Which LIGHT Linux distro for the 512MB AA1?

Have you tried MeeGo?

 

Seconded. The low boot time is also nice. I have turned swapping down to a minimum, which is also better for the SD.

Perhaps puppy would be an alternative ? Now also based on ubuntu, but lighter.

 

I tried Mint 8 and 9 lxde, Ubuntu 10.04 and Netbook edition, Crunchbang, Puppy, PClinuxOS lxde, Fedora 12 and 13 and many more. Many worked well, but i had problems with most dropping wireless connection every few minutes, but all above loaded ok and worked. Then I tried Jolicloud. Everything worked straight away, desktop looks stunning, speed is excellent and if you are running more than 1 computer with Jolicloud then when you install it you log into Jolicloud online and you can sync your computers so that all software and apps are the same. You can easily switch between their Netbook desktop or Standard style desktop. Jolicloud runs normal style programs and online apps.
All the programs you mentioned in your post run well in Jolicloud.

 

I am currently using Dreamlinux 4, beta 6. It is light and relatively fast. It idles at around 83mb with compositing, CUPS and bluetooth services disabled. It shows great promise for when it becomes a release candidate or final release.

There is currently an issue with the touchpad. It does not respond to a double tap as mouse click.

 

After some experimentation, I have concluded that Xubuntu works better than the netbook remix on the 8 GB SSd, 512 mb ram Aspire One. Pity it lacks the pretty interface, but such is life.

 

Lubuntu 10.10 is amazing... very fast, the best OS that i tried so far, i thik im gone stick with it :lol:

 

Try Puppy Linux "Quirky 1.3" for a blazing fast boot, and makes your AOA feel like it's on steroids afterwards. Only thing I couldn't get working was the webcam.
Don't use Quirky 1.4.....the wifi never seems to work.

 

I just backed up Linpus, installed lubuntu with a 7GB root and 1GB swap, and that was pretty much that. Firefox just worked, Skype too but it needed the default port changing and the .Skype directory zapping due to a long-standing Linux Skype bug. Wifi, speakers, camera, mike, keyboard shortcuts, suspend, and LH SD all work just fine. I had to add acerhfd to /etc/modules and create a conf file, but other than that, away it all went.

Best thing we ever did to our A110L with 8G SSD and 512MB RAM!

Ian

 

update: switched to peppermint ice
needs cheese to get the webcam up and running, and small tweaks with the card readers, wallpaper and fan speed, but it is now super fast, rock solid stable, and good to look at. Very web-focused......a little like a cross between the new Chrome OS, and LXDE Linux.

 

Try Puppy Linux Lucid 5.2. It's not an either or choice with Linpus since Puppy loads into memory (512 MB is fine) from a USB stick. Just press F12 at the AAO startup screen for the boot options. The slow SSD is not used (google about RAM cache for firefox) so it is very quick. There is a wide selection of current additions (dot pets) for Skype, VLC, etc. The iso download is just 130 MB.

See http://murga-linux.com/puppy/viewtopic.php?t=31298&search_id=858815929&start=75 for a few tweaks.

 

I just downloaded Puppy and it seemed good, I have now partitioned a chunk of my SSD and am dual booting Puppy and the stock Linpus. Puppy boots quicker to a state where it is connected to my wifi (Linpus often fails to connect as it tries to connect before something else it needs has started). I have got most things running on Puppy but expect the webcam wont work and maybe a few other things that I dont want, thats why I kept Linpus. Seems to work well for me. Thanks for the reccommendation.

 

Ive been running Peppermint ICE and really like it. Its fast! I just installed Chrome OS and thats working well for me for just a quick email check and a little browsing on the go. Amazing boot and shut down times.

 

After trying almost everything mentioned in the above posts, I'm back to using Meego. I've tried all the Buntus, JoliOS, Fedora LXDE, even Android.

I couldn't get Wi-Fi to work with Android, the update manger quit working with Fedora 14, and Ubuntu/Kubuntu/Lubuntu/Xubuntu were just too slow to boot (over a minute from when I hit the power switch). Joli OS (formerly JoliCloud) required me to log in to their service, but I didn't want to set up an account or give them access to my Facebook account, so I deleted that OS as soon as I installed it. I've used Puppy and DSL in the past and I like them, but I wanted something more modern for the netbook.

Meego is the fastest-booting of everything I've tried. It seems to boot up at least as fast as the original Linpus and it works great on the 110L. I did make a couple of tweaks to fstab related to the SSD, but honestly I don't think they're necessary. Meego uses the new BTRFS filesystem, which is supposed to be able to auto-detect SSDs, according to something I read somewhere. The only thing that didn't work with Meego was my SDHC card that was formatted in XFS wasn't recognized. I swapped it out with a regular SDHC card (don't know it it's FAT32 or NTFS) and that works fine in either the left or right slot.

The only thing I don't like about Meego is the cartoonish theme, but I'm starting to get used to it. Plus, they're supposed to come out with a new version this spring.

 

Interesting choice. I've got an android iso and a meego image sitting on my desktop PC, waiting to try on my A150. Will have to check them out.

 

I gave Lubuntu ("Light Ubuntu") a spin a couple of weeks ago (if only the "live" version).

VERY IMPRESSIVE and FAST, FAST, FAST.

They are going to be recognized as an official offshoot of Ubuntu starting with the 11.10 release.

Default browser is Chromium.

Check it out!

www.lubuntu.net

 

Peppermint ice >>> http://peppermintos.com/2010/07/pepperm ... he-clouds/

Very fast and complete!

 

does any one know where i can get chrome os from and will it work on my acer aspire 5536 ?
thank you.