<p><strong>TEST BENCH for Netbook OSes. Highly Recommended: LEEENUX 3.0</strong></p> <p>HERE ARE SOME OF THE LINUX OSes THAT WERE EVALUATED FOR NETBOOKS: </p> <p><strong>Puppy and BrowserLinux</strong> Puppy is only mentioned here because of it's popularity and notoriety of being small and fast. But don't let that fool you: it is not designed for netbooks, but rather for old hardware. Features like WiFi, power management, screen brightness are all afterthoughts, retrofitted into it. It doesn't manage WiFi well, requiring "profiles" you create and manage for different hotspots, and enhanced hardware management features may or may not work with your computer or may be absent. Also, having several apps to manageone thing (such as wifi) becomes confusing - in which case do you pick one, and in which case is one a precursor to another? Browser Linux is a scaled/slimmed down version of Puppy, with less apps and features, but still more ideal for old machines than for netbooks. </p> <p><strong>Puppeee</strong> This is a new, promising, distro in the making, by a Puppy enthusiast, "Jemima". Adapting Puppy for the eeePC and all other popular netbooks and laptops, improving the menu items groupings, and slimming things down to things that work. It is still perfectible, but coming along at a nice clip. Where other netbook OSes have a whole team for development and theirOS drags along the same bugs for weeks, Puppeee's developer, Jemima, responds to bugs and requests fast. In all, a very nice project. If you like to tinker, and be involved with this community, ahd have the ultimate lean and mean OS on your netbook, give it a try. </p> <p><strong>AntiX 8.x</strong> Antix (from antics/LinuX, and not anti-"X") is a slim fast OS that runs well on netbooks, but we wonder if it may not be more of a design for old hardware than for newer netbooks. You may be disappointed at it's lack of support with the default WiFi app for WPA encryption. No encryption is the default for most hotspots, but not in your home, where WPA is safer than WEP. It looks, plain, runs very well, but you should try it on your old PC with wired ethernet-to-dslmodem. </p> <p><strong>Knoppix</strong> Knoppix is nowhere near the compactness you would expect from a linux for netbooks. BUT it is extremely fast for a standard distro with full apps, and one of the only stable LXDE based OSes out there. Although Knoppix doesn't look exciting, it performs faster than many "netbook" linuxes, and configures everything automatically for you, just like Linux Mint ubuntu does. If you don't use it on your netbook, consider it, and Mint-ubuntu, as your desktop OS of choice. Use it if: your netbook has more hardware resources (1+gh processor, the typical 160gb HDD), and you prefer a conventional interface to the ones designed for small screens. It runs rather well on most types of hardware, whether old and slow or new and fast with modern features - but it's not a space saver for mini disks (SSD or solid state drives). </p> <p><strong>EasyPeasy (Ubuntu Netbook remix)</strong> Renaming of ubuntu netbook remix, now called easypeasy, this latest version has an extremely annoying stall-and-jump pointer bug in it. If it weren't for that, this is a reasonable speed, wonderfully designed OS. Try it on your netbook to see if it has the same problem on yours. If not, you'll love it. (eeePC owners, look at Leeenux 3.0)</p> <p><strong>Jolicloud</strong> Just like ubuntu netbook remix / easypeasy, but with added shortcuts/quick launchers for (disguised, minimalistic Firefox) cloud apps links. This doesn't have that annoying jumping/stalling mouse pointer bug of easypeasy. In theory, running apps from the "cloud" should save you space, and some would reason, less bulk, more speed. NOT! A surprising quantity of cloud apps are available for activation in jolicloud, but not all are on reliable servers- you don't know if your data is safe, confidential, nor if the server will be functioning tomorrow, or if it will deliver your application at a satisfactory speed during waking hours. I liked this OS, but installing a few cloud apps brought my system to it's knees! And I reluctantly turned elsewhere ("reluctantly", because the idea is so good and appealing that you just want to believe in it). The only cloud apps I use now are Google Docs, Live mail and Gmail. And those can be used on any computer. </p> <p><em>Leeenux 2.0</em> Discontinued and replaced with a completely remastered 3.0. This was a slimmed down EasyPeasy, had the same bugs, and has nothing to do with the new 3.0</p> <p><strong>Leeenux 3.0</strong> With an interface much like EasyPeasy/ubuntu-netbook-remix/Jolicloud. Currently, this wins hands down, as the best netbook OS at this time, as compared to all that were tested here. On a eeePC with only 512MB RAM, a 8GB SSD, and a leisurely 800mh celeron processor, this OS is fast, full featured, and stable. You can't really ask for more. Perhaps a future Leeenux will be faster, but for the moment, working out of the box, managing all your features out of the box, including WiFi, hotkeys (screen brightness, etc), it does the job, and does it astoundingly well. Version 4.0 is already being worked on and promises to reduce it's dependency on Ubuntu, moving closer to Debian sources. (for noobs like me: Mint and Leeenux are perfected/enhanced versions of Ubuntu with is a perfected/expanded version of Debian which may very well be the most highly regarded Linux system). </p> <p><strong>Lubuntu</strong> Keep an eye out for this one. It is a slimmed down Ubuntu with an LXDE front end, and some "light" OSes are expected to be based on it - aiming ot slim it down and customize it for different hadware platforms. But for the moment, it suffers the same problems as most other ubuntus with lxde: not reliable. Hopefully, LXDE and Ubuntu development will allow a future version (ubuntu 10.xx) to work better. Also when this comes out, check out the Mint Lubuntu which will soon be released thereafter. </p>