Low-End Laptop Likes L... ... Kubuntu ?!?!

[bmarsh at bmarsh.com]

> On Oct 24, 2016, at 1:10 PM, Tommy Trussell <tommy.trussell at gmail.com> wrote:
> 
> TL;DR
> 
> For various reasons I've kept Ubuntu blinders on and I haven't run KDE much in several years. I was surprised at how well Kubuntu 16.10 "Yakkety-Yak" runs on a low-end laptop I own. 
> 
> Is Kubuntu considered a great choice for low-end laptops nowadays?
If Kubuntu ever appears to run out of steam on your laptop, give XFCE a try.  

Works well for me - - I don't need all the glitz of KDE...



> 
> What bugaboos should I be watching for in KDE on a low-spec laptop?
> 
> BACKGROUND INFORMATION:
> 
> I have an Acer Aspire One D260 netbook purchased at Wal-Mart a few years back. (I saw a recent posting on the Kubuntu list regarding a similar laptop, so I know there's at least one other out there.) We originally bought this one because it's very small and spouse and I thought it would be good for travel. Sadly its 2-core Atom N260 1.66Ghz processor and its maxxed-out 2Gb RAM are huge limitations. (That and its disappointingly low-spec battery, and smaller-than-most screen, but we'll ignore those for now.) I've never used Windows on it, though I left it installed for warranty reasons. I haven't run anything on it but Ubuntu flavors in years.
> 
> Because I wasn't the primary user of the netbook, I merely kept it updated on versions of "straight" Ubuntu, following the upgrades through the development of Unity etc. I also have been installing the Mate and LXDE environments as alternatives for testing, and I sometimes switch among those. 
> 
> In years past my experience was that LXDE has sometimes been more usable for low-end systems. I also assumed MATE might presumably look like the older Ubuntu releases spouse has been used to. Unfortunately (in my opinion) Lubuntu has some quirks that make it a bit harder to support, and neither it nor MATE have seemed as "polished" OR as RAM efficient as I hoped for.
> 
> SO I am again looking at KDE...!
> 
> WHAT I DID TODAY
> 
> I keep LTS releases on most of my systems, but I try them all on the netbook. I saw the Yakkety releases had come out, so I downloaded ISOs of Ubuntu, Lubuntu, and Kubuntu. (I haven't yet downloaded any other Ubuntu "spins," nor have I tried Mint lately.)
> 
> This morning, I tried all three (booting from a USB stick). The clear winner (based on my limited testing) was Kubuntu! Wow! I was surprised... 
> 
> This is based on a short (15 minute) test of each environment...
> 
> My test procedure: 
> 1) burn iso to USB stick (using my primary Ubuntu LTS system)
> 2) boot netbook from stick 
> 3) click "Try _buntu" button (doesn't exist in Lubuntu)
> 4) connect to network
> 5) open system monitor
> 6) open Firefox
> 7) connect to a couple of resource-intensive web sites
> 8) watch processor and RAM figures as I connect (yes the CPU stays maxxed out)
> 9) open a LibreOffice writer document and type a few words
> 10) watch RAM figures as I close everything (to see how much RAM gets released)
> ...
> 11) pick another ISO and start over at step 1
> 
> WHAT DID I MISS?
> 
> It occurs to me that maybe I am missing something -- 
> 
> For instance, I am watching the RAM figures in the system monitor because that seems to be the big bugaboo on this system -- in "straight" Ubuntu, by the time you open LibreOffice and a few web sites, the RAM usage is higher, and once it gets maxxed-out, presumably things start going to swap. Ubuntu does noticeably poorly with low RAM -- presumably Unity uses a lot of RAM compared to other environments. 
> 
> HOWEVER it occurs to me that maybe the KDE System monitor MIGHT be measuring RAM differently from the other system monitors. For instance, does the RAM total include system RAM? I presume it does, because it doesn't drop to zero, but it surprised me that it starts out noticeably lower, its maximum is lower, and it releases pretty much everything when I close documents. 
> 
> Also it's likely Ubuntu starts up more stuff as you login, and maybe KDE will start some things later. Do I need to turn something off as I use it more?
> 
> I just found a Reddit thread saying KDE works great on low-spec systems as long as you avoid akonadi. Maybe that's outdated info, but I'll watch for it.
> 
> In the past we have seen a few weird random crashes on the netbook when spouse is working hard on something, which may be due to hardware issues when everything has been churning away for minutes at a time. SO ultimately it may be time to retire the old laptop... but I hate to give up too soon.
> 
> NEXT STEP
> 
> I haven't installed it yet.... I'll be doing a "clean" install (overwriting the OS but preserving/restoring the user accounts, which takes awhile). I have never done this with Kubuntu but I presume the procedure is the same as regular Ubuntu.
> 
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