R32 And best LinuxDistro

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txnative3
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Joined: Tue Nov 26, 2013 3:50 pm
Location: St.Petersburg,Fl.

R32 And best LinuxDistro

#1 Post by txnative3 » Wed Mar 12, 2014 10:16 am

I just came across a IBM R32 Thinkpad it has 1.6 cpu ,Intel graphics ,512 of ram & 30gb Toshiba ide hdd....needs wifi card & power adaptor ....it boots into bios with no problem & the current bios on it is 1.2 & can be updated to1.6 & currently no operating system.Now If I update the bios & max the ram to 1gb ..the wifi card is like the intel 2200 that was in my t43 that i just sold ....or use a wifi card that you put into side port .......what would be the best operating system to put on this & have read that it will boot from a usb stick & also that it will not.Picked it up at a descent price & the laptop overall condition including the screen ,key board & shell is a easy 95% out of 100.......just want to know if it's worth the few things mentioned or go ahead & flip it .....Just really surf the web & watch a movie here & there.....was suprised with parts & priceson ebay for some that were working ....someone had ubuntu on ebay for sale.


Thanks Chess :roll:

kony
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Location: Poland

Re: R32 And best LinuxDistro

#2 Post by kony » Wed Mar 12, 2014 11:21 am

Check out whether the specific GPU works fine on linux, though I imagine it's new enough to do so, same with the wi-fi card. Other than that there should be no issues. If you are new to linux I recomment Linux Mint. Get it with a lightweight Graphic Environment (I recommend Xfce, but there's also Mate if you don't like my choice).
My T430 with GTX 560 Ti (Now with GTX 670)
T430: i5-3320m, 8 GB, SSD + HDD, 1600x900.

Tasurinchi
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Re: R32 And best LinuxDistro

#3 Post by Tasurinchi » Wed Mar 12, 2014 3:30 pm

R32's have ATI graphic cards, which is tricky to install in Linux since AMD was so nice and stopped supporting drivers for old GPU's :|

The VESA standard drivers will work fine, but won't be enough for watching videos or with flash with strong flash content. There are packages to install ATI drivers, but I never managed to get it done, (maybe I'm too dumb for that). As the previous poster said give a try with an easy going distro like Linux Mint or Ubuntu.

My 2 cents...
IBM Convertible 5140/L40SX/220/240/240X/2*340CSE/360PE/365XD/380D/380E/380XD/380Z/390/560E/560X/2*570/2*600/600E/750Cs/755C/760CD/760EL/760XD/770E
A20p/A22p/A31/i1600/G40/R50p/R61i/S30/SL510/2*T22/4*T4x/11*T6x/6*T40x/6*T5x0/3*W5x0/W700/3*X2x/4*X3x/3*X4x/5*X6x/3*X6xT/12*X2xx/4*X30x/Z60m/3*Z61x

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