[SOLVED] Help moving from XP to Mint

[polyform]

I'm on an old Dell Latitude E5500 running WinXP at 980mb RAM / Intel Core 2 Duo CPU. I'd love to switch to Mint but not sure if it's a wise decision considering the old machine I have. I did some research and some blogs suggest installing Xfce version of Mint, not sure why though.

I mainly use my computer for coding 2d canvas games on the web, and basic 3D graphics on webgl or blender. I'm afraid of the wifi card not working, or poor integrated graphics performance after installing Mint. I once installed Mint on a better computer and the fans would turn on more than on Windows, but perhaps it was pure coincidence.

Thanks!

[Pierre]

a lightweight DE such as xfce would be the best option,
for a laptop with just 1Gb ram - how big is the hdd? - 20Gb or 40Gb?.

another option, is an O/S that is designed for older PCs:
http://www.mepiscommunity.org/mx/
"anti-X is is a mid-weight OS designed to combine an elegant and efficient desktop with simple configuration,
high stability, solid performance and medium-sized footprint. "

[polyform]

a lightweight DE such as xfce would be the best option,
for a laptop with just 1Gb ram - how big is the hdd? - 20Gb or 40Gb?.

another option, is an O/S that is designed for older PCs:
http://www.mepiscommunity.org/mx/
"anti-X is is a mid-weight OS designed to combine an elegant and efficient desktop with simple configuration,
high stability, solid performance and medium-sized footprint. "

Thanks for the reply. I actually got around 200 gigs of harddrive space, so im okay there. One more question and hopefully it's not a stupid one, can a particular distro make some computers overheat while an os like win XP doesn't?

I ask this question after experiencing a computer spinning fans unstoppably only while running mint. Could have been a coincidence though, but I have to ask.

[Reorx]

If you want to use Mint, XFCE or Mate would be the best choices for a DE. Mint 17.x is the most current generation of Mint so you will most likely start there... If you have problems with hardware compatibility, you might consider using Mint 13 (LTS) instead of Mint 17.x. 13 is more likely to have good compatibility with your "older" hardware.

Good luck!

[polyform]

If you want to use Mint, XFCE or Mate would be the best choices for a DE. Mint 17.x is the most current generation of Mint so you will most likely start there... If you have problems with hardware compatibility, you might consider using Mint 13 (LTS) instead of Mint 17.x. 13 is more likely to have good compatibility with your "older" hardware.

Good luck!

Nice! Thanks Reorx, I'm already downloading 17.1 xfce, hopefully that's enough. As long as my computer doesn't start spinning fans during rendering 3D and heavy web browsing, I'm happy

[oldgranola]

Hi, with that machine you probably don't need this but just in case: I just encountered a laptop with a non PAE CPU -pentium M I think, and nothing in the bios to enable it so LM17 kernel wouldn't run even in 'compatibility' mode. I found here that LM13 stable (I used XFCE) was the recommended choice for that situation. LTS for two more years I believe. Saved my butt as I had promised an old couple to 'fix' a power hardware issue on computer but ran into a serious XP crashing problem even in safe mode where I couldn't seem to even recover their precious old files let alone run it. Plus looked badly rootkit 'ed. But was able to save their stuff with an LM13 xfce live DVD and backup USB-HD. Worked great. Was able to talk them into wiping and installing the OS. Now its a nice big screen laptop with everything working even if old.
Thanks LM teams!

[polyform]

Hi, with that machine you probably don't need this but just in case: I just encountered a laptop with a non PAE CPU -pentium M I think, and nothing in the bios to enable it so LM17 kernel wouldn't run even in 'compatibility' mode. I found here that LM13 stable (I used XFCE) was the recommended choice for that situation. LTS for two more years I believe. Saved my butt as I had promised an old couple to 'fix' a power hardware issue on computer but ran into a serious XP crashing problem even in safe mode where I couldn't seem to even recover their precious old files let alone run it. Plus looked badly rootkit 'ed. But was able to save their stuff with an LM13 xfce live DVD and backup USB-HD. Worked great. Was able to talk them into wiping and installing the OS. Now its a nice big screen laptop with everything working even if old.
Thanks LM teams!

Thanks for the reply, glad you were able to save the data, losing a client (or friend's) data is not a nice situation I'm going to download LM13 as well, just in case. Hopefully not many differences between those versions (13 and 17).

[pcpunk]

If you want to use Mint, XFCE or Mate would be the best choices for a DE. Mint 17.x is the most current generation of Mint so you will most likely start there... If you have problems with hardware compatibility, you might consider using Mint 13 (LTS) instead of Mint 17.x. 13 is more likely to have good compatibility with your "older" hardware.

Good luck!

Nice! Thanks Reorx, I'm already downloading 17.1 xfce, hopefully that's enough. As long as my computer doesn't start spinning fans during rendering 3D and heavy web browsing, I'm happy

polyform, I think this is not an issue with linux overheating your pc, but an issue with the compatibility. linux is going to run cooler on most, so I would suggest to try another OS via. liveDVD for a test drive, or you can seek help with correcting such an issue, as it can be corrected, I think, in most cases lol, see ya!

Okay let me re-think this, 3D rendering, that might be the issue in itself, but still linux should be better, I think you should Test Drive them first, so easy-and without knowing you might have to go to Mint13 as said. You sure don't need 17.1-you will get into trouble with that-avoid Compiz! Again don't install, just testdrive.

[polyform]

If you want to use Mint, XFCE or Mate would be the best choices for a DE. Mint 17.x is the most current generation of Mint so you will most likely start there... If you have problems with hardware compatibility, you might consider using Mint 13 (LTS) instead of Mint 17.x. 13 is more likely to have good compatibility with your "older" hardware.

Good luck!

Nice! Thanks Reorx, I'm already downloading 17.1 xfce, hopefully that's enough. As long as my computer doesn't start spinning fans during rendering 3D and heavy web browsing, I'm happy

polyform, I think this is not an issue with linux overheating your pc, but an issue with the compatibility. linux is going to run cooler on most, so I would suggest to try another OS via. liveDVD for a test drive, or you can seek help with correcting such an issue, as it can be corrected, I think, in most cases lol, see ya!

Okay let me re-think this, 3D rendering, that might be the issue in itself, but still linux should be better, I think you should Test Drive them first, so easy-and without knowing you might have to go to Mint13 as said. You sure don't need 17.1-you will get into trouble with that-avoid Compiz! Again don't install, just testdrive.

I was wondering if the OS was capable of making the fans work more or not. That answers that. I'm going to download lm13 and stay on the safe side. I'll test drive it as you suggested pcpunk. If I'm able to test it via a USB, I'll try it tonight

[Tar_Ni]

You best bet is with Linux Mint Xfce. Or for an even lighter desktop environment I would suggest Lubuntu.

But to be honest the best thing you could do is to add a RAM chip in this machine. Depending on your model of RAM, you can find some used chips in working condition for a very low price on Ebay these days. Here's a 1GB chip compatible with Dell Latitude E5500 netbook for sale 13$US: http://www.ebay.com/itm/1GB-RAM-Memory- ... 3cf1c4fb25

If you can get to a total of 2GB that would definitly help.

[pcpunk]

I was wondering if the OS was capable of making the fans work more or not. That answers that. I'm going to download lm13 and stay on the safe side. I'll test drive it as you suggested pcpunk. If I'm able to test it via a USB, I'll try it tonight

I will be watching to see what happens! and Yes you should be getting more RAM. I don't know why your system is overheating, and I am not very well experienced but, as said, it is more likely it is just an incompatibility issue. You could take a look at how hot the pc actually is, have you done that? or did you just assume it was hot because of the fans running so much? This would be very important. I've seen others complain of this, do a search here and google, anything Ubuntu is good also, usually.

[polyform]

You best bet is with Linux Mint Xfce. Or for an even lighter desktop environment I would suggest Lubuntu.

But to be honest the best thing you could do is to add a RAM chip in this machine. Depending on your model of RAM, you can find some used chips in working condition for a very low price on Ebay these days. Here's a 1GB chip compatible with Dell Latitude E5500 netbook for sale 13$US: http://www.ebay.com/itm/1GB-RAM-Memory- ... 3cf1c4fb25

If you can get to a total of 2GB that would definitly help.

Thanks for the link! Didn't know the ram for this computer is so cheap

I was wondering if the OS was capable of making the fans work more or not. That answers that. I'm going to download lm13 and stay on the safe side. I'll test drive it as you suggested pcpunk. If I'm able to test it via a USB, I'll try it tonight

I will be watching to see what happens! and Yes you should be getting more RAM. I don't know why your system is overheating, and I am not very well experienced but, as said, it is more likely it is just an incompatibility issue. You could take a look at how hot the pc actually is, have you done that? or did you just assume it was hot because of the fans running so much? This would be very important. I've seen others complain of this, do a search here and google, anything Ubuntu is good also, usually.

Sorry I might have explained myself wrong, this Dell is not overheating, I was talking about a previous computer I had and now is dead. This one is not overheating on WinXP. Still waiting for the download to finish, slow connection here. 45kb/s..so a few hours more

[polyform]

I was wondering if the OS was capable of making the fans work more or not. That answers that. I'm going to download lm13 and stay on the safe side. I'll test drive it as you suggested pcpunk. If I'm able to test it via a USB, I'll try it tonight

I will be watching to see what happens! and Yes you should be getting more RAM. I don't know why your system is overheating, and I am not very well experienced but, as said, it is more likely it is just an incompatibility issue. You could take a look at how hot the pc actually is, have you done that? or did you just assume it was hot because of the fans running so much? This would be very important. I've seen others complain of this, do a search here and google, anything Ubuntu is good also, usually.

I just booted up a usb version of the live DVD and I'm in mint. If this is how it feels after installing I'm already sold. There's one huge problem though: no wifi. I get a device not ready (firmware missing) message.

After a quick google search, I found that some wifi devices use proprietary drivers and need to be installed manually. Perhaps thats my case. With no Ethernet I guess I won't be on mint tonight I checked back on xp and indeed it's a Broadcom netxreme 57xx. On mint live DVD I inxi -N and get Broadcom BCM4312 driver: b43 PCI bridge.

Unless I can download the firmware on another computer and install through a usb??

[Reorx]

Look in System Setting > Device Drivers... if there is a suggested driver, use it under the DVD Live session to see if it works for you. I assume it will work great and you'll be GTG... click install and enjoy!

The system will run faster from the HD (after installation)...

[polyform]

Look in System Setting > Device Drivers... if there is a suggested driver, use it under the DVD Live session to see if it works for you. I assume it will work great and you'll be GTG... click install and enjoy!

The system will run faster from the HD (after installation)...

I was on the DVD live but no luck manually installing drivers for my broadcom device. I tried some of the steps suggested at this forum: http://linuxforums.org.uk/index.php?topic=5842.0 but nothing. Also found another post here, but nothing: http://forums.linuxmint.com/viewtopic.php?f=49&t=120789

[pcpunk]

polyform, did ya try what Reorx said? You also could still try a upgrade to LMM17 just to see if it will work, and then go down from there, this way you will be getting the best OS you can, you see? It might even have the drivers you need.

[BlackVeils]

this doesnt help your internet issue, but for monitoring CPU usage and temperatures, install psensor.

as for the internet issue, Dell tend to be awkward, sometimes it just needs a simple driver install.

[pcpunk]

this doesnt help your internet issue, but for monitoring CPU usage and temperatures, install psensor.

as for the internet issue, Dell tend to be awkward, sometimes it just needs a simple driver install.

Good advice, I love psensor, mostly because it allows you to set alarms, and the dev has been very helpful along with all the instructions on the net.

Again, Start at the top, IMO LMM17.0 and then go down from there so you will get the best for your pc, test drive - install drivers for internet to test - then install if all works out.

[polyform]

Fixed it! I'm on Mint (on the internet)

this doesnt help your internet issue, but for monitoring CPU usage and temperatures, install psensor.

as for the internet issue, Dell tend to be awkward, sometimes it just needs a simple driver install.

Thanks for the suggestion. I'll install psensor. I feel my laptop is running with less workload than when on XP, feels awesome

this doesnt help your internet issue, but for monitoring CPU usage and temperatures, install psensor.

as for the internet issue, Dell tend to be awkward, sometimes it just needs a simple driver install.

Good advice, I love psensor, mostly because it allows you to set alarms, and the dev has been very helpful along with all the instructions on the net.

Again, Start at the top, IMO LMM17.0 and then go down from there so you will get the best for your pc, test drive - install drivers for internet to test - then install if all works out.

I solved my wifi problem pcpunk I'm going to stick with LM13 for now. My laptop is running so nicely, I'm able to do a lot more simultaneously, no lag, all good. As long as I'm able to download the latest version of the software I need, I'm good.

Solution

For those of you who want to know, the solution that worked for me was soooo much simpler than the links I posted previously on this thread. Follow the instructions on this YouTube video:

http://youtu.be/j9PJYIfEpSw

...and you'll be on the Internet without having to restart. I did it all from the LiveDVD (via USB), so you don't have to install Linux in order to find out if it works. It's a matter of copying the b43 firmware folder provided by the video author, to the /lib/firmware folder. That's it.

You also want to check what wifi device you have by typing this into the terminal:
lspci -nn -d 14e4:

Also, here's a table with information relevant to your wifi device at this link: http://askubuntu.com/questions/55868/in ... ss-drivers

Hopefully this will help others too. Going to format and install LM on the harddrive, no dual boot. Adios Windows. Thanks all for the help by the way.

[Voltron]

Hi, polyform:

Welcome to Linux Mint!!! I wanted to alert you to something I have encountered, myself, while moving older hardware to Linux Mint from Windows XP. I have posts on here, describing the issue, too. My nephew purchased an older notebook computer, using Windows XP. When Microsoft pulled the plug on XP, I hated to see him give up the hardware, as the hardware, itself, was just fine. But, what could he run? Well, that's where Linux Mint came into play.

Originally, I wanted to install Linux Mint, with the Cinnamon desktop. I first attempted to use Linux Mint 13; however, I could never get the Cinnamon desktop to function, accordingly. The desktop kept crashing and I noticed the system fans were exhausting hot air, after being up for a few minutes. About what felt like a year or more, my nephew and I wanted to try to get this notebook computer going, again. So, with Linux Mint 17 out, I tried that, with the Cinnamon desktop, once again. I was thinking that moving from version 13 to 17 would offer many nice improvements and, hopefully, allow the Cinnamon desktop to function, normally. Unfortunately, that was not the case. I experienced the SAME issues: Cinnamon desktop crashing, running in software rendering mode (fallback mode), system exhausting hot air only after a few minutes of being up, etc.

Then, I turned to these forums, asking for help. Fellow Linux Minters came to the rescue. After a few discussions, while I, originally, wanted to stick with the Cinnamon desktop, I decided that having a working machine was much more important. Forum discussions led to something I had been considering: trying another desktop flavor or version. So, I decided to go with Linux Mint 17, using the MATE desktop. It was the CORRECT decision. Using the newer version, I was able to install newer versions of software, including a newer kernel. Plus, the MATE desktop allowed this notebook computer to run, quite nicely, without the desktop or the system, crashing. The fans are not exhausting hot air, anymore; and, my nephew enjoys working with his own system.

So, my experience turned out well; although, it took some time and patience to get there. Fellow Linux Minters, from these forums, helped me out and gave me great suggestions, pointing down good paths. And, I am happy to say that I have learned some nice things, along the way. Plus, I wanted to give back to others, as they encountered issues, questions, etc., using Linux Mint. This is why when I read your post, I wanted to be certain I responded, hopefully, helping you and/or others, in some form.

Good luck with your system and with your use of Linux Mint, polyform.