think 
the whole foot print of the VM on my hard drive was like 150MB or so.  
And it ran some kind of X window manager (I forget which ATM).  It 
seemed decent, but I didn't really put it through any real paces.

Thanks,
Rick Reynolds
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